L'ENFANT SAUVAGE

"L'Enfant Sauvage" is the 5th full-length studio album by French metal act Gojira. The album was released through Roadrunner Records in June 2012. Gojira have experienced a constantly rising popularity curve since the release of "From Mars to Sirius (2005)". "The Way of All Flesh (2008)" only cemented their position as one of the leading hybrid death/thrash metal acts and they've toured extensively in the wake of that album, which has further helped gain them popularity and a reputation as one of the tightest playing live acts out there.

...while some artist opt to release a new album each year or maybe every second year, Gojira are not as productive, but listening to "L'Enfant Sauvage" it's pretty obvious why that is. These guys are perfectionists. Not only have they honed they technical skills but they have also spend valuable time on songwriting details that ultimately makes "L'Enfant Sauvage" another very strong release by the band.

The music on the album pretty much continue down the same progressive hybrid death/thrash path as they've travelled for a couple of albums now. Sharp precision drumming, heavy rythmic groove based riffs, atmospheric sections (which often remind me of Killing Joke and their melancholic sound) and those trademark semi- growling/raw yet strangely melodic vocals by lead vocalist/guitarist Joe Duplantier. He probably has one of the most characteristic extreme metal vocal styles on the scene today. That mix of rawness and melodic sensitivity is rare. I'm thinking of a vocalist like Phil Anselmo in his prime. Not that Joe Duplantier sounds like Anselmo, but his vocal style features some of the same raw/melodic qualities as the former Pantera vocalist also did/does. In addition to his raw vocal delivery, Joe Duplantier's vocals are often doubled with more melodic sounding vocals. I'm not sure if it's vocoder created vocals, but there is a robotic quality to them.

The 11 track, 52:25 minutes long album features quality tracks throughout, but tracks like "Exlosia", "L'Enfant Sauvage", "Liquid Fire", "Pain is a Master" and "Born in Winter" (where Duplantier tries his hand at singing clean vocals and comes away pretty successful), stand out to me.

"L'Enfant Sauvage" not only features excellent musicianship and quality songwriting, but also features a strong, clear and powerful sound production to boot. All in all "L'Enfant Sauvage" is a very strong release by Gojira and a 4 - 4.5 star (85%) rating is deserved.