I must admit, today I get to present a band that is a bit of an oddity in their sound. Today I get to present the album "Age of Decay" by IN THOUSAND LAKES, but I am not certain on how I want to describe their sound. Their self-described sound is one of melodic death metal, and there are certainly aspects of that present in the song pacing and structure, the drums, and perhaps some of the riffs by the lead guitar, yet there also seems to be heavy influences from some aspects of rock as well as a more intensive use of the "New Wave of British Heavy Metal" elements. Their sound could just as easily fall into categories bordering regular heavy metal. For better or worse, while Melodeath metal might be the best overarching term, there are seemingly too many variations to put the band in one area or another of subgenres. As for the sake of brevity I will dive right in.

The album opens with "Death Train", and as stated before it has the drum beat that lies somewhere between traditional heavy metal and Melodeath metal, but it is the bass and riffs that give it the sound that could easily make its lie with heavy metal. In the entirety of this song, this does not vary much. There is also a somewhat arbitrary pacing of the vocals that makes them seem unnecessarily spaced out at some times and then becoming much more in line with the beat at others. It is just kind of strange and hard to describe and label the song as a whole. It does not create much of an impression yet has an odd sound and weird design decisions in it. "Fall Into the Void" has a much more traditional sound, especially with its more rapidly alternating chords in its intro. However, it still lacks an ability to make an impression. It is not a bad song by any means, it is just not really interesting or unique. The song does have a nice guitar solo that is good, yet as a whole nothing sticks out particularly. "I Rise" sort of continues this trend. It again contains a kind of more rock or British heavy metal intensive sound while incorporating aspects such as rapidly plucked chords to create a perceived sense of speed and some more traditional Melodeath riffs here and there, but nothing sticks out except perhaps the more than noticeable use of bass. Whether it is good or not, there is a far more noticeable bass in this song, and the previous 2 before this one were already above average for your average band. Yet again, it does not do much for the song, it is just a stated fact.

Compared to some of the other material on the album, "Hunter of Souls" is by far the oddest, especially in terms of its opening. It opts for a really strange pop/rock esque opening, and just as randomly as they opened with it it was gone but started to have a more Metalcore and Melodeath fusion sound for the song, although separate from this the song has some really odd progression and pacing. There does not seem to be much merit to the order or progression of the song's structure, and in the end it makes it just seemingly random, and the sudden use of pop sounding elements just adds to the confusion. Truthfully, many of the songs continue with this trend. There does not seem to be much structure through many of the songs, and there are suddenly added elements that are more than just slight changes to experiment with, in such a way that is not easily dismissed without explanation. It is not that the album is bad per se, just kind of random and sloppy. Even then, it fails to make an impression and feels lukewarm at best. It is here I must end. Are there people who will enjoy it? I am sure of it. However, I feel it might be a narrower than usual audience. For today for IN THOUSAND LAKES, I cannot highly recommend their newest album and think that perhaps they might want to review their formula for songwriting.