When it comes to metal there is no bigger band than Gojira for me. Since discovering them in 2010 they've been a driving force in my life. I'll never forget the day. 17 year old me was going to see Metallica. I had arrived at the show early to get a good spot and that meant I got to see the two support bands Gojira and Fear Factory. I hadn't heard of either before, and when Gojira took to the stage and started blasting Oroborus I was in complete awe. I talk more about this experience in this post.
When bands like Gojira release new stuff I'm always nervous. They're so huge to me and I don't want to feel any kind of disappointment towards them. They also churn out some of the very best live shows I've ever seen and I'm terrified they will release music I don't like to ruin that experience in the future. The new album Fortitude has been a roller coaster of emotions for me but in the end ecstasy and joy emerged victorious.
Metal InjectionA taste of singles
Over the past months leading up to the album release they've released several singles as teasers for the new album. Five in total which is almost half of the total 11 songs on the album. Personally I'm not a huge fan of listening to singles and I often stay away until I can hear the songs on an album. A single has the power to create a lot of expectations both for good and bad. I find more than often it's for the bad.
I wasn't able to stay away though so I listened to all of them as they released. Out of the five singles they released I didn't like any of them. I didn't feel like any of the songs had any soul. The vocals felt really weak and the technicality that I used to love about Gojira just wasn't there.
They had kept one aspect that I really like about them though and that's the meaning behind the songs. The members of Gojira are amazing people that strive to make the world a better place. They are avid contributors to the Sea Shepherd project and any proceeds they make from their new song Amazonia will go towards protecting the rain forests from greed and corporations. This is also why A Sight to Behold is one of my favorite songs from their earlier album The Way of all Flesh if you listen to the lyrics.
All of this comes to light in their music video for Amazonia:
Enter the album release
Being disappointed by singles has happened to me before. When Frank Carter & the Rattlesnakes released singles for their, at the time, upcoming album End of Suffering I felt the same. The hard hitting punk sound of Frank Carter was gone. Then the album released and I was in complete awe. It was their best work yet in my opinion. The singles Crowbar and Anxiety quickly turned out to be my two favorite tracks on the album. It was the same thing with Kvelertak leading up to the release of Nattesferd.
So when Fortitude dropped yesterday I sat down to listen to it and I was immediately disappointed. Everything I didn't like about the singles reverberated through the whole album. I was grumpy and bitter at work all day because of this. Had it finally happened? Had Gojira lost it? It couldn't be.
So I sat down to listen to it again after work. This time I was prepared for what was coming and to my own surprise I absolutely loved it. All of the songs just started to make sense. The groovyness and chanty/choirish vocals that I didn't like before just resonated with me all of a sudden. Songs that felt really weak the firs time around turned out to be the strongest ones. I guess this time I listened to it as an album and not as 11 songs.
The single I liked the least, The Chant turned out to be my favorite. The transition of Fortitude into The Chant is a work of art. The other singles Born For One Thing, Amazonia, Another World and Into The Storm are actually really strong songs afterall. The groove that I hated from Amazonia I'm now really digging. I sort of feel like my own musical tastes are evolving along Gojira's musical talent. They really are a big influence on me.
The music video to The Chant is a really strong one. It highlights one of those political themes that Gojira so stand for. It also lets you check out that awesome transition from Fortitude (first part of the song before the instruments start). I'm getting goosebumps.
Another thing I noticed after listening to the album for what was probably the fifth time was that the second part of the album sounds different to the first. The album has 11 songs, five before Fortitude, and five more after. Fortitude is more of an interlude than a song on its own. I thought the album sounded different before and after fortitude but couldn't quite place it. The notes sounded deeper and grungier.
Quite randomly while checking out the lyrics to the songs I stumbled upon this quote from Joe Duplantier:
This is a leap from the metal songs to a weird, Indigenous type of rock song. There’s a change of tonality also. The beginning of the album is a G, and then towards the end it’s a C. As the intro to this song, ‘Fortitude’ is something that orients your ear towards another field of notes, so it’s preparing the brain to make room. When “The Chant” hits, it feels two times harder and stronger than it would be if it was directly after another song. It’s a mantra with an intention of unification through peace and strength, something that the human race needs a lot. Joe Duplantier
I guess that confirms it. I found that detail really cool. I started reading through quotes from Joe on all of the different songs and I got a lot of confirmation to details I had noticed. For example the intro to The Sphinx reminded me a lot of Metallica for some reason, and he confirmed here that it was actually the case.
I'm gonna have to make an effort to not let this album consume me wholly. I still want to listen to Kryptograf that I discovered recently. I also have to check out the new album from Cannibal Corpse, Violence Unimagined which I've been putting off.
If y'all into Gojira let me know what you think about the album!