COLORED SANDS

The mighty tech death metal band GORGUTS makes a comeback after 12 longs years with their 5th album COLORED SANDS. They score a perfect hit with me by combining all the best attributes of the four albums of their first incarnation. Luc Lemay has a whole new crew of veteran musicians on duty and they nail perfectly the marriage of the accessible death metal started on their first two releases, the avant-garde technicality of "Obscura" and the atmospheric additions which debuted on "From Wisdom To Hate." The result is a finely tuned album that is perfectly executed and stunningly brilliant. This is also a concept album about Tibet and the brutal rule of the Chinese making the subject matter most atypical for a brutal metal album as well.

After "From Wisdom..." the drummer Steve MacDonald killed himself and Lemay decided to call it quits with this band. After a brief stint with the band Negativa and releasing a sole EP, Lemay was talked into reviving the influential band in 2009 to celebrate the 20th anniversary of its formation. Feeling like the fit with Negativa just wasn't working out, he decided to give it a go and what a wonderful decision it was. This album just flows so nicely from beginning to end incorporating not only their technical command of their compositions but also finding the right atmospheres to add at the right times. A major surprise was the middle track which serves as a kind of intermission to separate the first four tracks from the last four. "The Battle Of Chamdo" is an orchestrated classical string piece that reminds me a bit of the theme music from the 1987 motion picture "The Untouchables." It clearly demonstrates Lemay's musical compositional skills without being obscured by the brutal and avant-garde technical metal.

This was love at first listen and I am in agreement with many others that this is a major achievement for Lemay and GORGUTS. Their absolute best and most varied album to date. Once again GORGUTS prove you can make both complex and interesting music without compromising your integrity but also validate that a band of 20 plus years doesn't have to fall into a pool of stagnation. Lemay is a brilliant orchestrator of both music and band members and I hope we don't have to wait 12 years for another album.