Review Summary: What is best in metal?
What is better or more important, taking grand risks and potentially fail grandly in the pursuit of something greater, or to operate solely but playfully in the realm that’s most comfortable to you? It’s a difficult dividing line to ascribe, as the difference between consistency and stagnancy is a narrow crack to traverse. Winning formulas work for a reason, and sometimes changing them too much or taking too hard of a left turn can lead to disastrous results, but wallowing the same shallow pool for too long can only lead to stale, dirty water. People are bound to have their favorite examples of each; bands who tried a new direction only to run up a brick wall, bands who seem to live nestled in a safe zone but still put out satisfying material within that, and of course bands who seem to churn out the exact same record ad nauseam with no stylistic flourish whatsoever. As easy as it seems to categorize artists by which they fall under, it’s not as simple to nail down exactly what psychologically makes a consistent band so vastly superior to a stagnant one.
Allegaeon have managed to sequester themselves into a near-untouchable embankment of American melodic death metal, over a half-dozen albums in and each garnered its own praises as wonderful, pleasantly technical, and most of all: consistent. With an Allegaeon album you have the general gist of what you’re going to receive already cemented in your cerebellum, and your expectations are bound to be delivered upon.
The Ossuary Lens is no different, providing a cool 45-minute run of by all means excellent MDM. The funny thing is the Yanks draw remarkably heavily upon Swedish tradition in their music, not quite falling under the tight “Gothenburg” subcategory but definitely pulling stylistic bursts from
Opeth here (folksy acoustic interludes with clean vocals) and
Meshuggah (aggressive polyrhythms) there across their now-seven records. The rasping roar choruses conjure up older
At the Gates, but the riffs and melodies all still adhere strictly to Allegaeon’s playbook.
From the intro “Refraction” which slices the incoming melody to acoustic ribbons before blossoming into “Chaos Theory”, the immediate reaction I had to listening to Allegaeon’s latest was,
Wow, this band is FUN.. That I think might be the most key thing in explaining Allegaeon’s longevity and the long-standedness of their still distinct sound, is that after 17 years the band still has fun within the realm they live in and feel revitalized by it rather than seeing it as a giant iron ball they’re anchored to. Whether self-inflicted or persuaded by audience or label pressure, bands have surely released music they weren’t as personally attached to just to get new material into the world. With a respectable 3-4 year gap between records that doesn’t seem to be the case at all for Allegaeon. They may wear slightly different hats, but the outfit layout remains widely the same, both literally and figuratively, as with the return of original frontman Ezra Haynes the vocals come in a perfect triple-stage attack, from searing to bludgeoning to clean lulling before the next blast. Along with main guitarist Greg Burgess the soul of the band is still intact and newer members only serve to freshen a sound that’s already mostly found itself.
Songs like “The Swarm” fulfill their namesake by being satisfyingly technical and fast, the leads bleating and beeping without ever quite falling under the prefix “tech”. The fingerstyle acoustic guitar in the opening minute of “Dark Matter Dynamics” leads beautifully into the main riff, and across the album melodies blend perfectly with the dense riffs so that each song still has an identity unto itself. “Wake Circling Above” even touches upon more blackened tones, Haynes’ rasp becoming a snarl and the drums becoming a storm behind high-floating leads. This is also one of the few examples of a sung chorus on the album, tasteful and not cheesy, somewhat reminiscent of the soothing tenor of ICS Vortex. Allegaeon may have decided rather stoically their home playing field, but they are visibly most productive and comfortable here, and they play every inch of the turf and draw from the playbooks of other bands into their own movements to make themselves more interesting. Somewhat technical, somewhat brutal, somewhat melodic, never spreading themselves too thin or laying it across too thick, altogether forming something that is apparently an endlessly plunderable lode for modern metal.
