Let's face it: Meshuggah are the kings of Scandinavian metal. They're better than At the Gates; they're better than the Haunted; lord knows they're better than Children of Bodom; and, you might not have the balls to say it, but fuck it, I do: they're better than Entombed (past and present). How can I make such a bold statement? Easy. One word: originality. Meshuggah doesn't sound like anyone else. Sure, there are influences, but, as Robert Urich's main man Emeril would say, they kick it up a notch.
Now, Soilwork-- they're no Meshuggah. But they're close. Damn close. In fact, they even reinvent some of Meshuggah's greatest attributes just to drive that point home. Sure, the guitar solos echo Fredrik Thordendal's, and even Bjorn Strid's vocals have taken on a Jens Kidman-like affectation, but with enough quick stops and starts to put you in a neckbrace and a sonic assault as raw as a head of lettuce, Natural Born Chaos stands as their tightest and most pummeling record yet. The fact that it tops 2000's staggering The Chainheart Machine is only icing (but victorious icing, after last year's spotty A Predator's Portrait).
The one thing Soilwork has working in their favor that Meshuggah don't, though, is a goddamned sense of melody. I know what you're thinking, but yes, there's plenty of room in metal for melody. Ask Steve Fucking Harris if you don't believe me. Soilwork switches back and forth between completely brutal thrash metal to melodic power metal without so much as battering an eyelash. All of the key elements to a good metal record are here: it's crunches and grinds with growling verses and anthemic choruses, and of course, there are those glorious fucking guttural, demonic invocations that, in some other genres, are referred as "vocals." There are even keyboards, for Christ's sake! I'm talking good atmospheric shit, too, not that overbearing, in-your-face classical crap Enchant forces on the Dream Theater pansies. (Think "Separate Ways," not "The Final Countdown.")
In fact, the only real drawback to the record as a whole is that some of its songs just sound like the old Soilwork. Imagine if you were halfway through a listen to the Flaming Lips' The Soft Bulletin, and right in the middle they threw in some stuff from Hit to Death in the Future Head. Don't get me wrong, Hit to Death is a damn good album, but you know, you don't get that kind of contrast on records we in the business would call "classics."
Natural Born Chaos peaks with the back-to-back shrapnel-spitting of "As We Speak" and "The Flameout." Both are incredibly dense and heavy, and somehow also maniacally catchy-- a combination that has evaded most of the strongest Swedish metal bands going. Also, it should be noted that "Mindfields" has one of the coolest pauses I've heard in a while (who doesn't like a good pause?). The only two songs that most readily come to mind as being misses are the title track (which could nearly make it onto MTV if it rode out its opening rhythm), and the closer, "Song of the Damned," which anticlimactically loses some of the steam the rest of the album had built up. But I only name those two songs because I feel like I have to name something. They're not actually bad songs. They're just not quite as mind-altering as some of the others. And "Song of the Damned" is a kinda dorky name. Whatever.
