And while the deep concept is certainly the root of the release, the music that surrounds it, is equally as deep. The 33 minute opus is broken up (though you can hardly tell with simply listening, the CD booklet helps somewhat) into 7 ‘movements’; I. Thinkers Slumber, II. Wandering Times, III. Within the Rounded Walls, IV. Pearls of Translation, V. Compendiums, VI. Stranded Minds on the Shores of Doubt, and VII. Besieged.

I’ve never been one for long tracks or single track albums (curse you Crimson !!!!!!), but at 33 minutes and full of the same crumbling, discordant majesty as Colored Sands, Pleiades’ Dust is an exception to the rule. Parts are hard to single out, and the movements seem to ebb and flow between monolithic expulsions of otherworldly dissonant chaos (14;40, 26:26) and more introspective, mystical segues.  As with the last album, this isn’t a release you put on and go to a song or moment, but rather let the conceptual and musical genius of Lemay and his (slightly different from Colored Sands) cohorts Colin Marston, Kevin Hufnagel and Patrice Hamelin pull you into the sonic sandstorm and get lost in it. The swirling, shifting chaos is like dunes, sometime clam and serene, sometimes neverending and destructive.

Lemay is clearly a genius both musically, conceptually and as a business man and clearly would have been at home at the House of Wisdom. And while we didn’t have to wait a full 12 years for new Gorguts music, this tasty place holder certainly shows Lemay is as focused and driven as he was 15 years ago for Obscura and once again has a hand in defining death metal almost 20 years later.

Why reunite and release an album now? What came about that made you do this in 2013?

I decided to reform the band and make a new record to celebrate the 20^th anniversary (the band was formed in 1989) of the band which was in 2009. The idea was given to me by Steve Hurdle back when I was playing in NEGATIVA. The album is being released in 2013 cause there was a lot of business to straight up with record contracts and that’s why it took a long time to release the album, since all the music was finished in late 2010 then I took over a year to write all the lyrics.

You have surrounded yourself with a varied array of musicians from Colin Marston to Jon Longstreth – how did these guys get involved with the project? Were they hired guns to record an album you had already written or did they assist in the writing process?

I was very impressed with their individual talent that’s why I choose them to be part of this. I’m a strong believer that you need to have admiration for your partners in crime! So I contacted them individually and they all said Yes! Then, on my side I’ve waited to have 3 songs completed, then I went to jam with John and it went really well! We almost got 3 songs together in one week end. On the other hand, for Kevin and Colin, I sent them the 3 compositions with all the music written in tablature, I also included a graphic illustrating the form of the music for most of the songs along with a recording of my guitar playing along to a click. Then a couple weeks later, Colin and Kevin would send me back my guitar track with their arrangements over it. All I can say is that it sounded great right away!!!! We haven’t changed much from the first draft! It was important for me to leave them complete freedom as far as their voices over the music. Otherwise, it wouldn’t make sense to have collaborators like them….I would have made everything myself on the computer then.

It’s been 15 years since the ground breaking Obscura and 12 years since From Wisdom to Hate, what was it like being away from Gorguts and other than Negativa, away from death metal for so long?

It was all good. When I decided to end the band in 2002 or 2003…after Steve MacDonald passed away, I was done with music and I wanted to devote myself to woodworking full time. I was very happy with all the achievements that the band accomplished so it was all good for me…..no bitterness and no feeling of unfinished business.

Obviously, Obscura stands as a truly groundbreaking death metal album, how much pressure was there to again try and create something as groundbreaking 15 years later, or was there no pressure and you simply tried to create a great album understanding that creating another Obscura was going to be virtually impossible 15 years later considering how far death metal has come since then?

Well, I did not think about this at all when I wrote COLORED SANDS….all that was important for me was to have fun, and write the music that I wanted to hear. That’s always been my motivation as a composer. And also I never tried to reproduce OBSCURA again. I don’t like saying the same thing twice musically. I think that I have enough self critique to notice if I’m going to repeat myself. So, if I would have notice that I was going to write a pale copy of OBSCURA I would have not went for it. What I like is to surprise myself and have a great camaraderie with my bandmates!

Has there been any feedback on Colored Sands from former Gorguts members?

There’s Steve Hurdle that got to hear the first 2 pre prods we did and he liked it for the fact that it was different for the previous records.

