Meshuggah - Catch Thirtythree (20th Anniversary) [2LP Gold & White Marble]

Meshuggah's Catch Thirtythree is one 47-minute avalanche of polyrhythmic dread, and this 20th anniversary edition presents it newly remastered on gold and white marble double vinyl.

Released in 2005, the album saw the Swedish extreme metal pioneers push their concept-driven approach further than ever. Rather than a conventional collection of songs, it plays as a single continuous suite split into thirteen movements, with themes resurfacing and mutating as it unfolds. The drums were programmed rather than played, using the Drumkit from Hell sample library, which gives the record an inhuman, machine-tooled precision that suits its cold, cerebral atmosphere.

The suite opens with "Autonomy Lost," locking straight into a lurching groove that refuses to resolve. "In Death - Is Death" is the monolithic centerpiece, more than thirteen minutes of crushing, hypnotic repetition and eerie ambience, while "Shed" delivers one of the album's most memorable riffs before the closing "Sum" brings everything to a slow, menacing boil.

Two decades on, Catch Thirtythree remains one of the boldest records in Meshuggah's catalog, an uncompromising work that rewards listening from start to finish rather than in pieces. Turn the lights down, start at side one and let the whole thing wash over you, ideally as loud as your neighbors will allow.