Local Spotlight | ‘Seclusion of Sanity’ by Mindfield

The chimera was born for modern metal. The hybrid monstrosity of Greek mythology, an aberration fire-breather with a serpent’s tail, goat’s body, and a roaring lion’s head, is the ideal emblem of a music that is a fusion of roiling thrash, glacial doom, guttural defiance, and resolute nihilism. The debut from Jacksonville’s Mindfield is an impressive and informed evolution of crossover: its own inevitable chimera of 1980s hardcore and metal, that blending of the slam pits of former rival camps.

From the high-hat counting in opener “Extinction,” to the guitar cable fry-out of closer “Violent Nature,” the five-piece serve up an expert and uncompromising nine-song discourse in Sunshine State aggression. ADHD sufferers can cue up the 90 seconds of “Terminal Atonement”: a swirl of propulsive thrash-gallop, cascading guitar wails, and vocal trade-offs that go from gnarly to decidedly worse.

While it’s a possibility that the architects of Florida’s 1980s crossover/death/thrash renaissance could be parents of Mindfield, it’s hard to imagine that these agitated dudes are seeking to recruit fans from the geezer slosh pit with Seclusion of Sanity. Too late: this oldster is all in. Hold my cane, sonny.