Time is a fickle thing in every sense, especially when we’re talking about bands going from one album to another. Normally, you’d expect that with more time comes more experience and, thus, any given act getting better over time, yet that’s sadly not the case for everyone. We could talk for hours about bands that have been around for over ten years that started out promising but are now a shadow of their former selves. Fortunately, time has smiled upon the likes of Legendarium who have gotten exponentially better for their upcoming offering that was leagues beyond the effort before that.

What intrigues me most about what “Reign in Repose” brings to the table is that there really isn’t the slightest change in the band’s sound (at least on the surface). That catches my eye really only because the sound that Legendarium was dishing out before was a little rough at best, but I could tell in the very spirit of the performances and how well everything came together for the most part that Legendarium had much more to offer. But that still didn’t properly prepare me for what I found within “Reign in Repose”. This is far a masterpiece, don’t get me wrong, but it’s far past anything that I thought we were going to get within these ten tracks giving us a very healthy dosage of heavy metal that’s always being seasoned tastefully by a ton of other styles that range from thrash to doom to goth in a way that feels as though it works a lot more than it should. Legendarium goes out of their way to make “Reign in Repose” an extremely eclectic work that never strays too far from its core sound without being afraid to switch things up a little bit, and all of that is without even talking about the bump in quality at play here that my words can do no justice for; you simply need to hear it for yourself. But it’s between all the delectable riffs, the pin-point perfect sense of heaviness, melodies that are often out of this world, the great conceptual theme that runs throughout “Reign in Repose”, or anything else that’s at play here that you realize Legendarium is quickly becoming a name that can do something truly awesome the likes of which the scene will be forced to take notice. I couldn’t say how soon or how long it will be before that happens, but I’m keeping my eyes peeled for it because I don’t want to miss that at all.

The underground is filled with thousands upon thousands of secrets that few are ever fortunate enough to come across, and Legendarium is one of them. But it’s hopefully with the graces of time that this band will see “Reign in Repose” become something that many will eagerly throw themselves into as they recognize how good the material is here, and I hope this is just the beginning for this Dutch act.

“Reign in Repose” releases on October 9th!

LISTEN to Legendarium on Bandcamp here.

FOLLOW Legendarium on Twitter: @LegendariumBand