I remember way back when, Jairo "T." was a band called Sepultura. He had some sort of disagreement as to the direction of the music, and was reported to have left to form a band "more along the lines of Motley Crue"... Well, if indeed that was the case, he sure as hell ditched that idea along the way, for The Mist resides in that realm of punchy, powerful metal, Brazilian style. On the surface, things are pretty straigtforward, and Gottverlassen could be another album which is spun a couple of times and then hits the recycle pile. Depth does exist however, most notably in the guitar work, which adds dimension to the songs, and lifts them from the standard "chug-chug" foundry where most bands feel content to reside. The production is good, don't know why the word "punchy" keeps coming to mind, but it is, with the lower elements (bass guitar and bass drums) given the proper accentuation, keeping things from getting to muddy, while retaining those low frequencies. The vocal work of Marcello Diaz is pretty interesting, being more of a deathly origin, yet every word is discernible, two great tastes that taste great together. Things do start to drag a bit towards the end, but with a running time of almost an hour, that tends to happen. Summing up, a strong guitar album that should appeal to fans of mid-paced powerful death metal, yet with a commercial enough edge to bridge that "gap" that's there.
A couple of historical notes, this is actually the band's fourth album, and was originally released in 1996, reissued in 1999 by Pavement Records (when I got it). Since then, Marcello Diaz has gone on to join Soulfly, and Jairo is now in Overdose. 6 1/2 out of 10