LIGHT THIS CITY „Remains of the Gods”

Music: Melodic Metal/Thrash
Country: USA
Website: http://www.lightthiscity.com
Duration:


Cool Songs: The Hunt, The Static Masses, Remains of the Gods, The Last Catastrophe, Obituary.

Arch Enemy front woman Angela Gossow has a fair set of lungs hey? And while some of you might not be thinking strictly about her VOICE, it is fair to say that she has only a few rivals as far as the aggressive death tones are concerned. One of those rivals comes in the form of Laura Nichols from San Francisco upstarts ‘Light This City’.

Seriously, when I first listened to their sophomore effort ‘Remains of the Gods’, I was drawn to the brutally aggressive vocals – they sounded ‘male’ but of course, I was even more surprised to find out they weren’t. Nichol’s is definitely a major strength of ‘Light This City’ – however, there is some serious shit going on musically as well. These guys might be signed to Prosthetic Records but don’t make the mistake of lumping them in with the rest of the American Metal crowd. Oh sure, they’re not THAT different, but if you’re expecting standard riff grooves and generic breakdowns, then LTC won’t exactly accommodate.

The real difference with LTC is the San Francisco connection. We’re talking Bay Area. We’re talking THRASH. Even at the tender age of eighteen!! (that’s right), LTC are well aware of all that has gone before them and with the addition of some furious prime Swedish melodic death ‘Remains of the Gods’ simply rips from the proverbial go to whoa. This is a fierce metal album folks – too heavy and way too fast to ever sit comfortably with the Metalcore crowd but not so ‘old school’ to completely ignore them either. In essence, it’s the Thrash/Swede balance that makes ‘ROTG’ such a hard hitting, ferocious affair – in the process, it also avoids the pitfalls of being too ‘Maiden-melodic and breakdown reliant (in fact there are none!).

Incredibly, this album was recorded as a three piece with drummer Ben Murray pulling double-duty on guitar (hell, he’s a phenomenon at both instruments) laying down the ultra shredding, tightly constructed riffs patterns like a man possessed. Since the recording, Murray has handed the riff baton over to Brian Forbes and Nick Koenig for live duties and I assume future recordings. Whatever they come up with musically on the next album, you can be assured that Ben Murray’s riff ideas will still be a big part of their song writing process. As far as the songs on ‘ROTG’ are concerned, there’s not a hell of lot of breathing space on this disc – it literally charges in, throttles the throat from the opening seconds and never dares to let go. Yet this strength is possibly a weakness in that the variation in pacing and rhythms isn’t quite there, but hell, at eighteen you can forgive the band for their wide eyed enthusiasm. Whatever the case may be on future recordings, if they can match or even surpass riff loaded neck snapping tracks like ‘The Hunt’ and ‘The Static Masses’ then I’ll be a very happy man.

Light This City is a very promising metal act. With age and maturity I expect bigger things from them. Certainly, the thrash rage needs to be maintained – the clinical ‘Carcass’ angle meets Bay Area tempos forged with dollops of ‘At The Gates’ works a treat here – but perhaps a little more expression and variation in the song writing would only help their cause. Then they burn the city down!!

note: 8

Tracklist

Remains Of The Gods
Obituary
A Guardian In A Passerby
The Hunt
Letter To My Abuser
Fractured By The Fall
The Static Masses
Guiding The North Star
Your Devoted Victim
The Last Catastrophe