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God Dethroned: The Toxic Touch
 Holland's death metal veterans God Dethroned are back with their follow-up to 2004's Lair of the White Worm, an extremely popular blast of speedy and ferocious extreme metal that was the band's seventh release. Now, with The Toxic Touch, God Dethroned have toned down the speed a tad, and turned up the melody, giving this latest release a very Gothenburg type melodic death metal sound. The band states that they are now going to rely less on blazing blast beats and concentrate more on grooves and melody, but make no mistake about it, this is still a very heavy album. One quick listen to "On the Wings of Pestilence" and you'll hear that God Dethroned are still out for your blood, whipping out waves of crushing guitar riffs, superhuman drum blasts, and growling vocals. But, (and there's always a "but" isn't there?) this time around the songs are actually catchy and have plenty of groove to them. Kind of like the same formula Satyricon show on their latest, which is an anthemic type of black metal, the songs here on The Toxic Touch are all instantly memorable, like little death metal anthems. "The Day You Died" contains plenty of hot guitar leads and a catchy chorus, while "Away From Emptiness" is a great atmospheric instrumental, complete with melodic guitar work and plenty of keyboards. Shades of Dark Tranquility and early In Flames can be heard on the brutal "Macabre World", a kick-ass piece with raging tremelo picked guitar riffs, killer vocals from Henri Sattler, and powerhouse blast beats.
Quite frankly, these four musicians (and this is a newly revamped line-up) have created a powerful statement here on The Toxic Touch. Filled with memorable melodies, huge guitar riffs, shredding solos, and thunderous drums, God Dethroned have perhaps opened up their sound to an even greater audience. This is still death metal folks, but a little more refined, yet just as powerful.
Track Listing
1. Faithless
2. Hating Life
3. 2014
4. Falling Down
5. On Wings Of Pestilence
6. The Day You Died
7. Away From Emptiness
8. Macabre World
9. Typhoid Mary
10. Fail To Exist
Added: November 16th 2006
Reviewer: Pete Pardo
Score:  
Related Link: God Dethroned Website
Hits: 4096
Language: english
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God Dethroned: The Toxic Touch
Posted by Ken Pierce, SoT Staff Writer on 2006-11-16 12:51:10
My Score:
After two long years of touring the Dutch masters of Melodic Death Metal have indeed returned but if you were expecting another blistering assault on your stereo that would be exactly in the same style that was presented on The Lair Of The White Worm, then you've got another thing coming. For The Toxic Touch they have altered their route just a bit and the main difference will be in the limited use of the "blast-beats" most common in the genre. On this change leader Henri Sattler stressed that it had been done so much in their music before that it tends to become boring and now instead it is used as an explosion to enhance the music. The change also displays the talents of the bands drummer Arien Van Weesenbeek even more as he is not only a powerful player but an incredible technical thrasher as well. "The Toxic Touch" is also much more melodic than their earlier adventures and this shows signs of musical maturity and mastery of their craft. There are those of you who might be a little annoyed at the band for such a dramatic turn from the typical blistering Death that they normally dole out but let's see what you come up with on your seventh album. The changes have not sacrificed any of their brutality or aggression as you will find on "Wings Of Pestilence" and "Hating Life" as this is indeed a pummeling pair of numbers but you also get to enjoy some crunching slower numbers like "Typhoid Mary". This track has a trudging groove that despite quick drumming underneath the main riff is one of the slowest of the albums contributions. From start to finish, the group has show how the level of Metal influences can be broad and remain exciting in the creation of new music. The CD was produced by Jorg Uken, a relative unknown, and according to Sattler, he has delivered the best sounding God Dethroned album yet. The lineup for the group is Sattler (lead vocals, guitars), Isaac Delahaye (lead guitars), Henk Zinger (bass) and Arien Van Weesenbeek (drums); both Delahaye and Zinger have proven their worth as members of the band after only joining before the recording of the album prior to this one.
The experimentation and change on this release should appeal to a wider variety of Metal fan as it is not run of the mill stuff but instead intelligent, interesting and still aggressive. God Dethroned is best enjoyed in the live sense and every cut on the new release sounds like it will hold up in this scenario very well.
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