There are a few elements of Gojira’s style that you can hear snaking their way into other bands as the French metal quartet’s influence grew – the wall-of-sound guitar tones and those weird harmonic scrapes being the most notable. Interestingly those are the first things to be largely, though not entirely, jettisoned as the band explores new ground on Magma.
Recorded in their own studio in New York, the comfortable setting seems to have inspired a more relaxed, stripped back sonic aesthetic, which is almost the opposite of what you might expect, given the record’s origins. It was written and recorded while the Duplantier brothers’ mother was dying, and rather than retreat into the kind of obsessive layering that some musicians have found themselves digging into when trying to distract themselves from personal woes (think Devin Townsend’s Infinity), Gojira has gone for clarity and directness.
The songwriting is more about the groove and the hook this time around, although make no mistake, it’s very much a metal record and very much a Gojira record. This band’s version of ‘accessible’ is still pretty damn crushing, and not made for FM ears. Freed from the weight of those massive guitar armies, Joe Duplantier seems to let his vocal melodies take more of the focus. Lyrically it’s a dark, moody album and yet the crunchiness of the guitars lends a feel of optimism.
Some fans have voiced a bit of disappointment with this record. They’re nuts. It’s not the perfect Gojira album but after all these years the band has earned the right to strip back the layers and present a sound more like what you’ll hear if you see them live.
BY PETER HODGSON
