Neuroscientists have studied the development of the human brain for quite some time. What they still don’t know about it vastly outweighs what they do. One thing they do know is around the beginning of your teenage years and into your 20s, your brain is busy building and pruning the pathways that will become mostly permanent. They theorize that this is why we are so attached to the music we listened to during that time. That music is literally hardwired into your brain.
That is why the debut full length album from Majesties, Vast Reaches Unclaimed, managed to jettison me back in time to when I was 16 and seeking out all kinds of “new to me” metal. I was a few years behind the glory days of the Gothenburg sound but was obsessed with bands like At The Gates and In Flames. In their first offering, Majesties does that style complete and total justice.
Vast Reaches Unclaimed has everything you would want from a melodic death metal album. The vocals are filled with anguish and pain, very reminiscent of the Tomas Linberg of the mid-90s. The guitars are impeccable, absolutely nailing the melodic nature of the style. The bass helps tie it all together and keep the low-end heaviness. And the drums are suited so well to the band and that Gothenburg sound, the deep sounding snare, modest but intense blast beats, it’s all there. Even the production sounds and feels authentic to Gothenburg, albeit better and cleaner than most releases from that era.
I know a lot of you can be skeptical of a “revival,” of sorts. Believe me when I tell you this is more than just an attempt at reviving or copying a sound. This album sounds like it could have come out a couple of years before Slaughter Of The Soul and The Jester Race and completely held it’s own. Honestly, if I did not know this was a new band and new album, I would assume it was a Gothenburg band I had never heard of. Majesties holds their own on Vast Reaches Unclaimed and manage to make a roughly 30-year-old style sound new again.
Overall Score: 9/10
Review by: Dan Perretta
