KOLOSS

"Koloss" is the 7th full-length studio by Swedish technical/experimental extreme metal act Meshuggah. The album was released through Nuclear Blast Records in March 2012. Meshuggah have become such a prolific and influential act in the last 20 years, that expectations to their studio output are always extremely high. By now there are literally hundreds (maybe thousands) of imitaters and acts influenced by their unique and distinct sounding odd metered extreme metal. It must be an almost unbearable pressure on the band when they begin writing new material, but you don't become the leader of the pack for nothing now do you?

On "Koloss" it's apparent from the get go, that Meshuggah have lost none of their heavy edge, their caustic aggression, the alien sci-fi atmosphere, or their dominant use of odd time signatures. The "core" features of their music style are intact. When that is said "Koloss" further develops on the more accessible direction of the material on "obZen (2008)", and it's perhaps the band's most accessible release since "Destroy Erase Improve (1995)" (which was also what I said about "obZen (2008)" when it was released). The less raw and sligthly more organic sound production probably has a lot to do with it, but to my ears Meshuggah have also begun to focus a lot more on memorability and "hooks" than earlier and that often leads to a more accessible sound. At this point I think it's the right path to take for the band. They've explored the extreme limits of their music style, pushed boundaries like few, and have now found a balance between extremity and accessibility that appears to suit them well. "Koloss" was, unlike most of it's imidiate predecessors, mostly written as a group effort and I think that approach has given the album a more groove based and imidiate sound than what we've been used to from the band.

"Koloss" is still a damn heavy and aggressive album though, so there are no loss of integrity (to those who care about such things) and still very few signs of mainstream appeal in the band's sound. The playing is outstanding as ever and you'll probably find yourself hynotized by the groove, the razor sharp riffing and the heavy beats that these guys deliver like no one else. So have they burned out on ideas or begun to repeat themselves? Hell no!!! "Koloss" is another high quality and distinct sounding album by Meshuggah, showcasing that they are fully capable of sounding unmistakably like themselves while at the same time incorporating enough twists to their sound, to make each album they release stand out as an individual entity in their discography. A 5 star (100%) rating is deserved.