Соңғы Сағыныш

2005 album by Bolt Thrower

Those Once Loyal is the eighth and final studio album by British death metal band Bolt Thrower, released on 11 November 2005 by Metal Blade Records. Recorded with producer Andy Faulkner at Sable Rose Studios in Coventry, England, it was the first Bolt Thrower album since Mercenary (1998) to feature vocalist Karl Willetts, who rejoined the band in November 2004. Musically, Those Once Loyal incorporates tighter song structures and arrangements into Bolt Thrower's melodic, groove based sound, whilst improving on the production of the band's previous albums. As on the band's previous albums, its lyrics discuss several aspects of war. Commentators and music critics have said that the album has a thematic focus on World War I, previously covered on the band's fifth album For Victory (1994); its cover artwork is derived from a plaque on the Guards Memorial in St. James's Park, London. Well received by critics upon release, Those Once Loyal debuted at number 76 on the German Offizielle Top 100 chart, becoming the highest charting album of Bolt Thrower's career. The band supported the album's release with the Those Still Loyal Tour across Europe, from January to June 2006. Those Once Loyal would be Bolt Thrower's final album before the band announced an indefinite hiatus from recording albums in June 2008, although they would continue to tour until the death of drummer Martin Kearns on 14 September 2015 and their subsequent disbandment in 2016, on the first anniversary of his death.

In 2001, Bolt Thrower released its seventh album, Honour – Valour – Pride, featuring Benediction vocalist Dave Ingram. The band began writing material for a follow up to the album in January 2004 without Ingram, who had distanced himself from the band amidst worsening personal and mental health issues. guitarist Barry Thomson reconnected with previous vocalist Karl Willetts, who agreed to re join the band in November 2004. Willetts' vocal capabilities were tested as soon as he rejoined Bolt Thrower, who made him re record Ingram's vocals over the instrumental tracks of Honour – Valour – Pride, derived from the album's master tapes. Although guitarist Gavin Ward said that Bolt Thrower had no intentions of releasing Willetts' Honour – Valour – Pride re recording, as it would "cheapen the product" and be insulting to Ingram, the band would release a rough mix of Willetts' re recording of "K Machine" in May 2005 owing to fan demand. As with Bolt Thrower's previous albums, the writing process for Those Once Loyal revolved around Thomson writing guitar riffs and solos that the other members of the band would make their own adjustments to, according to Ward. Willetts, who was primarily responsible for writing the album's lyrics, visited several places with significant military history for lyrical inspiration—including The Cenotaph and the Horse Guards Parade (both in London), Turnaware Point in Falmouth, Cornwall (an embarkation point for the US Infantry 5th Corps in the D Day landing) and Flanders Fields in Belgium. Afterwards, Ward provided Willetts with notebooks featuring song titles and additional subject matter. The band recorded their parts for the album in a piecemeal fashion, starting with Martin Kearns' drum tracks, onto Thomson's and Ward's guitar parts, Jo Bench's basslines and finally, Willetts' vocals. Bolt Thrower began mixing the album in late August 2005, after making some adjustments to its songs. The band allowed Faulkner to mix Those Once Loyal on his own first, before they both worked on a compromise between their ideas of what the album should feel like, according to Thomson. Had they not been set deadlines by their record label, Metal Blade Records, and by upcoming touring commitments, Thomson reckoned to Terrorizer in December 2005 that Bolt Thrower would have still been in the studio rewriting their songs by then.

The cover art of Those Once Loyal is taken from a plaque found on the Guards Memorial, a World War I memorial, in St. James's Park, London. Bench, who came up with the idea of using the plaque for the cover, said that Bolt Thrower wanted to distance themselves from the "fantasy battle" artwork used on their previous releases and find something that was less predictable and more "epic looking". Prior to its release, Metal Blade Records launched an "online player" that allowed users to listen to two songs from the album and organised several "release parties" in Germany and Austria in early November 2005. To prevent the album from leaking onto peer to peer file sharing sites, some promotional copies of Those Once Loyal were overdubbed with recordings saying "This is the new album from Bolt Thrower!" at various intervals, featuring the members of band. Those Once Loyal was first released in Germany on 11 November 2005, coinciding with Armistice Day.

Retrospective reviews of Those Once Loyal have been largely positive, The album has also been praised by Frank Watkins of Obituary, Jacob Bannon of Converge, and Riley Gale of Power Trip, who named it one of his top five metal albums of all time. In the 2016 edition of Choosing Death: The Improbable History of Death Metal & Grindcore, Albert Mudrian, founder and editor in chief of Decibel, selected the album as part of his book's "Essential Discography" for 2005. +Accolades for Those Once LoyalPublicationCountryAccoladeYearRankRef. (Reference)TerrorizerUnited KingdomTop 100 Albums of the Decade (2000s)200944Brave Words & Bloody KnucklesCanadaTop 30 Metal Blade Releases Of All Time201212LoudwireUnited States35 Best Metal Blade Records Albums2017N/A

Bolt Thrower began writing material for a ninth album in early 2007, According to Willetts, Bolt Thrower's "creative spark had been extinguished", and that aside from "a few riffs", their new material did not to live up to the "response and status" of Those Once Loyal. On 12 June 2008, the band announced that they had decided to "postpone [its] recording indefinitely", stating:'' <blockquote>From day one we made it clear that we'd stop recording when we felt we'd written the ultimate Bolt Thrower album; we just never knew when that would be. We kind of took for granted that each release would get better and better. But we have realized now that our last release, Those Once Loyal, turned out to be that album, and basically the new stuff we have written just doesn't match up to it. We have a lot of pride in our back catalogue, and we refuse to turn into one of the many bands (like the ones we grew up listening to) who end up releasing crap, and we're also not prepared to compromise by instead releasing an album of cover versions or a 'best of' album. |group=N According to Kim Kelly, writing for Vice in 2015, Bolt Thrower's recording hiatus allowed the band to "[bow] out with grace, sending their dead home in a closed coffin instead of propping it up listlessly on life support like so many others of their generation have seen fit to do. In refusing to betray their fans or their own principles, their discography was granted a warrior's death". Bolt Thrower continued to tour and perform shows for the next seven years after announcing their recording hiatus, On 14 September 2015, following a band rehearsal for a planned tour of Australia, Martin Kearns died unexpectedly at the age of 38. On the first anniversary of Kearns' death in 2016, Bolt Thrower announced that they had disbanded, as "the Bolt Thrower drummer position [had been] buried with him". Shortly thereafter, Willetts confirmed to Metal Hammer that the split was permanent, and that there would be "no reunion tours etc no compromise." Following Bolt Thrower's disbandment, Willetts formed Memoriam, after which he released his first album in 12 years, For The Fallen, in 2017.