The Dutch black-death horde around band leader Henri Sattler prepares to unleash its twelfth album four and a half years after the excellent Illuminati. The band lineup is once again revamped, with guitarist Dave Meester and bassist Jeroen Pomper remaining from the previous album and Frank Schilperoort joining on drums. Since their inception in 1991, God Dethroned have been walking the fine line between melodic death metal and black metal, with a serious influence from Slayer in the guitar department.
The Judas Paradox starts with the title track, which “deals with the topic of Judas being the scapegoat, used for a scheme to create a king for this world and how Jesus responds to him for being trapped in this dubious collaboration”, as the press release states. Typical Sattler lyrical themes, which, sadly, sit on a mid-tempo plodder, which tries, but fails to impress with atmosphere. It’s the same anti-climax to start an album as Maiden’s title track in Senjutsu, actually. Rat Kingdom quickly corrects the bad first impression with a frenetic tempo and great melodies, but, unfortunately, solidifies my initial impression that something’s wrong with the sound (production). The whole album sounds somehow muffled, as if you’ve put a thick cloth on your speakers. I don’t know what the hell happened, but even the better songs in the album suffer greatly as a result. The Hanged Man and Kashmir Princess display some really good riffs and the guitar solos are even better. The well elaborated and masterfully performed solos are what saves The Judas Paradox from being a complete disappointment.
Asmodeus is a familiar song we already know from 2022, when it was released as a one-off single and it lives up to God Dethroned’s name and status, but on the other hand, Hubris Anorexia, The Eye Of Providence and Hailing Death are just not good enough, lacking punch, memorable hooks and just sticking to repetitive, mediocre riffs. That’s sub-par material for a God Dethroned album and what’s worse is these three songs are placed back to back in the tracklist, thus harming the whole album flow. Broken Bloodlines is not much better, but at least the rhythm section adds more heaviness and brutality, with some nice melodies sticking out through the chorus.
War Machine closes the album with a Vader-esque leading riff and a very good, trademark God Dethroned dark melodic harmonies in the chorus. The solos and the mid-song transition are also top-notch, but alas, this beam of light (or darkness?) comes way too late. If they managed to replace three of the weakest tracks with something of War Machine’s caliber, then the result would be a whole lot better, with my previous remark about the weak production still valid. It’s a shame because I always have high expectations for God Dethroned, and we’ve waited for more than four years, but at least we have a new album and there are at more or less three fantastic new tracks to headbang to.
6,5/10
The Judas Paradox will be out on September 6th via Reigning Phoenix Music and you can pre-order it from HERE
