Since 1994 Lamb Of God have almost been in a league of their own.
Formed by John Campbell and Chris Adler, with Mark Morton joining soon after followed by vocalist Randy Blythe after the bands third demo.
After initially starting life as Burn The Priest, the band changed their name to the more user friendly Lamb Of God and released the album New American Gospel in late 2000, ushering heavy metal into the new millennium in style.
In the 22 years since Lamb Of God have released nothing but quality albums, in the process entrenching their name amongst the greats of metal such as Metallica, Slayer and Pantera.
Not content to be mentioned alongside such legendary acts, Lamb Of God have refused to rest on their laurels, pushing themselves on each new album. 2020's self titled release lit the fires for a new generation, but with their latest offering Omens set for release on October 7 you get the impression Lamb Of God are only just starting to fully settle into their groove.
The press release calls Omens "arguably Lamb Of God's most aggressive and ambitious work to date", and after listening to an advance copy I would be hard pressed to argue.
HEAVY caught up with Campbell earlier this week to discuss Omens.
"I'm excited to finally get it out there," he beamed. "We recorded it back in February and we were working on it well before that. I think it's our best record ever - as I do with every one because we're constantly trying to outdo ourselves and I think somehow we do it every time. This record is no different. This time we recorded it differently in that normally we would learn our parts, go to the studio, and go do the separate parts in the studio and track our parts and then that would be put together by the producer. This time we went in and tracked live to get that live feel. Those were the tracks we started with and pulled out the parts that were amazing. It was really for drum takes more than anything, but going for those live takes we really got the feel that they would translate well live so that was a different method of recording. The songs, I think we have really good at using our craft and writing. There are great songs on this that are very dynamic. There's more tunes as well as thrash. There's hard core and then a little experimental reaching out. Just some real heavy metal."
In the full interview, John responds to the press releases claims about the album, tracking at Henson Recording Studios where artists like The Doors and The Ramones produced classic albums, the writing process from album to album and how it changes, the early days of Lamb Of God, why they chose Blythe as vocalist, a possible visit Down Under and more.