Was Negativa was meant to be a continuation of Gorguts? What changed? You are no longer in Negativa right?

No, it was not a continuation of GORGUTS. It was a completely different musical direction and we had a girl singing in the band which brought something new….also there was a lot of improvised section in the latest music we wrote. And that’s one of the reason why I left, I was never a fan of improvisation. I like the act of composition by myself. And as far as NEGATIVA goes, it’s been disbanded for a long time.

So now Colored Sands is out and the reviews have been outstanding, how relieved are you after so long?

This is an amazing gift! I’m sooooooo happy to finally share this music with our fans! I think I achieved the vision that I had for this record and it seems to touch people. So, to me I reached my goal as an Artist. I wrote the record I wanted to hear and it touches people…..I’m more than happy! The fans have been amazingly generous!!!!!!!!!!

Was there a sound or tone you had in mind when writing Colored Sands? How do you make an album that sounds like a Gorguts album in today’s scene where Gorguts is an influence to so many bands and styles?

For this record, all the music was done before I wrote even a single word for the lyrics. So, music wise, I had like a soundtrack vision, I was picturing a lot of dynamics, and a story telling atmosphere. To me the music needs to work well on its own. I don’t like when we say like: “ wait the vocal are in….it will work then….” No way! The music canvas needs to be self sufficient. Then when I had the vocal to the music I find all the vocal rhythms so they do not conflict with the music canvas and I write all my lyrics so them fit in those specific rhythms. Then we keep this “whole” sound and a sense of polyphony and transparency in the orchestration even if it’s made of electric instruments. It’s the same process for me as when I write and orchestrate for a symphonic ensemble. I try to avoid conflicts among the instruments individual voices.

Was there any temptation at all to try and recreate the sheer chaos of Obscura?

Not really. OBSCURA is fine like it is and we don’t need a second OBSCURA. I like better challenging myself with a new vision and sound instead of trying to copy myself.

You touched on this a little already, but how long have you had Colored Sand material written? Is this 12 years of ideas?

I started writing the music for COLORED SANDS in the fall of 2008 and in November 2010 we were rehearsing for getting ready to enter the studio to record the music in February 2011. After I recorded the vocals sporadically at Colin’s studio in 2012 and February 2013.

Talk a little about the orchestral piece “The Battle of Chamdo”?

This piece acts like a breather. I wanted to take the percussion and the distorted guitars out of the listeners ear so we can start fresh for the darker part of the story. Also it’s a very important part of the concept. It illustrates and tells the story of the Chinese invasion of Tibet of 1950. I wanted to have real instrumentalist for this piece as well. I wanted to do that on FROM WISDOM TO HATE with the intro of THE QUEST FOR EQUILIBRIUM but I couldn’t find real string players back then so that’s why I went with synths. So no synths this time!!!!!! They just play amazingly well! It brings a lot of poetry to the record.

The title track is as stunning as a piece of music as I’ve heard in 2013 – talk a little about this monstrous slow burner of a song

Thank you for the compliment…Again, I wanted to have the story telling aspect from a composition point of view. The single harmonic illustrates a single grain of sand hitting the floor as the monks start to draw a sand mandala. Then this is dressed up with a rhythmic figure in 5 which illustrates the 5 elements in the Tibetan philosophy: air, water, fire, earth and space. Then when the distorted guitar kicks in that pictures the pilgrimage that leads to the mandala drawing ritual. Pilgrims walking for months… prostrating every 3 footsteps until they get to the place where everybody gathers to assist to the mandala ritual.

If you had not written and released Colored Sands, would you be happy with Gorgut’s legacy or is Colored Sands finishing unfinished business?

Like I said earlier, I was happy back in 2001, 2002 with everything the band had accomplished…now I’m more than pleased with COLORED SANDS…I cannot deny that….but back then I could never know I was gonna write this record 10 or 12 years later. That being said, my motivation was to offer a record to the fans for the 20^th anniversary.

There is another high profile reunion release coming out later this year with Carcass’s Surgical Steel. Any thoughts on that and other classic bands reunited over the last few years (Obituary, Suffocation, Incantation etc)

I love CARCASS!!!!!!!! I can’t wait to hear their record! You know there’s a great camaraderie among the bands in the scene! Last year we played a festival in Holland with SUFFOCATION and it was great to see each other again!!!!! We’ve been friends since 1991! Same with IMMOLATION!!!! It’s all great!!!!!!

