Gothenburg, Sweden is the birthplace of one of the most groundbreaking forms of modern heavy metal music. The melodic death metal movement originated there with bands like At The Gates, In Flames and Dark Tranquility. Curious then, is the emergence of Gothenburg's Laethora, a band with such lack of melody, they could only be termed death/grind metal.
While the genres may sound similar, a simple listen will show how different they truly are. Melodic death, while heavy, could almost appeal to the extreme music outsider, while grind metal has an abrasive sound only metal purists could love.
Even more curious is Laethora boasts one member from melodic death giants Dark Tranquility, without importing any of the Gothenburg sound. Throw in two members of gothic punk/metal band the Provenance with a first-timer vocalist and you have yourself an outright conundrum.
Despite all of this, the band's debut album, March of the Parasite, breathes new life into the somewhat stagnant lungs of the genre. It relies on traditional death metal vocals with just enough enunciation to indicate that vocalist Jonatan Nordenstam is, in fact, singing in English.
Nordenstam shows high intensity in his vocal style, bringing to mind Devin Townsend (Strapping Young Lad) at his yellingest, but staying on the safe side of more extreme death metal groups like Napalm Death. This provides a certain accessibility sometimes absent in this style of music.
The grind aspect of the music is present from the beginning, inundating the listener with the constant sound of frenzied, off-color guitar progressions. Most of the album proceeds in this way, and drummer Joel Lindell more than keeps up with his inhumanly fast-paced percussion.
The best of the high-speed tracks include ""Parasite,"" ""Clothing for the Dead"" and ""Impostors."" However, the standout track of the album falls outside the grind theme present in the majority of March of the Parasite.
""Black Void Remembrance"" is distilled death metal, boasting one of the heaviest riffs this side of 2007. The song also uses creative layering of vocals—one being typical death growls, the other, blood-curdling screaming. The song also uses clean vocals, but succinctly and appropriatly, unlike many cheesy melodic death metal acts looking only for radio airplay.
Upon a few spins, the listener soon realizes that while it is remarkable that such a record came out of Gothenburg, the land of melodic death metal, the album, as a whole, is decidedly unremarkable. This is not to say that the album is bad, but rather that it lacks innovation, or even any quirks to set it apart from the remainder of the sometimes-too-standardized death metal school.
While Laethora does call our attention to the oft-forgotten genre of death/grind, the band does so without setting themselves apart from the pack. That said, the March of the Parasite contains a listenable set of songs, but the members of Laethora should probably give serious consideration to returning to their day jobs in the incomparable Dark Tranquility and the unique the Provenance.
