L'ENFANT SAUVAGE

Lets get right to it.

This album was released a decently long four years from their previous release back in 2008 titled "The Way Of All Flesh", which is brought about because of a few things, one of which a label change. Gojira is more than happy to be releasing this LP under the Roadrunner label, and the quality of this emotion has spread well to their music. The production value has improved vastly (in my opinion) from the first couple albums they released "The Link" and "Terra Incognita" and the wall of heavy I love Gojira for has also shown some great changes, for better or worse depends on one's preference.

Before the release of the album, there have been short clips uploaded to the internet by the band of them recording the album (in New York City) and displaying all the wild and awesome techniques they utilise to create the unique Gojira sound. Among the videos is a clip of the behemoth of a drummer, Mario Duplantier, pounding away on a heavy steel door, microphones set up everywhere. I was greatly interested in this idea. This is album is going to be good.

Upon it's release, June 26 2012, I used the first bit of free time to purchase this album, and listened to it intensely and repeatedly over the next few days. I was not disappointed.

Kicking off L'enfant Sauvage ("The Wild Child" for those who don't speak French) is the explosive track "Explosia"and it does more than a fantastic job of starting this simply awesome album. Right off the bat it sets up the incredibly heavy mood of music that is Gojira, with the slow and definite intro riff. Following this is a series of technical drumming rhythms and guitar sections, over-flowing with guitarist and vocalist, Joe Duplantier's, intense ability to manipulate the guitar to speak in tongues with the music and to the audience. The effects he can conjure up are simply amazing. Ending this track is an amazing and yet simple, a but also heavy riff, which goes on, fading out, for around two minutes, allowing the listener to anticipate the next track.

The title track is the second song on L'enfant Sauvage, and it sure does an incredible job of being on the album it's named after (or vice versa, whichever happened first) The song begins with a quiet guitar riff opening up to another heavy riff, allowing the song to begin in proper Gojira fashion. Simplistic, yet brutal and progressively heavy. The song seems to follow a fairly simple structure, i.e. intro, verse, etc, but it delivers all that it needs to, so this should not be a problem for some of the most picky prog metal fans. Around the 2:20 mark opens up an incredible section of brutally heavy guitar and bass riffage that I simply love in Gojira. Perfectly placed in the song, and delivers no disappointment. The end half contains a bridge and more of the intro riff, followed by it's quite outro riff.

The third song, "The Axe" shows to be a fairly simple song, but does not let me down. It is filled with Mario's ability to play the bass drum loud and definitely there, and is quite excellent despite a more or less simple song. It is a track that belongs on a Gojira record, that is for sure.

Following "The Axe" is the song "Liquid Fire", this song also kills the doubt that Gojira is still awesome as they have been. It's contents involve Joe's fantastic ability to use his incredible and unique voice, accompanied by the technicality that Mario possesses on the battery. It also follows well the algorithm of L'enfant Sauvage.

Placed just before the LPs middle is an instrumental interlude "The Wild Healer", a short two minute section of a repeating riff with simple drums. Nicely placed to help transition the listener into the next, fantastically heavy, track.

At L'enfant Sauvage's middle is "Planned Obsolescence", an awesome track indeed. Heavy from the get go, with no messing around. This is the intensity that the band does so well, placed perfectly after a mellow interlude, "The Wild Healer" is similar to the transition from "From Mars" to "To Sirius" Found in their 2006 release "From Mars To Sirius" It is a fantastically awesome transition from light to heavy. It is the first track to focus attention on the intense ability Mario contains in blast-beats.

The remaining half of the album contains more or less, the expected second half of L'enfant Sauvage; The intensity is still hanging around, and Gojira is mostly able to keep their energy up and running. It is all accented quite well with their heavy attitude shown through the instruments. A track I would like to single out from the remaining five ("Mouth of Kala", "The Gift Of Guilt", "Pain Is A Master", "Born In Winter" and "The Fall") is "The Gift Of Guilt" This song possesses more of what I love from Gojira, and was my instant favourite off the album. It's starts of with a light tapping guitar part, into the heavier version of the same riff, much like From Mars To Sirius' "Global Warming", and goes into the bulk of the song. The contents of this song is more heavy and extreme Gojira, with the riff holding on to more of Joe's awesome ability to morph the sounds coming from his guitar into unique squeaking and yelling. Despite all technical elements of the song, it holds on to a fairly simple chorus, though the chorus delivers well and displays little room for disappointment, if any were to be found if looked for anyway.

All in all, this album is quite simply a 7.5/10; yes it contains an incredible amount of awesome, and is definitely worth the wait of four years since The Way Of All Flesh, but it still lacks something. It's difficult to say what it needs, but I find it slows down a bit after the middle point; L'enfant Sauvage opens very well, and holds on to its intensity easily into the middle, but starts to slip a bit towards the end. This does not mean that it becomes anywhere near bad towards the end, I just feel that they should close the album as, if not more, powerful as they opened. Despite this, however, upon seeing them play selected tracks from the album live, I can say the live performance of any songs played were beyond awesome. These songs are definitely meant, whether intentional or not, to be played live. I can say I look forward to next release, being the the EP "Sea Sheppard"

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