Review: Ihlo – Union

Style: djent, progressive metal (clean vocals)
Review by: Jonah
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 31 May, 2019

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This review was originally published in the May 2019 issue of The Progressive Subway.]

There is this problem that will occur in any genre of music where once a certain band becomes monstrously popular a plethora of other bands will begin to ape that band’s style. In many genres this spawns plenty of less-original but still wonderfully enjoyable bands, but in a genre like Prog I feel as though that level of derivative songcraft leaves a little extra something to be desired when it’s the forefront of your sound. Bands like Karnivool and Native Construct have shown that they can take another band’s ideas and make them unique again, but often this is not the case. Ihlo wears it’s TesseracT influences on it sleeve from the very first note, so the question becomes whether they can evolve beyond that basic mimicry.

They can’t.

I’ve listened to this album quite a few times, and by god all I hear is Tesseract and maybe a dash of Haken-y modern prog. The guitars sound like TesseracT, the drumming sounds like TesseracT, the production sounds like TesseracT, and by god the vocalist sounds like Dan Thompkins Walmart brand equivalent. I’m not the world’s greatest Tesseract fan so perhaps that is coloring this review, but my god I just can’t get past the unnecessary aping of a popular band. I’ve made this argument in the past with another band that wanted to be Protest The Hero: 2 and I’ll make it again. Why would I listen to a purely derivative sound when I could listen to the band that created it in the first place instead?

Now all of this being said, there is an absolute level of technical musical excellence being displayed on this album. The performances are tight, and the hooks in each song are strong enough. The problem is that I’ve heard them all before. Is this a bad album? Absolutely not, it’s perfectly listenable in every way. Unfortunately until the band develops a stronger hand for unique songcraft I don’t think I’ll find myself listening to them particularly often.

Recommended tracks: Starseeker, Parhelion
Recommended for fans of: TesseracT, Haken, Vola
Final verdict: 5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | RYM page

Label: Independent

Ihlo is:
– Phil Monro (guitar)
– Andy Robison (vocals, keyboards)
– Clark McMenemy (drums)