The DevilsHorns

It has been a long time since we last had an album by Swedish melodic stalwarts, The Haunted. The new album, Songs of Last Resort is the first full-length since 2017, and if you think these Swedes were settling down into veteran style complacency, then you’d be 100% wrong.

Songs of Last Resort is 12 tracks crammed into under 41 minutes, and for the most part, it smacks you about like an abusive pimp. The opening track, ‘Warhead’ sets the tone. It welcomes you with a trademark, typical The Haunted riff, with robust drumming and a rather decent vocal performance. As the lead single from the album, you may have heard and, no doubt, enjoyed it.

The thing with The Haunted is that you know what you are going to get with the album. You are going to get pounding death metal riffs, ‘In Fire Reborn’, ‘Hell is Wasted on the Dead’. You will get wicked solo’s, ‘Death to the Crown’, ‘Blood Clots’. You will get incredibly consistent drumming, and superb vocals through out.

Songs of Last Resort is a very welcome return. It is almost great. It is a magnificent album that uses every aspect of the bands arsenal, chainsaw riffs, jagged riffs, smooth riffs, all riffs that get the head nodding.

But then, the intensity does seem to level off in the last 2 songs. Yes, they are still rather decent, but in terms of the rat-a-tat-a-tat nature of the preceding tracks, it kind of left me a bit let-down as the last track faded from memory. This is, of course, a review based on 1 listen. Perhaps further listens will make a little more sense to me. Perhaps it will prove my 1 listen review to be a bit of nonsense?

I will enjoy listening to the album again, now this is written, to prove me wrong.

Songs of Last Resort is a welcome return from the Swedish boys, and I look forward to many future listens.

The Haunted Website

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