MEMORIAM — For The Fallen (review)

MEMORIAM — For The Fallen album cover Album · 2017 · Death Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Nightfly
I doubt there’s anyone with even a passing interest in death metal who doesn’t know of the sad premature death of Bolt Thrower drummer Martin Kearns in 2015 bringing to an end perhaps the greatest death metal band to come out of the UK, the band feeling they couldn’t continue decided to call it a day. Memoriam is the next venture of vocalist Karl Willetts who has teamed up with Benediction bassist Frank Healy who suffered a loss of his own with the death of his Father not long after Kearns’ death. Completing the line-up is original Bolt Thrower drummer Andrew Whale and guitarist Scott Fairfax.

Neither Bolt Thrower nor Benediction had released anything new for years so For The Fallen is a welcome return for these guys. It follows in their tradition of old school death metal , more akin to the sledgehammer no nonsense approach of Bolt Thrower than the busier and generally faster sound of Benediction it’s a very good solid release which whilst not the equal of the best Bolt Thrower had to offer I prefer to anything I ever heard from Benediction. In the Bolt Thrower tradition the riffs are solid as a rock with an excellent performance from Fairfax throwing in a few Zack Wylde style licks, demonstrated no better than on War Rages On, the second track in after the underwhelming and ordinary opener Memoriam. Fortunately after this things only ever really dip again for the more simplistic punk injected Corrupted Sysytem with most songs having strong and memorable hooks, with a doom element creeping in at times. Some of the songs are pretty long though fortunately there are enough twists and turns with changes of tempo to keep things interesting.

Overall then, For The Fallen whilst treading old ground with no pretence of originality, not necessarily a bad thing, is a promising start with a strong performance from all which hopefully won’t turn out to be a one off.
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Nightfly wrote:
more than 2 years ago
I think there may be better to come from them. I've seen quite a few negative reviews which surprised me. Not going to be considered a classic but a solid release for sure.
UMUR wrote:
more than 2 years ago
My rating is also 3.5 stars. It´s a pretty good old school death metal release, but it doesn´t exactly make my blood boil wildly.
Vim Fuego wrote:
more than 2 years ago
It's nothing very original this album, but that's not really the reason you'd listen to it or Bolt Thrower in the first place. It's heavy as hell, and delivers exactly what a Bolt Thrower fan would want.

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