Genres: Traditional progressive metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Loudly dropping your weights at the gym, leaving your plates on the barbell when you’re done with the bench, Sons of Apollo, shallow philosophical musings
Country: United States
Release date: 15 March 2024
Ostensibly a spiritual successor of the now-defunct supergroup Sons of Apollo, Whom Gods Destroy takes two of the members remaining from the original five-piece, splices in three guest stars, and cobbles together this Frankenstein’s monster of a progressive metal album Insanium. Aptly titled, this directionless oeuvre alludes to greatness in the same way the made-up word “insanium” alludes to the future-tense of the Latin verb INSANIRE, “insaniam” – that is to say, it displays a middle-schooler’s idea of depth. Insanium is a dinner course served on a platter that shines with a mirror polish, the plating immaculate; but the dish lacking in anything nutritive. Not exactly haute-couture for prog metal, WGD seems rather an outlet for Bumblefoot’s, quite frankly, extraterrestrial ability on the doubleneck.
The guitar playing on this album is mind-bendingly virtuosic, and simultaneously replete with the type of protruding-brow-ridge syncopated riffing that make any first-time gym-goer proudly want to leave his weights where they fall. If the man doesn’t let out that massive talent I suspect he’s sure to have an aneurysm. The lyrics meanwhile touch on war, death, and the human experience, in a way that is trite and devoid of subtlety: “Death we celebrate, as if it was something we were born for” – yawn – but vocalist Dino Jelusick’s stand-out performance can convincingly deliver a pseudo-intellectual dialogue that would give any sophomore philosophy student goosebumps. I first enjoyed Dino’s work with Michael Romeo on his War of the Worlds Pt. 2 release in 2022, so I was pleased to see him making an appearance in this project. On this release, Dino adds a lot of grit to his vocal performance, in contrast to Jeff Scott Soto’s decidedly more polished cleans.
Sherinian’s keywork is the powerhouse melodic force of this outfit, creating atmospheric tension with his counterpoint lead melodies and ethereal background elements – I highlight the track “Crawl” for his unnerving, discordant harmonic leads that transition later into distinct melodic chord voicings to deliver a very satisfying sense of resolution. His patch choices never come across as artless or haphazard. I find that his tones are especially engaging, specifically the ones he uses to emulate an electric guitar when trading solos with Bumblefoot. The guy’s a master synth programmer; he dials these sounds in with a specific purpose and they nail it – and cut through the mix extremely well.
On the rhythm side you have Bruno Valverde of Angra fame manning the drums, and bass player Yas Nomura from The Resonance Project. Being a longtime fan of Angra I’m intimately familiar with Valverde’s chops and I dare say he’s underutilized on this release. Bruno’s lightning-fast and precise technique was hardly showcased at all on this album, which really didn’t feature a speedy track for him to go off on. Something in the vein of but not completely like Angra’s discography wouldn’t have gone totally amiss – I mean, it’s not like the two Sons of Apollo discs didn’t have their fair share of then-drummer Mike Portnoy’s off-and-on-again band’s influence. But I digress. Bruno does his duty but never gets too creative with it. On the other hand, I have little and less to say of bassist Nomura, whose role is mostly relegated to beefing up the low end and who wasn’t given an opportunity to truly flex his fingers until he was given a quick solo bass run in the latter half of the album on “Hypernova 158”.
Overall, I think the songwriting on this release can feel a bit uninspiring. The tracks seldom ever really pick up from a slow-to-midtempo pace until the aforementioned “Hypernova 158”, an instrumental piece which sits at about 160bpm (or perhaps 158?). Aside from the typical instrumental mastery we’ve come to expect from the two titans Sherinian and Bumblefoot who were the primary songwriters, there isn’t much that stands out here. There was a certain songwriting ability that I feel Portnoy brought to the previous iteration of this group that is notably lacking. It’s not that the album is bad necessarily, but some of the tracks tend to blend into one another with a similar tonality and structure – intense throughout the start and middle, then with a slow part that comes in about 2/3rds to 3/4s of the way through before picking back up in the final 100yds – and it starts to feel a bit predictable. Not very progressive of ’em to find a convention and stick with it.
Insanium telegraphs “hear how well we can play” and doesn’t back it up with the writing. I hesitate to even want to call this a first offering since it’s hardly different sonically from SOA’s two albums, although tonally darker – and less complex in arrangement and lyrical direction – but nevertheless for a debut from such talented and established musicians it barely manages to leave a lasting impression. It’s heavy for this style of prog, sure, and masterfully played… but ultimately it failed to resonate with me. Honestly not sure if they’ll keep it going after this album, so I shook my Magic 8 Ball: “outlook not so good.”
Recommended tracks: Crawl, Crucifier, Insanium
You may also like: Stone Leaders, Temic, Nospun
Final verdict: 5/10
Related links: Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Official Website
Label: InsideOut Music – Facebook | Official Website
Whom Gods Destroy is:
– Dino Jelusick (vocals)
– Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal (guitars)
– Derek Sherinian (keyboards)
– Bruno Valverde (drums)
– Yas Nomura (bass)