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It’s almost impossible to concisely compress the influence Gorguts has had on extreme music in general. Obscura’s complete evisceration of the confines of Death Metal went on to inspire countless current bands. Gigan completely owe their career to Luc & Co. Ulcerate, who are incredible and definitely have a voice of their own, still owe much of their influence to Gorguts, overt or not.

I will try not to go much into the rest of the history of the band’s breakup, reformation, and current all-star member lineup, but it is unavoidable to talk at least a bit about. Powerhouses Colin Marston and Kevin Hufnagel of Dysrhythmia handle the bass and second guitar duties respectively. Colored Sands is definitely Gorguts, but you can tell that Colin and Kevin have had their hand in the writing. Musically it is less technical for technicality’s sake than Dysrhythmia, and more angular and alien like you would expect from LeMay. It actually is strikingly exactly what you would think a mash up of these minds would create.

The production is great. Clear, crisp, and HEAVY. Shockingly so, even. It’s definitely modern, but still has that twangy off-kilter quality that wowed so many 15 years ago when Obscura threw Death Metal on its head. My ONLY qualm about the entire album is that having Colin Marston mix and master it, along with having a hand in the writing, gave it a bit too much of his voice. Marston is a genius in his own right, don’t get me wrong, I love much of his catalog, but maybe this record sounds a little TOO Colin? He definitely has a signature production technique that he applies to most of his work, and it all sounds a lot like this (see: Indricothere, Krallice, Dysrhythmia, et al.).

All of this talk, and still no words about drummer John Longstreth? If you haven’t heard of him somehow, he is, or was at one time, the powerhouse behind the kit of Dim Mak, Skinless, The Red Chord, and Origin, among others I’m sure I’m not mentioning. He is an unbelievable beast capable of out and out war on the skins. His methodical flair on Dim Mak records and incredible speed and power with Origin has made him a household Death Metal name, yet it’s not just either of those things that let him shine here. His restraint on the throne is what helps elevate his performance. He toils and thrashes along with the rest on Colored Sands, but never overpowers. His purpose here is to illuminate the bizarre twists and turns, hoist the curious dissonant melodies, and highlight the implausible technicality.

By this point you must have some idea of what you’re getting into with this album. A track by track breakdown is not forthcoming for brevity’s sake, but it’s impossible not to talk about at least a few of the brilliant moments on this record. The very first is the first riff of the first song “Let toit du monde,” a blistering piece of technical savagery that is both striking and memorable. It makes a reappearance in the song multiple times and I frequently catch myself humming it. Immediately after, a killer dynamic piece lets you know Gorguts is back. Track 3, “Forgotten Arrows,” is grotesquely gorgeous all the way through. Alien harmonics flutter and appear during the more subdued passages, while angular riffs attack and spasm around the dazzling technicality of it all. 3:40 into this song is where I first noticed the pure genius of the production. Unreal heaviness abounds here and illustrates the fact that Marston was a great choice for both bassist and engineer. The purely orchestral “The Battle of Chamdo” is exactly what I would imagine if someone told me Luc LeMay was writing a film score. Remarkable and hummable riffs overflow from the songs on this record. “Enemies of Compassion’s” opening riff is again another I find dancing in my head from time to time. The heaviness returns in the first minute of “Absconders,” and closer “Reduced to Silence” is creepy, extraterrestrial, dynamic, and concludes perfectly with crashing cymbals and all instruments being punished in sync.

I listened to Colored Sands a good 20 times before beginning to write this review, as I was hoping something profound would come over me like it must have when the world first collided with Obscura. But I don’t think we have Obscura II on our hands here. I just can’t imagine in 2013 something can invert the genre like Gorguts did before. That realization made listening even easier. As for all his brilliance, Luc must have known there were massive expectations for this album. So instead of trying to carve another path in the rotting corpse of Death Metal, he just sharpened his knife and continued disemboweling it. Colored Sands is dazzling, masterful, and everything I was hoping for. Though I was too immersed in the next Earth Crisis or Snapcase album to have felt the impact in 1998, I’m thankful I’m here in 2013 for the aftershock.