Goldust “Destroyer | Borderlines” CD/LP

6.21.2010

Goldust - Destroyer | Borderlines "Destroyer | Borderlines" (released on CD by Let it Burn Records with Apil Records handling the vinyl) is the latest full-length outing from prolific German act Goldust, unloading another 12 tracks/nearly 40 minutes of their always solid metallic hardcore. Going off track for a minute, I must say that I really appreciate Goldust being so good about keeping me posted on their latest activity. The majority of the bands that I write about never really keep in touch after the fact, and I'm so busy/absent-minded these days that I have a really hard time trying to follow-up with hundreds of MySpace pages to determine when bands have new material available, etc. Goldust, however, is always quick to let me know when a new release is on the horizon—hence this is already the fifth time I've written about this band (two splits, an EP, and two full-lengths since 2007), and they even did a demo and a 7" before that!

With such a constant stream of output, you'd almost have to expect the quality of Goldust's material to start fading out a little bit, but that's not the case at all. In fact, this is easily their strongest outing to date. Once more the band has started to introduce subtle new shifts that make a huge difference. This time out it's a handful of sludgy, slightly rockin' riffs/leads; and more importantly some unexpectedly melodic fare that provides an almost catchy sense of energy. This may suggest some sort of significant stylistic shift, but fear not, as the core of the band's approach is still straight up metallic hardcore with plenty of those chugging rhythms and a dark, dissonant edge—accented by occasional fits of more metal-based influences like near-grinding blasts and thrashy picking patterns. Though I must admit that I think the intriguing melodic tendencies heard in "The Clawed One", "To No Avail", and "Passage" should definitely be explored further! Since I've posted about these guys so many times now I feel like I'm running out of stuff to say, so... here's a track to judge for yourselves:

Goldust "Passage"