Taking their time in producing their eighth studio album, four years on from Rise Of The Tyrant (and not including the re-recording of older material for stop gap release The Root Of All Evil), Arch Enemy finally return with a huge album of extreme metal, showcasing clear NWOBHM influences, for arguably the first time ever. Khaos Legions is a tour de force of European melodic death/extreme metal, performed to the highest calibre, encompassing some of the finest guitar work displayed on any metal album in the last few months. Led by the inimitable Michael Amott, the six string section of Arch Enemy is on top form throughout, with even some classic rock influences seeping into the brutal and punishing extreme death metal onslaught.
Lulling the listener into a false sense of security with an instrumental opener Khaos Overture, the album truly bursts into furious life with Yesterday Is Dead And Gone, suggesting that Arch Enemy are no longer concerning themselves with their past, but focusing on their future prospects, and for restaking their claim at the top of the melodic death metal scene. The track showcases some fine shredding and immense drum blast beats, indicative of the sound that the rest of the album follows suits with.
Khaos Legions has a number of atmospheric instrumental interludes, which set the scene well for the vicious and violent metal tracks that follow, and the likes of Blood Stained Cross (as frenetic and religion baiting as you would expect) and the incendiary Cruelty Without Beauty are huge death metal punches to the stomach, and sound truly massive. Everything else is just as brutal also, purpose built for laying waste to any mosh pit around.
What is stunning about Khaos Legions though is the progression in the playing abilities of the band, and the plethora of additional influences that get thrown into the pot here. Through The Eyes Of A Raven has an incredible flamenco metal outro, and Cruelty Without Beauty has a massive NWOBHM duelling guitar part in the middle section. The Zoo has an awesome opening riff (one of the finest that you will hear all year), and Thorn In My Flesh is heavy as fuck, easily one of the most ferocious tracks around at the moment.
It loses marks due to the fact that, as great a record as it is, there is a lack of distinctly memorable numbers, but that is in part to the genre in which this album comes from (and often something that cannot be helped with extreme metal). It is also a mammoth listen, but if you want intricate and extreme modern metal, this is as good a place as any to start right now.
A solid and technically superb return.
7.5/10
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