Death Decline didn’t wind us up yet!
Three years after their last recording, Fabien Legue (guitar), Alexis Fleury (vocals), Alexandre Morel (bass), Jordan Henriques (guitar) and Arnaud Fournet (drums) return with Pattern Of An Imminent Collapse, their fourth album.
The Undying gets off to a blistering start with jangly riffs, where the vindictive vocal parts, saturated or not, settle down to accompany the band’s charge and Old School influences. Lead parts lend a more complex touch to the track, but the band follows up with Surrender to the Fierce Side, and its devastating rhythm that calms down only to let the harmonics express themselves, but immediately regains its virulence and heaviness. Aggression doesn’t subside with Feast on the Ashes, where the band stays with a high tempo, furious double kick and marked Thrash and Hardcore roots, but it disappears temporarily with the opening moments of Towards Void and Oblivion, a long composition with a rather dark atmosphere. Although saturation soon returns, it is obviously coupled with spasmodic violence, but also with more experimental passages, such as the choirs or clear vocals found on Through Shadows…, an anguishing introduction to …And Daggers, which revives the rage. There’s a touch of metalcore on this catchy composition, as on Wake the Dead, which follows with the same energy and intriguing vocal alternations, but also those long lead parts that disturb the chaos. The groove returns on Of Serpents and Thieves, a composition where the rhythm section plays an important role in guiding the musicians’ savagery before letting the guitars roar, then the album closes with Among the Leeches and its eruptions of anger conducive to all kinds of crowd movements punctuated by breaks and moshparts.
Death Decline‘s influences are more pronounced on this album. Pattern Of An Imminent Collapse remains rooted in a Thrash/Death base, but you can feel the band’s thirst for energy, and their desire to get us moving with them!
80/100