Sticking a very well-positioned middle finger up to the ageing process, and all that comes with it, are everyone’s favourite groove metal assailants – Lamb Of God. Now unleashing the potency and pace of this, their tenth album, along with a much-discussed new logo that is, probably, as bad as the old one, these Richmond VA veterans find themselves in formidable form.
I first saw Lamb of God in 2004 on the ‘Ashes of The Wake’ tour, loved the energy and the tangible integrity of Randy Blythe, in particular, and have kept up with their career ever since. I don’t really think they have put a foot wrong (bar the logo debacle) and, ironically, the only somewhat lower point was their self-titled album of six years ago. Even that wasn’t bad – just not up to the very high standards they had set themselves.
Gone are the drummer debacles and the protracted legal proceedings, as they now re-become the band they were right at the very start of all this misbehaviour. ‘Into Oblivion’ does exactly what the title suggests – this is angry, feral and unsparing. It’s also dynamic, exquisitely balanced and heavy as shit.
From the off, the title track catapults you into the kind of edge-of-the-seat aggressive, pumped up state that only Lamb of God can provide. There are all the gritty footprints of the younger versions of themselves that dug so deep on 2006’s ‘Sacrament’, particularly on ‘Parasocial Christ’, ‘The Killing Floor’ and the absolute ripper ‘Bully’.
There is definitely experimentation here – not wild, but a willingness for a bunch of guys having fun to try stuff out – and tracks such as ‘Sepsis’ and ‘El Vacio’ show this off well.
Not many bands have a pretty flawless career, not many bands stick it pretty much unscathed for 30 years, and not many bands have the ability to make almost no one keep a straight face when they are announced on a festival billing – Lamb of God have all three of those things. And, on ‘Into Oblivion’ they have sent a very noisy statement out reminding all of us that is the case.
And now we’ve reached the point where we all wonder how long they can keep it up for….my guess is, on the back of their 10th album, quite a while.
Best Paired With: A dusty air guitar, flipping your baseball cap back to front and bruised knees.
lamb of god – into oblivion is out now on century Media Records.
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