Gallows

My first Landmine Marathon album and I am incredibly thrilled with it. This is unrelenting stuff, even when they slow down to almost doom like speeds there remains a claustrophobic, pummelling feeling that you just can't help but revel in.At its core this is Death Metal but done in a way that ensures it is not limited by any puny genre boundaries. The danger sometimes is that these types of albums can have songs which sound too similar luckily this is a trap that LM deftly avoid here.The album isn't overly long. It is a case of quality over quantity, perfectly formed to leave you wanting more. No filler here and no loitering.Three Snake Leaves: Oh yes. Thick rhythm, relentless drums, squealing guitars and Death roars. The guitars snake this way and that giving the song a strong groove while the leads slice you to bits.Cutting Flesh and Bone: Straight in and your neck will need some serious support after this one. Has an early `Deicide' feel to it.Knife From My Sleeve: The album slows to a Doom style crawl, recalling `My Dying Bride'. It gives the album as a whole some great dynamics. The song kicks up a gear and has some amazingly intense call and response vocals, before it slips back into Doom territory for a nice lead. The end is chaos.Liver and Lungs: Fast paced blast this one, the drums are relentless and the guitars offer a nice bounce.Dead Horses: A more mid paced song that concentrates on the heavy and it achieves this well. `some will say the horses are all dead' indeed.Cloaked in Red: This ups the pace yet again going for a violent full frontal assault of speed.Beaten and Left Blind: The momentum gained on `cloaked in red' is continued here, but the groove is upped.Morbidity: This mid paced track is a slow smashing of your skull which you end up wishing would last forever because you really do not want the album to end.A storming album, a modern day death metal classic, which will leave you dribbling and begging for another album, until then this needs to be put on constant repeat. BUY. IT. NOW.For fans of all death metal and even fans of bands like Arch Enemy, Slipknot and Trivium will find this a good album for digging further into the depths of metal.

At just under half an hour, Gallows is a viceral, violent and brutally simple assualt on the senses from a four dudes and one girl who definitely get up on the wrong side of bed on a regular basis.Landmine Marathon had previously been a band I enjoyed on a casual basis, but they had never really impressed me in any special way before, which is probably why I've come to treasure Gallows as the scuzzy, sweaty metal monster it is. Landmine expertly channel the no-nonsense, sledgehammer in the face approach of 90s extreme/death metal like it was their own - simple but titanic riffing, crushing atmosphere, skull-chrushing drums and vocals so raw your throat hurts while listening. Comparisons can be drawn to Napalm Death, pre-Necrotism Carcass, the mighty Bolt-Thrower, and maybe even a touch of Morbid Angel at times. Gallows an ugly SOB and it knows it; it has long hair, tattoos, spikes,leather and I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't shower regularly. It reaks of blood and sweat. It'll scare the crap out of your Trivium-loving little brother.Landmine seriously upped their game on this one. Despite not doing anything radically different from Sovereign Decent, Gallows is simply better written, more aggressive, slightly more varied, and just better. The joy of Gallows comes from the simple but effective method of its delivery. The guitar riffs are nothing two complicated, but they slay, often building up into hypnotic waves of Bolt Thrower-esque filth or exploding into breif blasts of grindcore. There is a power, aggression and unrelenting fury built up in the guitar lines that is collosal in nature, and should provoke violent bouts of headbanging. Every once in a while, simple melodies and sludgy sections crop up, only adding to the atmosphere. Yes, in all there simplicity, I found Gallows to be rather atmospheric listen, almost bordering on epic with the crushing Knife From My Sleeve. Front woman Grace Perry uses a much lower, more 'death' range than before, making the album feel even more evil and oppressive than previous offerings. The drumming of is also stellar, especialy on absolute scorchers such as Three Snakes Leave and my favourite Dead Horses. Killer stuff. What really makes it all work though, in my estimation, is that behind all the heavy riffing and gutteral growling is the sound of a band just rocking out and having a hell of a lot of fun. Its pretention-less, no BS metal. No symphonics, tech-death indulgence, cvlt aspirations or desire to be 'artistic'. Just a bunch of road dogs rocking out. And its that unadulterated sense of enjoyment in with all the aggression and blast beats that really makes Gallows much more than just a nostalgia fest.As I've said in other Landmine Marathon reviews, this band is keeping the spirit of 90s bullets n leather death metal alive. If you like Napalm Death, Bolt Thrower or Carcass, or pretty much anything that came out on Earache during the late 80s and 90s, Landmine Marathon might be something you want to check out. Likewise, those who crave a break from the ultra-complex assualt of tech-death brethern such as Obscura or Necrophagiast in favour of something a little more basic (meant in the best possible terms), take a trip to the Gallows. I've never regretted it.