Vicky
Alright, so I am quite late with a few albums, but I have a good excuse: for the past month I have been practicing and polishing my Latin skills with the poetry of the great Ovid. As a result, yours truly returned from a contest dedicated to Ovid’s literature with a special award and appreciation for great deciphering of his poetries. I’m saying all these not to brag, but to give you some clarity regarding my absence amongst the family reunions held at the Metal Eclipse Reviews webzine (in clear translation, I am saying these for you to understand why you haven’t read anything written by me in quite some time). Anyway, since I also missed our two-year anniversary, I have returned holding a bouquet of roses and am here to shout out: Happy Birthday, MER! May you grow more and more powerful!
After this long thread of emotions, let’s dig into The Medea Project’s Akkadian Artefacts. It’s a decent album, but nonetheless, until Akkadia falls, one must suffer… And greatly, for that matter. In other words, at first listen I didn’t like it, but then suddenly there appeared a beam of light shining through my Windows (pun intended) – the song “Redacted”. Also known as the track closing Akkadian Artefacts for once and for all. What makes it so good? Well, for starters, it’s completely different from anything that you might hear on the other four songs off the album. Then, it helps that it features a more experimental, prog, almost tribal sound. Kind of like Dissocia’s “Zenosyne”, but a lot calmer and sounding like it came from the Vikings’ camp.
When it comes to the other songs making Akkadian Artefacts, things take a turn for the slight worse. While the prelude, “Babylon (The Fall of Akkadia)” is also more tribal, it’s simultaneously a great deal raspy and somewhat majestic. Think of Joy Division meeting Wardruna, Depeche Mode, and, towards the end, Jean-Michel Jarre. It is interesting, to say the least, however I personally could not listen to this every single day.
The other tracks feature more synth madness combined with Death or melodic Metal. Either way, it’s not necessarily my style and I don’t even know how one might make these two entirely different styles blend, but I guess that is for The Medea Project to know and for us not to question. The pinnacle of this quirkiness lies probably somewhere in the track “Cave Dweller”, a song so profound and baffling that it made me genuinely wonder whether I still have any mental sanity left or if it all just went away with every flwoop-tkt or whatever sound that is.
Certainly, while there are both good and not so great parts regarding Akkadian Artefacts, I must admit that if you like Depeche Mode and Katatonia, you will either enjoy the living crap out of this or, like me, you will find it delightfully peculiar. Kudos to The Medea Project for taking two styles that are virtually incompatible and transforming them into something that sounds better than a ceiling fan. Esoteric Dark Ambient/Doom/Electronica is literally a thing, it would seem!
Label: BDB Studios
Release date: April 20, 2026
Website: https://themedeaproject.bandcamp.com/
Country: South Africa/U.K.
Score: 3.3/5.0 (could be worse!!)
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