Album Review: Omnium Gatherum – May the Bridges We Burn Light the Way (Century Media Records)

After nearly three decades of forging their own path through the world of melodic death metal, Finnish torchbearers Omnium Gatherum make a triumphant return with a defining statement: their tenth studio album ‘May the Bridges We Burn Light the Way’, out November 7th, 2025, via Century Media Records.

How do you celebrate such a momentous milestone? If you’re Omnium Gatherum you look at the length and breadth of your career (30 bloody years), taking everything that they’ve done to date, and putting it into one complete record. It is the complete Omnium Gatherum as they stand today, proudly looking back, but with feet facing forward. It might be a celebration, so to speak, of the band’s immense melodeath ways, but it’s not stuck in past.

Following a vivid, spacey, and instrumental intro that is the title track, Omnium Gatherum unleash a bevy of riffs with the energised head banger that is My Pain. This is the stuff Omnium Gatherum are so good at. Potent vocal variation, punchy guitars, hefty drums, and big melodies courtesy of the keyboard, it’s a real fan-pleaser and the first of many.

It’s important to reiterate that Omnium Gatherum aren’t looking to surprise anyone here and to really enjoy this album, you have to accept that it is often nothing more than melodeath 101. It just happens that they’re so damn good at delivering melodeath 101 that innovation hardly matters. If you can accept that, you’re going to have a blast with the likes of the infectious The Last Hero, the rockier chorus-driven epic that is The Darkest City, and the retro-tinged The Darkest City with its cool melodies and extravagant guitar soloing.

The first half of the album really does fly but, but that’s partially because it is such a tight listen. Which isn’t always something you can say about melodeath, and that really benefits the lasting appeal of the album. Omnium Gatherum have gone the ‘all killer, no filler’ route, and it pays off. Long terms listeners will lap it up, but it’s also got the power to draw in a whole new audience willing to dip their toes into the melodeath pool safe that an album like this won’t bite them off.

Though that isn’t to say the album lacks intensity, because as the heavy and speed focused Ignite the Flame proves, Omnium Gatherum are still more than capable of bringing the noise. Chasing that one down with the scorching banger that is Streets of Rage, a guaranteed crowd-pleaser, and the high-powered Barricades. Before closing out a stonking record with dramatic atmosphere, head banging power, and soaring melodies. It’s Road Closed Ahead and the fact that it is an instrumental (aside from a chorus of angelic voices) doesn’t dent its impact.

Omnium Gatherum have delivered melodeath gold. Again.

Omnium Gatherum – May the Bridges We Burn Light the Way Track Listing:

1. May The Bridges We Burn Light the Way
2. My Pain
3. The Last Hero
4. The Darkest City
5. Walking Ghost Phase
6. Ignite The Flame
7. Streets Of Rage
8. Barricades
9. Road Closed Ahead

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