Chaos Doctrine came down on the metal world like the hammer of Thor in February this year with a shredding track called “Black Friday Bedlam”, featuring Swedish metal legend Jörgen Sandström (Entombed, Grave, Torture Division, Krux, The Project Hate) on vocals. If you watched the lyric video, you would have caught a peek at the title and artwork of the band’s second album, set for tomorrow, June 25. It is called And in the Beginning… They Lied.

Throughout history, the human race has been fed much destructive doctrine and had the truth deliberately hidden from it – all in the names of politics, of religion, of wealth and power. Ancient knowledge was burned at grand scale and relegated to mythology, and its proponents persecuted to near extinction. The result is that humanity is a species scarred with amnesia. We have giant gaps and anomalies in our conscious history caused by the suppression of the actual truth, which has severely stunted the progress of civilization in general.

Chaos Doctrine’s debut album painted Moses in front of a dystopic landscape, hinting at the ultimate result of blind obedience to doctrine. The band’s subsequent EP, The Chaos Chronicles Volume I, continued the theme by placing a modernized Baphomet in front of the Tower of Babel. The cover for And in the Beginning… They Lied becomes the prequel to these tales to capture the album’s story graphically. At the center is a tree, a well-known symbol of the original sin, but also of knowledge. Within the tree is the great serpent – outcast as the heretic by some but revered by others as holy and wise. The tree and the snake intertwine with the human DNA sequence, placing a spotlight on our contested origins and purpose as a race. Finally, fading behind the tree are mechanized versions of the feathered serpent, widely interpreted as a dragon – god to some, demon to others. 

The band also gives us four tracks to explore these themes.

Intro “And In the Beginning” kicks off the madness with monologues clearly set to interrogate. New single “Blood Serpent God”, premiered by BraveWords, explores both familiar stories of human sacrifice in pre-Columbian South America, and the less familiar tale of how documented history was rendered myth. “Christ Church Horizon” spits hate at lie mongers abound, while outro “…They Lied” wraps up the album with the same rage that the intro started.

Tracklisting:

“And In The Beginning…”
“Blood Serpent God” (feat. Anna Hel)
“Black Friday Bedlam” (feat. Jörgen Sandström)
“Harlot”
“Nocturna Mors”
“Father Grigori”
“The Rite”
“Christ Church Horizon”
“…They Lied”
“South Of Heaven” (Slayer cover)

“Blood Serpent God” video:

Photo: David Devo Oosthuizen (Devographic)