I remember that I’ve found out about this piece
of vinyl by accident, when I’ve been checking some news about Kaamos around the
time, when they were just to release “Scales of Leviathan”. And of course I
wouldn’t be myself, if I didn’t want to purchase a copy of the LP version, as
soon as it was available. And so I did, which I’m very happy about nowadays,
knowing how difficult is this, as well as all other Kaamos vinyls, difficult to
get nowadays. This mini album comes on 12”LP, but the music is just on one side
of the record (side B has no music, there’s just a graphic on it). And there’s
a huge poster, but it looks rather poorly, plus an insert with the lyrics and
some additional graphics (I like the layout of it a lot!). So, I can say that
the LP looks quite effectively, but it’s the music, what counts most of corpse.
But that aspect surprised me even more, as in my opinion “Scales of Leviathan”
is the best release in short Kaamos discography!
It kicks off with the title song and I must say
that “Scales of Leviathan” is just a killer tune, it’s definitely the best
track for me from all, which Kaamos has composed ever. It is just fantastic,
the riffing in it is superb, with many great, aggressive parts, killer
atmosphere and there’s of course also this chorus part, where you just need to
scream “Scalesssss of Leeeeviathaaaaannnn”, banging along with more doomy
riffage, so lovely infectious and devastating it is!!!!!!!!! I’m crazy about
this song, really, it’s one of those tracks, which could be played on my
funeral, if I was going to choose some. Then “Darkness Awaits” begins just like
an old Morbid Angel song, from their early albums! The riffing is quite
similar, thick and slashing, with this great vibe and even slightly resembling
sound and only Karl’s vocals distinguish Kaamos from the good old Morbid Angel.
Yeah, all in all – we are all morbid, right? And really, when I hear the
opening riff of “Blood Has Stained the Cross” I also have a feeling like it’s
very close to say “Maze of Torment”. Anyway, Kaamos has enough guts and talent
to create something own, so even if there’s a part, which reminds me Morbid
Angel, then next one will be very different and all in all I can easily
recognise that this is Kaamos playing, with their characteristic sound, some specific
riffs and rhythmic and also due to very characteristic vocals of Karl!
“Scales of Leviathan” offers five tracks in
total, circling around 20 minutes. Along with the three killer tunes that I
mentioned above, there’s also one song, which fits the whole material
perfectly, but which at the same time sounds very different to the rest of the
material. This song is called “Spiritual Funeral” and is really slow, doomy,
has an eerie, sinister atmosphere and a lot of surprises, but I must say that
even though it differs so much form the rest of Kaamos material, I like it a
lot. Somehow it’s also quite cool feeling that such epic and mournful doom
death metal song ends the last chapter (maybe??) in the Kaamos history. You can
call it a funeral march in many ways! Anyway, I love “Scales of Leviathan”, it
is truly a superb release and I can only honour Kaamos for deciding to quit
with their best material, never wimping out and without unleashing poor music.
Final rate: 90/100
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