After a five-year gap between albums, Arizonan quintet Gatecreeper are back with Dark Superstition (Nuclear Blast). Their third album sees their heavy, Death Metal roar wed to more melodic and concise metal. A heavy band embracing melody like this might raise some metalheads’ hackles, afraid their band going soft, but fear not. Their heft and aggression is still alive and kicking, but just married to more accessible metal.  

Perhaps the best example of this is “Superstitious Vision.” It is still loud and Chase Mason’s vocals are still as hearty as ever but they are paired with a stupidly catchy, Classic Rock style guitar hook that will not leave my head. 

“Caught in the Treads” has a wonderfully thick riff and a stomping groove, it sounds like something from The Black Album but beefed up. As does the NWOBHM-esque guitar licks, heavy chug and big, Hard Rock like chorus of “Flesh Habit”.

About the cheery topic of a soul stuck in purgatory, “The Black Curtain” is a taut and focused slice of Trad Metal with a clean guitar melody that is wrapped up in under three and a half minutes.

It is still raucous Metal with beefy guitars and vocals that are impressively throaty, it is just more immediate; the first track “Dead Star” is all of these things and whets your appetite for more. The menacing “Masterpiece of Chaos” showcases the volume and is more aligned to their classic sound with its deep groove, tasty drumming and an electric but short solo. “Mistaken For Dead” is perhaps the most ferocious; a whirlwind of a track with its reckless pace and Thrash like brutality.

Gatecreeper’s third album is the perfect combination of heavy, Death Metal aggression and Hard Rock and Trad Metal melody.

Buy the album here:
https://gatecreeper.com/

9 / 10
THOMAS THROWER