In his ongoing quest to be featured in one in every three heavy metal bands, Tomas Lindberg is – aside from his main stint as vocalist for a little-known band called “At The Gates” – also the vocalist for The Lurking Fear. In fairness, the band also features Adrian Erlandsson (drums) and Jonas Stalhammer(guitars) also of the same crew, while they are joined by Andreas Axelson (Bass) of Tormented and the brilliant Disfear, with Frederik Wallenberg also on the guitars.
Quite the line-up. Are we going to get more angular, complex and melodic death metal? Ah, no, not really. What you’ve got here is all dials set to ten, less complicated and more violent extremity. Opener “Abyssal Slime” really sets the tone – straight out of the trenches and up in your grill. Sure, there are some times where the music chills a little – “Funeral Abyss” has more of a mid-tempo chug to it, while the title track flirts with some progressive song writing and changes.
That’s not to say that this isn’t without charm. Lyrically, this deals with the post-Lovecraft notions of cosmic nihilism and horror. Accordingly, when The Lurking Fear click into a groove, it doesn’t quite sit as simply as many other old-school death metal albums do. There’s always a slightly angular feel to the music, and while the riffs are easy to follow ad nod along to, there’s always a hint of discordance or not quite fitting together as they should. Take, for instance, “Architects of Madness”. Even the song name is a call back to first generation death metal, and while it doesn’t sound a million miles away from prime Unleashed, the slight weirdness to the sound and wailing, alien axe solo give this more than a hint of the unhinged.
Weird psychedelic interlude …erm… “Kaleidoscopic Mutations” features the unmistakeable voice of Chris Reiffert (Autopsy), which is a nice aside for any ancient fans of extremity like myself. The stand out here though is the closer “Leech of the Aeons”. This is pretty much the most At the Gates-esque track on the album, and could have been written from the same batch of sogs as “The Red In The Sky Is Ours” recording sessions. This is absolutely a dizzying, off-kilter and deliberately strange number, along with odd time changes, flexing and waning six string work, and some of the most inventive drum passages I’ve heard from Erlandsson for a long, long time.
It’s a bit of a mixed bag, to be honest. There are no bad moments on this at all, but some of the more basic songs are a little easy to drift by without getting into the consciousness, but when it clicks? Oh man, it clicks. If nothing else, listen to the album closer. It’s a modern classic.
(8/10 Chris Davison)
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