Golem - Dreamweaver (2004)

Although I can't say for sure whether the band has ever really broken up, Dreamweaver was their third and most recent offering, now almost two decades old, and while it certainly shares some fundamental influences with its predecessors, the first time I spun this one I almost thought I was listening to a different band. It's got a similar sense of melodic acumen, but it's as if somewhere along the way, Golem started listening to a lot more brutal death metal in the early 00s, which translates into a more propulsive, ear-rupturing experience, and coincidentally takes them even further away from that Carcass comparison which dominated much of the debut and some of the sophomore. Dreamweaver is tense, clinical German death metal, and like the rest of their catalog, underrated.

The riffs here really churn along with syncopated, punchy rhythms, full of weighty melodies that aren't so obvious as their earlier writing. The new drummer obliterates the performance on those old albums, blasting effortless when necessary, and they basically possess all the weaponry of your standard issue brutal/tech death metal band, though where so many of those struggle to find a soul for their music, Golem is just left of center incorporating enough progressive and melodic components to keep you coming back. No, it's not Cynic or Atheist, but if you're into groups like Lykathea Aflame that can balance off that exoticism and atmosphere with the brutality, then this is certainly an album you will want to track down. It might even be a little forward thinking when you imagine bands like Fallujah or Rivers of Nihil were still coming down the road about a half-decade after this came out.

The vocals still consist of guttural and snarls, but they only superficially resemble their original influence, and feel more like a blunt object being dispensed over your head alongside those choppy rhythms. Leads are good, often emitting jazz/fusion or bluesy vibes, but even more interesting are the points where they'll just throw out these simpler, atmospheric guitars over the more complex battery ("Breeder"). The bass playing here is the best of the three albums, grooving and compelling on its own without always copying the guitars at a 1:1, and like the title demonstrates, this is perhaps the easiest of their albums to get lost in. I enjoy this one nearly as much as The 2nd Moon, and if they had kept putting out material along this path and evolving it further, they'd be one of our hugest death metal acts of this sort today. I guess there's still a chance!

Verdict: Win [8.25/10]

http://www.golem-metal.de/index.php

Golem - The 2nd Horizon (1998)

The artwork for the second Golem, while equally as cheesy as the first, seems a lot more innocuous, and its cosmic orientation gives off the impression that the Germans might be taking their slightly technical Carcass-like death metal into a more progressive direction. In fact, that is more or less the truth, although it's not yet as atmospheric, jazzy or new age as it might look, this sophomore does steer them a little further away from the worship that defined their debut. In fairness, there is still a lot of that influence gleaming through, largely through the vocals but also in a few of the spikes or more melodic riffing, but they definitely seem headed down their own path, and it's a good choice because this is probably my favorite album they've put out.

Part of that is the improved production, which is less punchy and digital feeling as their first album which went more for that Necroticism vibe. This is more balanced and organic, and works well with the denser melodic chord patterns. I don't think the lead tone on this album is that great, especially for the spacey harmonies they're infusing, but it's good enough to get the gist of their ideas, and there are a LOT of them, because Golem is easily one of the riffiest death metal bands to never ascend the throne, possibly because of that derivative factor which hovered over them for a few years. And it still does pop up from time to time, like the chugging breaks in "Departure" which might remind you of a certain tune from Heartwork, or the raucous vocal delivery, but where the Germans excel here is when they go full on with some of the most melodic material like "The Shortening of the Way" or "Heretics", the sorts of tunes that instantly embed into my memory.

There were definitely other great bands that took the Carcass stylings and ran with them, Exhumed and Impaled from here in the States come to mind, but Golem almost represented a potential strain of melodic death metal that might have thrived if more bands had gone that route rather than aping the In Flames, At the Gates and Dark Tranquillity. The 2nd Horizon is a really great example of that potential development, and strong enough to get this band to the next level, but somehow that just wasn't about to happen...maybe it's the cover art, maybe groups like Soilwork and Darkane were just doing more exciting material (they were), but this one definitely holds up even more than the debut.

Verdict: Win [8.25/10]

http://www.golem-metal.de/index.php

Golem - Eternity: The Weeping Horizons (1996)

I admit I have a soft spot for awful digital photography covers from that late 90s/00s era, and Golem's debut is a prime example. Superimpose some topless, 80s-haired bombshells over a skyscape, inverted as if they were guarding the gates to some Middle-Earth city, and then slam your pretty cool logo right in the middle. This was one of the first Invasion Records releases my friend and I bought from a small import record store in Seabrook, NH, and one that we were pretty surprised with when we put it on the sample CD player. That cheesy, memorable artwork has literally nothing to do with the actual sound, and it would have been received better with a great old school death metal cover, which it later was when combined with the second album in a re-issued collection in 2014.

But I digress...Eternity: The Weeping Horizons is very much Carcass-influenced melodic death metal, like a blend of Necroticism and Heartwork, only not as quite as clinical as the former, nor meaty and amazing as the latter. I even here a few grooves present that bring to mind Symphonies of Sickness, only this is much cleaner in tone and nowhere near as grotesque. The lyrics aren't medical texts, and cover more esoteric or personal topics, but the vocal exchange between a rasp and guttural is also derivative of the evolving British goregrind gods. Fortunately, the Germans are all over the place here, with a lot of excellent writing and melodies, helping to balance out that morbid body end with the chunkier riffs that feel like you're about to be exposed to the innards of some cows and pigs as part of an anti-meat campaign. The first few tracks on here, like "Throne of Confinements" or "Mental Force" are really great, with lots of shifting tempos and memorable guitars.

The production is a bit dry, reminding me of Necroticism, and all the atmosphere here has to emerge from the guitars themselves, but it's rather well-mixed for its day, and the guys have no end to the amount of riffing ideas they can produce from that Carcass palette, nor do they ever lose steam, because there aren't really any duds among the nine tracks and 43 minutes. A couple of riffs here or there also remind one of Pestilence circa Consuming Impulse and Testimony of the Ancients, with perhaps a helping of Chuck Schuldiner, and there's certainly nothing wrong with any of that. A very easy one to recommend to fans of that 90s Carcass material, especially if you felt there was never enough of it, the guitars are the stars of the show but everything else falls in check.

Verdict: Win [8/10]

http://www.golem-metal.de/index.php