Artist: Deadlock
Title: Bizarro World
Genre: Melodic Death Metal
Release Date: 25th February 2011
Label: Lifeforce Records
Album Review
If there is one thing that DEADLOCK has always been good at doing, it is surprising listeners with its direction, whether it is concerned with musical style or vocal choices. At the same time, these experimental directions do not detract from the melodic death metal style overall; though one could argue they’ve been getting a bit more industrial and gothic metal than melodic death. With ‘Earth Revolt’, the album just hit heavy with crushing power, yet the surprise there was a guest spot from their (now current) female vocalist on a few tracks. With their second album, ‘Wolves’, there was a more stable use of male harsh vocals and female clean vocals, and though it was pretty typical for most melodic death metal bands with members of both genders to have that whole ‘beauty and beast’ vocal tradition going on, DEADLOCK also made sure to vary things up musically by introducing techno elements, despite how random they seemed. With their last album, ‘Manifesto’, the band continued in their egalitarian use of blending harsh melodic death metal with softer, female gothic elements, and also included their typical symphonic interlude tracks and a solo performance from the female vocalist, who tends to have a bit of a high pitched voice, but can use it to great effect rather than just keep a monotone. The band also experimented with adding rap elements, but failed miserably at blending the two effectively because it felt completely random and didn’t suit the musical style overall.
Now, with ‘Bizarro World’, the band strikes yet again, and proves their most mature effort yet. They don’t go out on as much of an experiment limb as their previous albums, but instead create a entirely balanced album as a whole that doesn’t feel for once out of place at all. The album begins with the strong opener, ‘Virus Jones’, which is basically just as catchy and addicting as ‘Manifesto’s’ hit, Martyr to Science’. It chugs, it thrashes, it roars, it sings, and has all the great elements that DEADLOCK usually implore to get listener attention, whether it is the rapid bursts of rhythm or softer interlude sections when the female vocalist sings. On that note, fans may be surprised to notice that she has been given a lot more prominence on this album. The second track, ‘State of Decay’, feels like a pretty decent melodic Goth metal track that goes at a mid pace and is entirely dominated by the female vocals, along with ‘Paranoia Extravaganza’, which follows the typical DEADLOCK ballad pattern that is reserved only for the female vocalist. The harsh vocals are involved in many tracks too, but it is clear that DEADLOCK really wanted to let the female vocalist’s clean style really flourish, especially compared to the first album where she was hardly featured at all.
Musically, much of ‘Bizarro World’ is the same as previous albums. The guitars have that distinct distortion to them as they either chug or just rip into solos, but on tracks like ‘State of Decay’, ‘You Left Me Dead’ and ‘Renegade’, there is much more variation to focusing on the keyboard/ industrial elements while incorporating softer guitar notes. ‘Renegade’ is especially good because the band not only creates some pretty great and energetic techno beats, they for the first time layer the female vocals over the harsher male ones, which is used to great effect. The industrial moments also tend to flourish a lot more at the beginning of the tracks, such as with ‘Falling Skywards’ and ‘Brutal Romance’, but for the most part these two tracks are strictly melodic death metal rather than techno/ industrial metal (these guys haven’t reached PROJECT HATE MCMXCIX level of grandeur yet). While some fans may complain that the heavier tracks like ‘Falling Skywards’ relies on the same aggressive chugs as previous DEADLOCK material from ‘Manifesto,’ ‘Bizarro World’ can easily be noted as the “softest album” DEADLOCK has ever done. Mostly this is due to the only odd track, ‘Alienation’, which is very soft and just features guitar playing, even though it feels more like a tuning session than an actual, brief instrumental. The album’s bigger, fuller instrumental lies within the title track, which is a beautiful symphonic orchestra that is usually reserved for the first track on previous albums.
Lyrically, DEADLOCK still tackle pretty strong issues poetically regarding social issues and humanitarian issues. They aren’t as ‘animal rights centred’ as ‘Manifesto’ was, but there is definitely a lot of outcry when it comes to a track like ‘Earthlings’, and DEADLOCK’S vengeful taunt towards how humanity is doing stupid things like killing the planet through various ways. The only track that would seem a bit “dumb” is ‘Brutal Romance’, mostly only due to the repetitive chorus that just doesn’t have that beautiful poetic justice that suits the female vocals during the chorus. Despite this, overall ‘Bizarro World’ is a fantastic effort and once again DEADLOCK stuns their fans with their innovation. Fans who have never heard them before would do good to start looking into the band’s career with this album because everything seems like it falls into place without too many randomness or being too cheesy.
Tracklist
01. Virus Jones 04:59
02. State Of Decay 03:43
03. Falling Skywards 04:22
04. Earthlings 03:41
05. You Left Me Dead 04:11
06. Brutal Romance 04:08
07. Alienation 01:42
08. Renegade 03:25
09. Htrae 04:48
10. Bizarro World 02:11
11. Paranoia Extravaganza 03:08
Line-up
Johannes Prem - Harsh Vocals
Sabine Scherer (née Weniger) - Clean Vocals, Keyboards
Sebastian Reichl - Guitars, Keyboards
Gert Rymen - Guitars
John Gahlert - Bass
Tobias Graf - Drums
Website
http://www.xdeadlockx.com/
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 10
Sound: 9
Total: 9 / 10
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