What a way to discover a band. While and friend and I were traveling on the train from Denmark to Germany late last year, we started chatting to three metalheads who walked into our cabin. Long story short, after quite a while we found out it was German melodic death metal band Fear My Thoughts, whom we hadn’t heard of at the time. When I got home and checked them out, I was surprised to see they’ve been around for quite a while, with Hell Sweet Hell being their fourth full length album. Basically what’s on offer is no compromise, no holds barred melodic death metal with a few slight metalcore moments thrown in for good measure. Furiously fast and heavy riffing, guitar harmonies you will lose track of and catchy-as-hell, memorable choruses is the best I can describe Hell Sweet Hell.

The biggest influence on this album I think is early Swedish melodic deathsters At The Gates, particularly in the vocals. Windows For The Dead certainly displays this and wastes no time in getting the ball rolling, kickstarting the album fantastically (although technically track 2, but I'm not counting the pointless intro). Vocalist Mathias Ockl (who subsequently left the band after their next release Vulcanus, but that’s another story) is incredibly versatile, not sticking to one vocal style, but flicking between death growls or more of a gruff sandpaper style shout throughout the album. As far as things go, the songs are fairly inseparable and remain quite consistent, if not a tad repetitive after a while. Windows For The Dead, Sweetest Hell, Master’s Call and Ghosts Of Time remain the biggest standouts, with the most variety and excitement going on throughout the songs. The other songs aren’t really bad in anyway, but average compared to the tracks just mentioned. It could be just me, but the opening riff to My Delight reminds me too much of the theme song to TV show Inspector Gadget, strange.

I don’t think Fear My Thoughts will be a name to set tongues wagging just yet, compared to other melodic deathsters In Flames, Dark Tranquillity, Soilwork and so on, maybe in a few years they will rise in popularity. It’s not like they’re not as talented, they certainly write good, enjoyable music, but I don’t think there’s that special X factor Fear My Thoughts have compared to those other bands. That said, Hell Sweet Hell does get better with each listen, if you think it’s “heard it all before”, it probably is, but there’s still enough variety and slight hooks that become prominent in each song after a few listens and do give them their own sound. Maybe two songs too long, The Fighting and Satisfaction Guaranteed not really (insert your own generic saying here, options could be "cutting the mustard", "packing the punch" or many more) and could be classed as fillers. The ending track Trying To Feel... is interesting, but not really a memorable track. Still, it’s light years better than their previous works, 23 and Vitriol, which were more in the obscure hardcore style.

They have certainly worked their asses off to get where they are today by touring with some big names and releasing consistent and decent albums. Being snapped up by Century Media after this release (again I won’t bring the new album into play) is a great success and I’m so happy for them. Despite a few minor flaws here and there, Hell Sweet Hell remains an enjoyable album to listen to, no doubt about it. Headbanging a-plenty, great riffs and melodies and very strong vocals make this an above-average release in the melodic death field.