Black Midi burst onto the scene in 2019 with their debut album, Schlagenheim. The grotesquely overdetailed cover art, with its seemingly random green rectangle in the corner, sets the tone of the album before you even begin to listen. The mood of the album can best be summarized in one word: “What?” Schlagenheim pulls only the most visceral and hellishly strange elements of many genres–math rock, jazz, and pure noise rock. Without many true themes serving as through lines in the album, listeners are left to scratch their heads.

However, confusion is a necessary element of this album. Many songs off this project feature lyrics that repeat over and over and over ad nauseum. However, the incredibly theatrical, over the top voice of Geordie Greep keeps things moving in a situation where most other projects would stagnate. Take, for example, “bmbmbm,” which acts as almost a theme song for the band. Greep’s vocal delivery borders on cartoonish from the word go, and only devolves into hysteria as the song continues, the singer noting that “she moves with a purpose” and not much else. While “bmbmbm” is far from my favorite song on the album, it serves as a prime example of the group’s ability to take a simple concept and take it to the extreme, a theme that will grow even more prevalent in the band’s later releases. The conclusions any of the songs on Schlagenheim come to can hardly be considered logical, as the initial lyrics are distorted and repeated, as the harsh instrumentals deliver punch after punch.

The opening track, “953,” is a mostly instrumental noisy groove that truly sets the tone for the album to come. The high feedback creates screeching in the background, the lead guitars are passed through so many filters they begin to sound like they’re being heard over the receiver of a 1990s wall phone, and the math rock-ish switches in tempo leave no room to relax for the listener.

While Greep steals the spotlight for most songs on the album, the next track “Speedway” is performed by the other singer of the group, Cameron Picton. Picton’s vocals are far less performative than Greep’s, but he excels at the extremes of singing in a chilled, emotional maner, or full on screams. Speedway provides the former, as this track starts slower, providing a reprieve after the insanity of “953.” I think this is also a tone setter for the album, serving as a metaphor for how the group refuses to conform to the regular sounds you’ve heard before. Picton repeats “we won’t build to this code” in a defiant statement to the rest of the industry. All this pride is warranted, as the rest of the album shows Schlagenheim truly is unique.

The sound at the core of Schlagenheim for the most part did not continue into Black Midi’s future releases. Even the album art of the other two albums looks similar enough to set Schlagenheim apart from everything else. Schlagenheim was quite a strange debut album for the band, all things considered, but one that garnered them a cult following from the get go.

Black Midi fans only had to wait until 2021 for the next album, Cavalcade, which offers a very different sound from Schlagenheim, bringing a far less abrasive energy. This project opts instead for a more theatrical, jazzy blend. The main strength of Cavalcade is its instrumentals. It offers distressed pianos, muted frantic bass, and occasional string sections. The project is chock-full of riffs and moments that sound like they were produced by a more manic, over-the-top Frank Zappa, if that’s even possible. All of these elements come together to create a more melodic, less harsh album.

A prime example of the more theatrical sound on this album comes with the song “Marlene Dietrich.” This song, and most on the album, shift to a formula that would carry forward into all future works. The song follows far more of a story than anything on Schlagenheim. It begins by describing a woman, a public figure on a stage of sorts, who is widely adored. As the song progresses, though, it begins to describe the audience crying out to be damned, feeling somehow inferior to the titular woman. It then goes on to mention a Mackie Messer, which is essentially the original German version of the song “Mack the Knife,” which has a completely separate, complex history that is far beyond the scope of this article, but all of these elements come together to become an example of distorting a basic idea to the extremes.

Whereas Schlagenheim achieved this theme by repeating many of the same lyrics with increasingly manic vocals, Cavalcade and future projects begin with a simple story element before turning the narrative corrupt, bleak, confusing or visceral. The mention of a Mackie Messer also exemplifies Greep’s tendencies to throw in seemingly random references from culture that, if the listener so chooses, can dive into on their own time.

However, make no mistake- Cavalcade still offers up multiple punchy, chaotic confusing tracks harkening back to the band’s 2019 release. Tracks like “Hogwash and Balderdash,” “Slow,” and “Dethroned” all feature prominent moments that, if pulled out and put into Schlagenheim, would not sound out of place in the slightest. “Hogwash and Balderdash” specifically serves as a sort of break from the rest of the album’s sound. The entire song is strange and abrasive, with little to no discernible story in the lyrics. This is more than enough to keep any diehard Schlagenheim fans satiated if they do not resonate as much with the groovy, melodic sounds.

