REVIEW: ARCH ENEMY 'KHAOS LEGIONS' (CENTURY MEDIA)

You don't need to be told that Arch Enemy are a load of mid-paced, plodding, cancerous garbage, that's one of the first conclusions people come to in their journey through death metal. In that respect they form a vital first touchstone for newcomers to the genre, who whatever their level of immersion into extremity, knowledge of Napalm Death demo order or the the significance of the the different coloured vortexes on Massacre's 'From Beyond', they can all rally around the fact that Arch Enemy are lazily pushing a little dingy through the foetid, still end of the great genre lake and skimming dirty great bucketfuls of stale water, condoms and dead animals from the murk.

'Khaos Legions' is, obviously, another such bucket of all the crap bits from melodeath and Swedish death metal. Watered down with the brackish fluid of lowest common denominator, and bound together neatly by those iconic Mike Amott riffs which were cool in Carnage, fun in Carcass and incredibly, unendingly tedious to hear dragged out since. The basic mechanism is the same as Hatebreed – they take 90s metalcore and NYHC, throw in some broadly applicable anthems about being vaguelly 'down' and vaguelly 'overcoming' them, and then the $$$$ comes spewing in. But hardcore is pretty basic anyway, and its power comes from the simplicity of its delivery, the primal thump-thump-thump of its riffage. Death metal, even in the sausage fingers of bands like Severe Torture and Jungle Rot, is intense and comparatively complicated, and Arch Enemy reduce this to the point of nothing. 'Khaos Legions' isn't even musically terrible, it's just nothing. Absolute nothing – not even the song-titles stick. Rare is the eardrum that will come away with any lasting impression.

Which leaves us only with the image as any sort of talking point. Dressed in anarchy symbols and the black-fucking-flag, Arch Enemy are suddenly offering up their punk-rock status in deference of their shameless corporate might, acres of sponsorship and 17 euro t-shirts. This isn't all that new – Angela Gossow has been touting herself as some sort of feminist icon for ages, despite posing for sexy photoshoots (well, about as sexy as you can get when you're some sort of weird robot creature) and, well, not doing anything that women in music haven't been doing for decades.

Women in punk have never felt the need to push their gender to the fore, it's just a biological fact like asthma or big feet – it might inform the lyrics, but the band are supposed to be bigger than any one person. From Crass to Bolt Thrower, bands rooted in punk rock, tossed aside any attempt to view their art through the lens of gender as offensive and patronising. And here are Arch Enemy, offering up claims up punk status, of liberation politics, in one hand – and confirming the lack of a penis as being some how amazing and remarkable with the other.

I'm a strong, powerful woman – pat me on the head and feed me a fucking peanut.