Gatecreeper - Deserted


A Logical Step Forward.

(Originally submitted to the Metal Archives on March 21st, 2020)

Arizona's finest Gatecreeper return with their 2019 sophomore release, Deserted, an album which shows the band tweaking and evolving their sound by improving their songwriting and adding more interesting details to their original formula of riffy death metal first seen on 2016's Sonoran Depravation, which, while extremely fun, suffered from being a bit too one dimensional and lacking variety. Deserted builds on the extremely solid foundation laid by its predecessor without losing what originally made Gatecreeper appealing to begin with.

The album's opens up with the title track, "Deserted", a slow-to-mid paced crusher that gives us a taste of what we're going to be getting throughout this album and some of the new elements introduced to their tried-and-true formula. The song actually has some leads in it and a solo, things that were originally seen on the Sweltering Madness EP, which released 2 years prior. It is then followed by "Puncture Wounds", a more straightforward cut reminiscent of what we saw on the debut, proving that they haven't forgotten how to write punishing death metal riffs. 

Those two are then followed by the best tracks on the album, "From The Ashes" and "Ruthless", the former of which has some excellent riffwork, with a breakdown around the halfway point that slowly builds up with a lead to a fantastic melodic riff that still maintains its headbanging capabilities, while the latter opens up with a bass break and moves at a faster pace than most of the tracks on the album.

The closer, "Absence of Light" is also worthy of mention due to its doom influenced riffs and solemn tone, which is a perfect way to close off this album. 

While the album is very consistent all around, it's not without fault, as there are a couple of tracks that aren't all that interesting, such as "Barbaric Pleasures" and "Sweltering Madness", the latter being taken from the EP of the same name. Both of these cuts don't really do anything interesting and feel like they're sticking to a rather formulaic structure, and they should have either been cut out of the album or replaced by tracks such as "Mastery of Power", the other track off Sweltering Madness, or the digital-only bonus track, "Anxiety".

Lyrically the tracks have quite a bit of variety, ranging from isolation and decay (Deserted), to more gore influenced lyrics typical of death metal (Puncture Wounds, Ruthless, Sweltering Madness), sex (Barbaric Pleasures), despair and suicide (Absence of Light), and even some eldritch horror on "Everlasting", and Chase Mason does an exceptional job with his delivery all across the board and has taken a new approach to his vocals, adding a bit of a hardcore bark to his previously unintelligible grunting, which I personally enjoy quite a bit, although it might not be for everyone.

Production wise the album has some differences in comparison to its predecessor, namely the guitars, which have more of an HM-2 buzzsaw sound reminiscent of Entombed, and the bass actually has a place in the mix now and can be heard, and while it doesn't do much of note for the most part it does add to the desolate and heavy feel of the album.

Deserted is an album that shows us a band growing and maturing, honing and improving their craft as they move on in their path as musicians, and showing us that they've quite a bit to prove to their followers, and perhaps even detractors, by not resting on their laurels with their first success, but instead opting to try something new with their music.

Highlights: Deserted, From The Ashes, Ruthless, Absence of Light

Rating: 85% 

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