The band’s third and final album, Hellfire, is Cavalcade perfected to a science. The vast broad instrumentation makes a triumphant return, as do the more narrative lyrics. This is the first album by the group to feature a true thematic throughline.

The title track, “Hellfire,” starts the album with a heavier punch than most of the songs on the album. There is not a moment in this brief opener that can’t be described as brash, as Greep almost raps about things being broken down, disease, and all the ideas that make us uncomfortable.

Then, the song “Sugar/Tzu” begins with a boxing ring announcement, setting the scene of a heavyweight bout. The story of the song follows Chinese war general Sun Tzu and a fictional character named Sun Sugar, which is actually the name of a tomato variety (again, with the random cultural references) as they have a boxing match. The narrator watches on before later shooting Sun Tzu from the stands, giving the win to Sun Sugar as the crowd roars. The initial idea is strange but simple- watching a boxing match. But the song slowly devolves into chaos. Yet again, we see the theme of taking simple ideas to insane places. Hellfire features that time-honored Black Midi tradition at its very best, as nearly every single song in the album follows that formula.

The narrative throughline in this album, something no other Black Midi project before it truly had, is that of hell-bound individuals. Some are the narrators, some are not. Some are immoral and bound for literal hell, while some are trapped in a personal worldly hell. We meet a soldier who is tempted into war by promises of debauchery in a foreign land before being forced to kill and face the horrors in “Welcome to Hell.” We meet a man who loses his sanity after becoming addicted to gambling on horse races in “The Race is About to Begin.” We meet a humble farmhand who is given money by a mobster to kill one of his enemies, seems to get away with it and breathes a sigh of relief, before having to face down his horrible actions in “Dangerous Liasons.”

There is not a weak track on this project. Sitting at only just over 38 minutes, Hellfire is not a long album by any stretch of the imagination. This short length helps it pack a massive punch, though, as we travel through this powerful series of vignettes. Greep’s booming voice and storytelling elevate the tracks he features on, and Picton has a chance to show his screaming chops for the first time since Schlagenheim on “Eat Men Eat.”

Soaring strings, beautiful brass, and punch percussion from Morgan Simpson underscore the incredible vocal performances. “The Defence” in particular features a sweeping orchestral backing track with mixing any producer would salivate over. Hellfire truly is Black Midi’s sentinel work, and in my opinion, nearly perfect. This acts as a beautiful sendoff for the group, but makes it all the more painful looking back knowing Black Midi has now broken up.

Shortly after formally announcing the band’s indefinite hiatus in August, Geordie Greep released his first solo album, The New Sound. This solo project has been met with much praise from critics since it released in October, and seems to carry over much of what made Black Midi so special. Greep’s storytelling is as stellar as ever, and his voice remains unmatched.

However, the album’s title does not lie–this sound is new. Perhaps it’s unfair to label this as Greep’s “solo album,” as it was recorded with over 30 session musicians, one of whom is Black Midi percussionist Morgan Simpson. Parts of the album were recorded in Brazil, which is very evident through the bossa nova influences which were not truly present in Black Midi’s albums. The chaos of Schlagenheim has almost completely faded by this point, with a very melodic sound. Black Midi, this is not.

Cameron Picton has moved on as well, starting his own group, Camera Picture. So far, he has yet to release any albums under this name and has instead opted to slowly release songs on his Bandcamp under the new moniker. There is not much yet to say about Camera Picture, but if Picton’s wide range and somber writing is to carry over, any fans of his work during his time in Black Midi are sure to like what he has in store.

Black Midi has been lauded by critics as progressive, fun, and intense, and the group will be sorely missed by its sizable, dedicated fans. As of now, I believe we are not far enough removed from the breakup of the band to truly analyze the influence they will have on musicians going forward, but without a doubt their work has led to a revival of math rock elements. Black Midi’s legacy is one of innovation, experimentation, and intricate writing. Despite their relatively short discography, the work of Greep, Picton, and Simpson will surely leave analysts with much to talk about for decades to come.