Genres: prog rock, prog metal, shred guitar, jazz fusion (instrumental)
Recommended for fans of: Plini, Sithu Aye, Owane, I Built the Sky, John Petrucci
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 23 January 2024
Life is tough as a fledgling musician trying to promote themself in an overcrowded scene. Day in and day out you hone your craft, practicing, composing, recording, and producing so that your music can be heard, and for the vast majority of artists, it just isn’t unfortunately. The Loot Experiment plays in perhaps the most saturated genre of them all, too: instrumental “prog metal.” If you’re gonna make a name for yourself promoting in this quagmire of a genre, you’d better be a part of the next gen of guitar gods.
The Loot Experiment—or as they call themselves “a clump of stardust that created four instrumental tracks” really did try their best, I reckon. I hear attempts at mimicking their idols, guitarists like Plini and John Petrucci (Dream Theater, though if you needed this in parentheses how did you end up on this site?), and the constant stream of metal-adjacent chugging juxtaposed with jazzier guitar leads show off a solo multi-instrumentalist pushing themselves to release an EP in a style they clearly love. Unfortunately, despite the best efforts of The Loot Experiment, Into the Ether falls well short of the mark. Most notable, the production is rough, to be expected of a DIY debut EP, but still a necessary critique. The bass lies entirely too quiet under the guitars and drums, and the drums—let’s just say the drums are not good. Clearly programmed, they keep time for The Loot Experiment’s shredding, but they’re excruciatingly cheap sounding and hardly change up the pace as much as a style as demanding as this necessitates. “Stampede” switches from the Dream Theater and Plini worship that preceded it to even more bland attempts to sound like Tool, and The Loot Experiment simply does not have close to the level of skill required to succeed at even attempting to program Danny Carey, leaving the whole thing sounding limp as the drums poorly attempt a cascading, ritualistic sound.
Clearly The Loot Experiment’s favorite instrument that they play is the guitar, but that, too, suffers from a relative lack of skill. Listen, the clump of stardust touching the strings clearly knows their way around the instrument, and several of the solos exude an exuberant quality that the artist is proud of their work—and for that I salute them, releasing and incessantly promoting music is surely scary—but when you’re up against the likes of Plini’s restrained genius and Tosin Abasi’s (Animals as Leaders) generational virtuosity and creativity, you’re doomed unless you’re the top one percent of the top one percent, and The Loot Experiment regretfully isn’t quite there. The chugging guitars at the start of “Mirage” sound like a less dynamic Circus Maximus riff (who are themselves Dream Theater wanna-bes), and their drab tone doesn’t help matters. At the very least, The Loot Experiment has a pleasant, albeit very standard and rather predictable, lead tone for his soloing, setting up his more important moments for success. The guitar parts that can be focused on over the extremely grating drum sound lack the extra oomph they need for an instrumental project of this nature. Across Into the Ether, guitar parts feel a tad too slow, too restrained, slightly sloppy, or, at their worst, completely creatively void.
Let’s break down the best track, “Into the Ether,” to see what I mean. Moodier than the other tracks, The Loot Experiment does spacier soloing like the Polish Gru or Widek, but without a synth background, the project feels rather hollow when I crave atmosphere, especially with those cheap drums banging away repetitiously. The jazz tone around a minute in would be a great change of pace had the actual solo not been extremely cliche, and the awkward switch to phrygian doesn’t help before an even blander switch into slow, plodding grooves. Now imagine if the final sequence starting at 8:05 were twice as fast—it would be a pretty sweet climax! But it’s capped at an awkward half speed as if The Loot Experiment simply couldn’t get their ideas physically out of the guitar at their current ability. Most of Into the Ether feels similarly lethargic even when the compositions are more intriguing. Not to say that the compositions are great; final track “Transcend” ends without any sort of warning and since there aren’t any lyrics, I can’t even chalk it up to artistic choice like on “Pull Me Under,” leaving a sour taste in my mouth at the very end that The Loot Experiment couldn’t even figure out how to end their EP with a bang.
Normally, I’d be telling a fledgling artist to carve out their niche in order to stand out against the slew of competition; however, The Loot Experiment needs to focus on the fundamentals of production, composition, and performance. I want them to channel the passion they clearly possess and focus on their craft. I don’t write this as a roast—I admire The Loot Experiment’s hustle—but as an admonition that they’ve still got a ways to go before making it.
Recommended tracks: Into the Ether
You may also like: earth7, Regressor, Gru, Widek, Dorian Lynch
Final verdict: 4/10
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify
Label: independent
The Loot Experiment is:
– a clump of stardust that created four instrumental tracks (everything)
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