Mortal Prophets “Stomp The Devil”
Mortal Prophets, the latest project by John Beckmann channels the raw, authentic early blues and the masters during the pre-war era. “Stomp the Devil” has a darkly haunting quality that seems to echo the buried stories and awaken ghosts from the American history. Every stomp on the ground carries out a lightning strike that point and scream at the devils and ghosts from the underground. On the other hand, “Stomp the Devil” has a deeper connection to the past and the root that it lingers and continues to haunt our waking hours.
One thing that instantly stands out is the depth John Beckmann on the subject of blues. It seems to go into the era of Robert Johnson, Lead Belly, Blind Willie Johnson and even beyond that to the early days of field hollers and prison songs. There’s a lot that has been lost in the long history of blues and rock n roll is being brought to light here, through the dark and wicked electric guitar licks and the powerful group singing that echos the “stomp.”
It’s even more interesting to hear German and French electronica influences and the 20s’ filmic atmospheres being smashed into this collectively deep sonic sphere of “Stomp the Devil.” The song gives out the type of black n white silence film vibe without it being mute. It’s a sensational, unique experience that feels multi-dimensional — it doesn’t sound like old music, it’s very much in the modern era, however, everything that happened in the earlier time, across the globe is somehow brewing in the air.
More interestingly, both Mortal Prophets’ current releases, “Stomp the Devil” and “Nobody Knows” seems to tap into a very specific mythology that hovers above Robert Johnson and Rock n Roll, given that Johnson hugely inspired the genre. In his music, the devil, the crossroad, and the hell hound seemed to be a coherent theme, which then continued to be a tradition in many iconic rock musicians’ catalogues. Mortal Prophets addressed that, in a very interesting way.
“Stomp the devil” evokes a special unifying and soul shaking experience that is somehow wrapped between chaos, suffering, mystery and lightning.
Mortal Prophets is set to release their debut album Stomp the Devil on July 8.
