Review Summary: Another album; another collection of fleeting brilliance, and a whole lot of sustenance in the monotony division.
Surely rebellious tyrants, waging sin against the doomsday machine was enough, but apparently Arch Enemy are obliged to now offer us
legions of rebellious tyrants, waging sin against the doomsday machine. The common thread has been this cliché concept of cataclysm, rebellion, death, legions, sins et al., and it’s all essentially culminated to an anticlimax that is likely to be chained to the band’s coffin. It does come to question Angela Gossow’s immeasurable imagination but then again, you can’t really blame Arch Enemy for being a metal band with apocalyptic thoughts...
As a banal next move from the group, there’s naturally not a whole lot to be said Khaos Legions otherwise – eleven economically sourced second-hand tracks, two instrumentals (one healthier than the other, take your pick), a ludicrous intro (possibly their worst ever) and of course to two incredibly able brothers incessantly duelling to their hearts content. The Amott brothers appear to be – and have increasingly so per each album – overly conscious of their own abilities to design fluid leads, but it’s this same self awareness that’s guised as an album which unfortunately sounds exceedingly parallel to previous material.
Instrumentals are no longer glorious intermissions but casual redesigns of passing notes and lower mordents; leads while independently cordial seem to devour songs instead of elevate them; jointly, Gossow’s lyricism holds dearly onto mutinous themes that still haven’t jumped ship since... well ever. All this is purely representative of the self-afflicted downward slope they’ve preserved for quite some time, however doesn’t entirely symbolise the album’s sum, for the moments of capability stem from times where they share melodic impressions with connected influence.
“Cruelty Without Beauty” sounds convincing while being flanked by elements of
Slayer’s “
Dead Skin Mask” and
“South of Heaven” which is surely no fluke. Similarly, the second instrumental,
“Turn to Dust” treads melodies shown in both
The Beatles’
“While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and later
“Cult of Chaos” and its enjoyable chorus.
Unfortunately the remainder again may as well have originated from an anthology to the point where it’s almost certainly a more appropriate idea to find your Arch Enemy fix in previous albums, particularly the music and lyrics from 2001’s Wages of Sin and their previous effort, Rise of the Tyrant. Fans on the other hand, are more likely to show a casual enjoyment, though perhaps not as sustaining as they would prefer.
