Yes, you read right - that title's no typo. Extending the extrapolation, Lost Soul are one of the preciously few Morbid Angel-inspired bands to tap into Trey Azagthoth and crew's adventurous spirit without swiping the death metal legends' sound wholesale, and they do such via a viciously angular attack that retains the touch of grace Trey hardly gets enough credit for. Generally, the qualifier "angular" gets tagged onto bands of a metalcore/noise-rock nature, but when such an adjective - in the operating sense, of course, and not merely another word to separate Clone Band #345 from Clone Band #346 - gets dropkicked into DM without once bordering on the tech-head obtuse, sparks fly and fast.

Witness this Polish quartet's second and latest album, Ubermensch (Death of God). Barely longer than a half-hour, Ubermensch is the searing sound of the good ol' Florida DM style receiving an IV or five of meta-amphetamine, resulting in the sort of monomaniacal menace, heightened consciousness - if not intelligence, or at the least the illusion thereof stemming from the previous element - and disregard for safety the drug's known to induce in (ab)users. Or, essentially, it just shreds - if not familiarly, then interestingly, as heretofore unexplored angles get bent over backwards and reconfigured into DM that strives for more/more/more. And really, isn't that all a discerning metalhead should request? Then again, Ubermensch isn't necessarily the sound of a band coming into its own, since their godly Scream of the Mourning Star debut easily goes blow-for-blow with this second and latest full-length installment. The only niggling criticism of this sophomore attack is the rather tinny 'n' too-triggered-for-my-tastes sound of Adam Sierzega's drums versus the robust 'n' ransacking one found on the debut, although the budding drum-god assures me that my fears are ill-founded.

"Well, I think both of our albums have the same fury and passion," Sierzega begins about the two albums' seemingly cosmetic differences. "Scream of the Mourning Star was a very fast, raw and brutal album. We decided to keep all these things on Ubermensch, too, but this time we've added some new elements to our music - the instrumental parts like 'Apeiron' and 'The Crown,' for example. We realized that it might be a risky step, but now I'm sure it was 100% successful. All this takes our art up to the higher levels in extreme music - y'know, we aren't afraid of something new. We have eyes wide opened to different styles and genres, which is so helpful to create interesting music."

Rest your weary heads, dear readers: Lost Soul is full-blooded death-fucking-metal all the way. I mean, c'mon - they're from Poland, the second coming of said Florida DM scene (more on this later). And yet, there's a trace or two of black metal extant on Ubermensch, not necessarily in the occasional keys or the racing guitar-harmonies but rather in tone color, so subtly and expertly integrated that you'd be forgiven for thinking the whole album's deathly from blitzing beginning to bitter end. Thus, with the longstanding Behemoth increasingly trading in BM for DM over the years, are we gonna see the reverse of that with Lost Soul?

"Good question," Sierzega concedes. "First of all, we always wanted to play extreme and dark music. As we have started in '91, we've been fascinated with brutal death metal bands like Morbid Angel and Death, so death metal was the main inspiration for us during that time. Over the years, we've changed as musicians and composers - this is a natural process. Our music is now more authentic, because we try to find our own style and our own unique way in extreme art. We're interested in different styles, and not only death metal. Y'know, if we play some riffs, we don't care if that riff is death metal or black metal at all. If it sounds interesting, that's good - there are no barriers in our music. Our latest album is very important to us, because it opened quite a new dimension of music before us. Now we stand somewhere between death, black metal and more, and this is a big challenge to us.

"I know Nergal and company," the drummer continues, now shifting the subject to Behemoth and Lost Soul's relation to them, "and I've got a lot of respect for their creativity. I think they have a very similar point of view to music as we have. It's really interesting - Lost Soul and Behemoth have started from two different corners of music, death metal and black metal [respectively]. But for me, there's no big difference between these genres - dark art is one!"

Speaking of which, I'm guessing there's something of a lyrical concept for Ubermensch, merely judging by its title.

"Ubermensch is a concept album," Sierzega confirms, "but there's no one story told as on King Diamond albums, for example. The new album's title came from Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche, and it's the most important word in his philosophy. All the lyrics on the new album revolve around the dark side of human nature, the battle of light and darkness, knowledge and ignorance. We're trying to find the answer to 'who we are, and why we are?' The existential and mystical themes were always in our lyrics. Ubermensch is also the stream of free will and the way to self-perfection. As Zarathustra said, 'Man is something to be surpassed' - these words are an ideal description of the album's lyrical concept."

However, some might incorrectly interpret the new album's title as a hidden endorsement of racial superiority since Adolf Hitler hamfistedly co-opted the concept, yet I imagine Lost Soul are using said concept as some sort of anti-religious model and hence the subtext Death of God - after all, the first album had a great deal of anti-religious sentiments, as well.

"It's sad, but many people still see the philosophy of Nietzsche as the basis for fascist ideology," the drummer laments. "This is a complete misunderstanding - you won't find any fascist themes or shit like that on our albums! About the subtext Death of God, it has a close connection to the album title. I mean, if you're walking the way of the 'Ubermensch,' you don't need any god above your head. You're the creator of your own fate and will - the real victor, not a victim. "Poland is seen as a Christian country," Sierzega shifts gears toward the fuel for their lyrical fire, "and the Catholic church still has a strong position in Poland. Also, I can see that many people are starting to oppose Christian dogmas nowadays [in Poland], especially the young generation. We've always stood away from all kinds of ignorance and 'blindness.' I agree that Christianity gave us a lot of inspiration for our lyrics, especially in the early days. Now, our lyrical 'fire' is like a Promethean rebellion - we give you the light and show you different ways, but you have to choose which one you will go down.…"

On the topic of Poland, there's no disputing the influence forefathers Vader have had on the country's now-absurdly-burgeoning DM scene - any cursory spin of recent DM records from there would support this claim. But no matter how many in number and how quantifiably good some of the Polish DM bands following after their forefathers, just about every one of them could be branded "Vader clones" - which is especially odd, since Vader have long been rewriting the Morbid Angel catalog (albeit exceedingly well). All told, something of a sticky, no-win situation, but one Lost Soul has a different perspective on. "Personally, I think Vader is now more similar to old-style Slayer than Morbid Angel," Sierzega contends. "Anyway, I realize that many people interested in brutal sounds see only Vader when they (think) about Poland. It's very simple - Vader is the first Polish band well-known around the world. But everyone who's said that other bands in Poland are just a 'Vader clones,' they're simply deaf! What's positive is that there are many really good and original bands in our country who successfully came out from the shadow of Vader. Just take a look at Behemoth, for example, but also Dissenter, Trauma.… We have a really strong and original metal scene in Poland."

To each his own, then. Seriously, though, are there way too many bands "praying" at the Altars of Madness? It's one thing to be influenced by another band, but to truly be your own band, one must actually do something with those influences. Off the top of my head, only Lost Soul, Anata, Hate Eternal, Behemoth, and currently unsigned countrymen Tehace are the DM bands who are really going somewhere interesting with this framework - to reiterate, challenging Trey's adventurous spirit rather than totally swiping his sound...

"It all depends on how you treat your own music," Sierzega concludes. "To some bands, it's enough when they play like others, but then they've become 'clone bands' - I really hate it! We're trying to find our own style with Lost Soul - we really don't need to be Morbid Angel II or something like that. Music is art, and for every real artist, the most important thing is to be original and, first of all, sincere with yourself."