Missed Album Review: Vulkan – Technatura

Style: progressive metal, alternative metal/rock (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Tool, Karnivool, Rishloo, The Mars Volta
Review by: Stephen
Country: Sweden
Release date: 8 May 2020

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This review was originally published in the Missed Albums 2020 issue of The Progressive Subway.]

To start this review, I feel the need to address the elephant in the room. We had a miscommunication, and dropped the ball on reviewing this album in our May 2020 edition. Considering the fact that we interviewed Vulkan prior to the release of Technatura, combined with the fact that most of us love this album, we couldn’t believe that it somehow didn’t get reviewed in the May edition. Anyways, with that out of the way, let’s dive into this fantastic band and fantastic album. 

Vulkan has had a special place in my heart for a while now, ever since discovering their debut album Mask of Air. So when I heard Technatura was in the works way back in 2019, the seed of excitement was planted. I imagine that many of our readers are already aware of Vulkan, but for those of you who have not heard Technatura yet, you’re in for a treat. These are the types of albums that you search the underground progressive metal landscape for. 

From the moment “This Visual Hex” kicks the album off, you’re taken to a soundscape that is a combination of an ancient primal world and a futuristic dystopian world. There are so many highlights on this album, it’s difficult to highlight them all in a concise review. That said, I’d be remiss to point out some of my favorite moments. The first I’ll highlight is in the midway point of the fourth track on the album, “Bewildering Concept of Truth.” There is an interlude where the song slows down, and includes an absolutely beautiful string arrangement. The violin, which leads the string section, has some tasty delay on it that gives it a very unique listening experience on top of the beauty. Then if that wasn’t awesome enough, the track slowly builds back into a heavy release of tension that concludes the song perfectly.

The second moment I need to highlight is the middle section of the tenth track on the album, “Blinding Ornaments,” where singer, Jimmy Lindblad, delivers one of my favorite vocal performances on a Vulkan track since “Moon Over Paris.” The vocal segment is followed up by another beautiful string segment that transitions to the next track perfectly. Which also happens to be the prog-metal epic of the album.

Speaking of vocal work and prog-metal epics, the third moment on the album I feel like I have to highlight is on the eleventh track, “The Royal Fallacy.” This song has it all, heavy riffing, incredible vocal work, awesome polyrhythms, grooving bass, huge drums, hypnotizing synths, and more. It’s difficult to pick out one moment on this track, but one moment worth mentioning is that this song features some harsh vocals, which is a first from Vulkan if I’m not mistaken. Seriously, if you only check out one track from this album, check out this one. It’ll convince you to check out the whole album, I can almost guarantee that. 

In summary, there are too many high points on this album to cover everything. I’ve yet to mention the horns sections, the triple bass tracking, the steel banjo, swedish songs, and much more. The core instrumental band members on guitar, bass, and drums do a fantastic job throughout the album as well. I chose to mention the moments I did because moments like those are the ones that elevate Technatura to a status few albums we review reach. If you are a fan of Karnivool, The Mars Volta, and/or Tool you can’t miss this album. It’s just too damn good. Spoiler alert, you’ll be hearing about this album from us again in our year end AOTY write up.

Recommended tracks: Bewildering Concept Of Truth, Blinding Ornaments, The Royal Fallacy, The Madness Sees No End, just… all of the album.
You may also like: Sermon, Riviẽre, Lucid Planet
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram | RYM page

Label: Independent

Vulkan is:
– Jimmy Lindblad (vocals)
– Christian Fredriksson (guitars)
– Olle Edberg (keyboard)
– Oscar Pettersson (bass)
– Johan Norbäck (drums)