Every now and again an album will land in your lap that will make you feel animated, an album that will demonstrate exuberance, energy and excitement. Recently I had the pleasure of sharing that experience with Brighton metallers Echovirus and now it's the turn of London based newcomers Cypher 16 to display their worth with this six track mini album 'The Man Of The Black Abyss.'

Formed four years ago at the tender age of 16, these four young guys have spent the last four years honing they craft to great effect, fusing various styles into their music, helping to create a mini album of diverse offerings.

And you have to give Cypher 16 the utmost kudos as without any record company backing, the band have already successfully completed a US club tour, funded purely by merchandise sales, which resulted in the band playing a slot on the prestigious Locofest festival at West Beach Florida alongside Mudvayne and HED.p.e back in March 2009.

This mini album takes that DIY ethic to the next level and kicks off with the lead single from the album 'Symphony To End It All (III)' (that also comes with an accompanying video, shot at Gloucester Cathedral...which incidentally is the same set used for Harry Potter for all you film buffs out there). This track displays the vocal talents of Jack Doolan as he switches from a strong lead vocal style to a death metal growl with ease and confidence.

'Reaper' displays an energy that only a band of passionate young metallers could possess; this track reeks of early Metallica from a time when they still shared the same passion for their craft as Cypher 16, and before the almighty dollar and personal life coaches took over. 'Stains Of Time' is an instrumental number, displaying the band's incredible musical prowess whilst carefully managing to remain the right side of self-indulgent.

Whenever I hear the words electronic and metal in the same sentence, I start to fill with dread...okay; sometimes bands get it right such as German industrial metal gods Rammstein. So with that in mind I have to confess to being mightily impressed with 'Superdancer', a metal number incorporating a dance element to it, that with the aid of various samples and death metal vocals gives an industrial feel to the proceedings, thankfully this is far more akin to the mighty industrial legends Ministry than the disco/pop rock of current media darlings Enter Shikari and for that I'm truly grateful.

Closing with the awesome '...And The Force (Threw Him Across The Room)' displaying some pretty impressive fret work, along with prodigious vocals that I would liken to the almighty Slipknot and in today's metal climate compliments don't come any greater than that.

This any extremely impressive debut mini album, and following on from their self released EP 'Symphony To End It All', this release proves that Cypher 16 have a very bright future ahead of them indeed.

http://www.myspace.com/cypher16