The genre
of doomed death metal has seemed to pick up speed over the last
few years. Sweden of course shall give to us a supreme band in
the form of THE GARDNERZ. You may dismiss the name upon
first hearing it, but don’t let it fool you. THE GARDNERZ
will amaze you with their gloomy mix of death metal and doom metal
on The System Of Nature.
As the album
begins with The Art Of Suffering you may think of Katatonia
with its slow and somber guitar tones, but then the song cracks
open to reveal growling death metal vocals and heavy Swedish leads.
All while keeping a mid pace beat, if you can imagine that. The
layers of the guitars are a dreamy sound scape of infinite melancholy.
As the next song Lady In The Grave comes in we are treated
to more elaborate vocals of both growling and black metal type
screams, almost like a duel. Backed by intricate guitar leads
that seem to mesmerize. As we go on to Shift In Thought
the black metal vocals are back and the guitars are howling. Flaw
In The Axiom will draw you in within the first few bars of
the song, with its sorrowful and distant leads, as the song progresses
into an abyss of dwelling, the ambient solo repeats throughout
the song like a chorus. You aren’t going to find any fast
paced songs or blast beats on this album. However, you aren’t
going to find anything lame about it either. THE GARDNERZ
know how to keep it heavy and they do it quite well. Think Runemagick,
Amorphis and Hypocrisy if you will. There is definitely a Swedish
old school sound to the guitars, and they dominate the album to
their fullest potential. So many different sounds to them from
acoustic to fast and heavy leads, and technically beautiful solos.
Having just signed to Abyss records with Dan Swano at the controls,
that should tell you right away that THE GARDNERZ are quite
worthy, after only having been in existence for two years.