Gates of Slumber Call New Album Their ‘Sad Wings of Destiny’

'True metal' is the most appropriate of all the tags that have been bestowed on Indiana's Gates of Slumber. While most would argue the band fits the classic definition of doom metal, guitarist and vocalist Karl Simon doesn't "really know how doom we are. We kind of started in that vein, but there have been so many other influences that have come in ... that genre tag stuff," Simon bemoans, "I think it's important to a degree, to help you develop what you're trying to do with yourself. But eventually you need to just change everything up and go for something new."

On Sept. 29, Gates of Slumber will release their fourth studio record, 'Hymns of Blood and Thunder,' a thunderous metal explosion fueled by the metal of the 1970s and early 1980s. "That's where we draw our influence from," Simon says. "That's where our heads are at -- '69 to '83 ... and then, just kind of gun it through a prism of all the stuff that's happened in between. Where we get the bulk of our inspiration is stuff like Deep Purple, Cream, Black Sabbath ... and then some of the later stuff, like St. Vitus, Manilla Road. It gives it this nice kind of blend between the organic '70s sound and that very early '80s Scorpions and Thin Lizzy kind of thing. And of course, then we put our own spin on it."

Gates of Slumber's latest sounds like the metal those of us past 30 grew up on, but it's still fresh enough to attract folks who were raised on Limp Bizkit and Disturbed. It's bleak, morose, and yet sounds crisp and punishing. 'Hymns of Blood and Thunder' is just one of those fist-pumpers that make you wish you were pounding beers, wearing a jean jacket covered with one huge Iron Maiden patch, and talking about vikings."We definitely try to go our own way and really not pay attention to what other bands are doing, because if you do that ... you can only be so original, because of the limitations of the instruments, and there are only so many riffs that are going to sound cool on a guitar," Simon says. "I guarantee you, if you sit there and you think you have the most original riff, just wade through the thousands of records that have been written over the last 30 years.

"It's going to be pretty close to something someone else did. If its like not dissonant-based. Dissonant stuff can be completely new, but we always try to not focus on what other people are doing or what trends are going on. We kind of just work on ourselves, and try to be that. I'd rather go my own way."

This latest release isn't a concept album, per-se (though the cover art might lead one to assume as much). If there's any sort of concept that runs through Gates of Slumber's music, it's the music itself.

"Thematically, it moves from theme to theme to theme, but musically, we really wanted to make a record that's basically like our 'Sad Wings of Destiny' [Judas Priest's second album] ... a record where you put it on, and the first song leads you to the second to the third to the fourth.

"And the next thing you know, you've finished a record without skipping a song," Simon says. "Back in the vinyl days, that was the goal. You wanted someone to play one whole album side, and be intrigued enough to flip it over. Today, most kids skip around and pick and choose what songs they want. That's why we wanted to make a record that was musically compelling enough that people would leave the skip button alone. The pacing of the record, the way the songs flow together musically ... therein lies the concept. Lyrically, we're all over the place."