Metal Hammer Features Editor Amit Sharma got his hands on a copy if the new GOJIRA album yesterday so the mag got him to run his critical ears over the new album ‘L’Enfant Sauvage’ and you can check out some extracts from his track-by-track guide below…

1. Explosia
It only takes Gojira 10 seconds to prove that they are once again back with a record that will melt your ears into a pool of bloody mess.

2. L’Enfant Sauvage
The title track is even faster. Whilst they maintain a perpetual brain-simmering heaviness, there are cleaner melodies that seem to leap out of nowhere and sit above the crushing rhythms, adding a cerebral progressive edge to their signature brand of skull-crushing metal.

3. The Axe
If Mastodon were more death metal influenced, this is what they would sound like… The Axe carries a searching, torch-bearing sense of pilgrimage with a chorus that is hellishly catchy and wouldn’t sound that out of place on Enslaved’s last record Axioma Ethica Odini.

4. Liquid Fire
Liquid Fire picks things up in tempo with apocalyptic sized riffs and Joe Duplantier’s instantly recognisable usage of guitar harmonics.

5. The Wild Healer
The Wild Healer is a short, instrumental track that is pretty mellow for Gojira – it’s atmospheric and spacey. But you know this is just the quiet before the storm.

6. Planned Obsolescence
Planned Obsolescence is a total face-melter, echoing the gloriously heavy, fist-in-the-face noise of Morbid Angel’s Domination but with added intensity.

7. Mouth Of Kala
This is Gojira showing their groovey side, once again stepping out towards the progressive and not far off Mastodon’s heavier work.

8. The Gift Of Guilt
This opens with a tapping lick that is part Angus Young and part Eddie Van Halen, though there’s nothing classic rock about it

9. Pain Is A Master
Another ambient excursion off into more progressive realms. Pain Is A Master lures the listener to a false sense of security… this lullaby turns into a death metal nightmare very, very quickly.

10. Born In Winter
The shimmering structures of Born In Winter are a definite highlight on this record…

11. The Fall
The Fall starts off like something off Nine Inch Nail’s The Fragile before evolving into an acid-marinated anthem that is dark, psychedelic and sickeningly heavy.

Read the full low down over on Metal Hammer’s website by clicking here – we think they may just approve!

Find out more about GOJIRA’s upcoming album by clicking here.