June 26, 2012 • Roadrunner Records
It's been a while since I listened to Gojira—From Mars to Sirius, in fact—and this new album seems to be on every metal fan's radar this year. I have to say I'm not terrible enthralled by what I'm hearing so far; not bad, certainly, just par for the course.
In two albums not much has changed: Gojira still has their death metal riffing, their wide-open and spacy atmosphere, their prog flourishes, and (of course) plenty of pick scrapes. Anyone who liked what they heard on From Mars to Sirius (as I did) will easily be able to get into the mood of L'enfant sauvage; probably a good thing.
But I feel like their songwriting skills have taken a turn for the worse. There are some cool moments (the verses during the title track have a pretty neat groove going) but some tracks just totally fall flat. "The Axe" is a good example, especially coming right after the decent title track. It's a horribly generic song with very boring riffs and drumming that sound like they didn't have much effort put into them.
And unfortunately I get that feeling about a lot of the album. They've hit on a solid formula, but I can only take this endless chugging for so long when it's so monotonous (and this is coming from someone who still digs Catch Thirtythree). When there isn't a lot to differentiate the songs from each other, it's so difficult to get into the album and enjoy it.
I dunno. Maybe I'm taking it all the wrong way, and it's just supposed to be a metal album and nothing more. If you find entertainment in it, fine; if not, that's fine too. It's okay, but I won't be returning to it, especially when From Mars to Sirius seems to be all I'll need from Gojira.
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