Review: Kingcrow – The Persistence

Style: Heavy Prog/Electronic/Djent(??) (clean vocals)
Review by: Sam
Country: Italy
Release date: 07-09-2018

NOTE: This album was originally included in the September 2018 issue of The Progressive Subway

This doesn’t belong here, straight up. This band has gotten way too much acclaim by this point to be featured here. However I felt obliged to review this album since I’ve been following this band closely ever since their 2015 album Eidos. By the time they released The Persistence I had been refreshing their Facebook page for nearly two years. Their blend of Fates Warning and Queensryche riffage, Porcupine Tree-style atmosphere and Dream Theater-esque proggy theatrics just made me instantly fell in love with them. So the question is: how does their latest offering compare?

The Persistence is a completely different beast. Gone are the upbeat rockers, gone are the salsa breaks and the flashy progressive twists and gone are the guitar solos that (largely) defined their previous three albums. Instead what we have here is a rhythmically driven album defined by bleak emotion and atmosphere, the only remaining aspect of their previous sound. An album like this, where a band sheds almost all key elements of their sound, does not often end well. So how do Kingcrow fare?

In short: it’s great! Despite the stylistic shift, their music is still dramatic as ever and atmosphere has always been one of this band’s strong points. And the shift to rhythm as the driving force works superbly. The drums sound incredibly tight. Cafolla’s pulsing rhythms are executed with such rigid regularity they literally and figuratively become the heartbeat of the music. The riffs also sound deep and bounce of the drums as if Leprous and TesseracT had a baby. And thanks to the electronic production it all sounds extremely tight, to an almost machine-like fashion.
That’s not to say this is 55 minutes of staccato and/or djent grooving though. In fact most of this album is driven by soft atmosphere and Diego Marchesi’s beautifully heartfelt vocals. The aforementioned harder groovy parts are rather used to bring the songs to their climax. Just listen to Closer or Devil’s Got a Picture to see what I mean. And there’s also the amazing duet with Daniel Gildenlow from Pain of Salvation on Night’s Descending.

What most defines this album though is the emotion conveyed. The Persistence sounds bleak and desperate, yet it’s also a message of hope and warmth. The following lyric in Everything Goes is exemplary of that:

Can you hear me?
Can you feel this pain?
If you have a raging fever
You’re about to turn the page

Everything Goes

Due to its introverted nature this is an album that’ll only reveal its beauty as you give it multiple listens. What at first seems like an introverted album, screened off from the outside world, is actually a powerful scream desperate to be heard. Because as you peel off the layers with multiple listens and the emotional depth and intricacy of the songwriting begin to reveal itself, that first soft cry has suddenly become an all-encompassing roar.

The Persistence is a magnificent album. Somehow Kingcrow have managed to improve on their previous album while dropping almost everything that defined their sound, resulting in what is in my opinion their best album yet. Don’t write this off in one listen, as this will grow on you guaranteed.

Recommended tracks: Everything Goes, The Persistence, Devil’s Got a Picture, Night’s Descending
Recommended for fans of: Porcupine Tree, TesseracT, Anathema, Pain of Salvation
Final verdict: 9/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Metal-Archives page

Label: The Laser’s Edge – Bandcamp | Facebook

Kingcrow is:
– Diego Marchesi (vocals)
– Ivan Nastasi (guitars)
– Diego Cafolla (guitars)
– Thundra Cafolla (drums)
– Riccardo Nifosi (bass)
– Cristian Della Polla (keyboards)