I have always championed those acts that have stayed within the spheres of traditional death metal but still had the skill to encompass a variety of styles to give the listener that little bit more. Since the primal savagery of early albums, God Dethroned are just one band and here they spread their metallic wings into concept realms by tackling one of the catastrophic campaigns of World War One near the city of Passendale. The Great War is fertile ground for war mongering death metal bands and here God Dethroned throw everything into the proverbial pot and have come up with a release that is loaded with aggression and crammed with atmosphere.
‘The Cross Of Sacrifice’ starts the album ominously with background gunfire and a narrated female voice before the furious blast is unleashed with a great riff and fiery violence on ‘Under A Darkening Sky’. The dynamics of this album lay in the way the songs adjust tempo and pace without resorting to technical wankery for the sake of it. At times I was reminded of Necrophobic due to the atmosphere of the songs and the use of melody and harmony in the guitar work.
‘No Mans Land’ begins with an 80s style thrash riff, not too far from Slayers debut in all honesty, and is super fast and extremely vicious. The furious pace shows no abating as ‘Poison Fog’ (a reference to mustard gas warfare) starts up, but here a huge change in atmospherics is added that had my metal grey matter conjuring up references to early Amorphis for some reason. The clean voice works extremely well, emotive and powerful the song is propelled forward epically and heroically.
There is a very dark and eerie feel to many of the songs such as ‘Drowning In Mud’ or the ball crushing crunch of the title track where the speed is reined in and a chunkier mid paced stance is adopted. ‘No Survivors’ is as violent as they come until the sudden drop in pace and the clean vocal line is incorporated to catch you totally unaware that you wonder if it happened at all.
The album flows so smoothly it traps you into its ferocious hostility and captivating melodies with consummate ease as the brilliant ‘Fallen Empires’ has yet more potent guitar work and battering double bass kick that will beat the very last breath out of your pitiful carcass. The album ends with a lovely harmonised instrumental, ‘Artifacts Of The Great War’ that is gorgeously sad and intensely passionate. Yet another fantastic death metal album to add to the already great growing pile I am accumulating this year.
http://www.goddethroned.com
http://www.myspace.com/villavampiria
