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By DAN SOUTHALL
MAYHEM will always be linked to their formative days as wild, directionless young men bent on doing things a little differently, helping create a new music genre while leaving death and destruction in their early wake.
Unfortunately, this manages to detract from the fact that Mayhem have been leaders in black metal for nearly as long as the genre has been around.
Mayhem always approach their albums with concepts in mind, be it war or the dark corners of religion. There is always something there to confront. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Liturgy of Death concerns itself with the finality of life itself. Not just because it makes for great musical fodder, but because the members of the band are all getting older themselves. With age comes both wisdom and questions about what comes next, if anything.
With this in mind, Mayhem attack in their typical, almost unrelenting fashion – and herein lies the problem. Even Mayhem usually have more moments that breathe than exist here. There are small moments such as “Weep For Nothing” but that comes after the opening two tracks just go past without eliciting any kind of reaction. Then another couple of tracks blast by before the guitar interplay of “Funeral Of Existence” finally snaps you from a trance.
It’s not really bad, it just comes across as something by a band that has been there, done that and knows they don’t have to do much anymore for recognition. This is sad, because once upon a time Mayhem was all about pushing limits in all directions to achieve attention on their own terms.
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