Artwork by: Lukas Klotz

Style: Metalcore, Progressive Metal (Mixed Vocals – mostly harsh)
Recommended for fans of: Kardashev, An Abstract Illusion, Silent Planet, Humanity’s Last Breath
Country: Germany
Release date: 13 March 2026

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Amnesia is a popular writing trope in genre fiction. Sometimes, this decision yields positive results, like Jason Bourne or Final Fantasy VII’s Cloud Strife, whose mysterious, fragmented pasts are used to explore themes of identity and purpose. Other times, we get characters like the amnesiac Endministrator (Arknights: Endfield), who employs the personality of an unpainted wall while affording the developers an excuse to mag-dump lore, concepts, and game systems at the player, leading to largely uninteresting stretches of time.¹

With third LP Amnesia, German progressive metalcore act Monosphere bring this conceit forward as the framework in which to encase their muscular, aphotic, and atmospherically aggressive blend of post-metal and metalcore. I was reminded of Kardashev’s deathgaze masterwork Liminal Rite (2022), whose exploration of a man’s return to a home he can hardly recall delivered one of the most devastating musical moments in “Beyond the Passage of Embers”. (Excitingly, Kardashev’s Mark Garrett guests on Amnesia’s closing track.) With two prior conceptual albums in the rearview (The Puppeteer² and Sentience), and a desire to maintain the efficacy of their artistic vision by remaining independent, Monosphere’s tenacity and confidence in their work is commendable. But as it goes, threequels can be notoriously difficult to pull off. Do these German genremancers have what it takes to deliver something impactful? Or will I need a plucky and patient sidekick to fill me in on the details?

I’ll say this: opener “Collapse” will slap you out of whatever torpor may have befallen you, drums and chugs coming in loud and hard like a shockwave to get that attention lifted while thrumming synths fill the space beneath. Vocalist Kevin Ernst heralds the metalcore bombardment crashing at his back with meaty harshes befitting this thick, guttural breed of modern -core. Motes of the apocalyptic, megaton designs of Humanity’s Last Breath float in the ashen, industrial air, glittering in the light of black fires as guitarist Lukas Klotz drops bunker-busting chugs against the megastructural foundation laid down by drummer Rodney Fuchs and bassist/keyboardist Marlon Palm. Ernst deploys cleans that shift between a semi-spoken singing and gravelly bellowing that lends tracks like “Collapse” and “Nadir” a sense of grandeur and grit alike, channeling images of Ernst’s avatar standing amidst smoldering architecture as golden rays beset his pleading visage. Ernst even pulls some black metal-adjacent screams on “Nadir” to create a sense of vicious urgency and anguish. Post-metal guitarwork wanders across the devastation in a contemplative stupor, shocked and lost. Melancholic yet lively keywork in tracks like the interlude “Allusion” supply Amnesia with elements of majesty and madness alike, as though the gossamer threads of reality are set to come undone at any moment as the album’s dystopian weight and desperation build to a fever pitch (“Limbic”).

Fittingly, the back half of the album feels like fallout, with the decidedly moody (and bass-driven) “Idiomorph” embracing the band’s post-metal attitudes as Ernst delivers some Silent Planet-coded verses. Clean, resonant guitar dances around him like lost hopes, tribal drums build to pounding double-bass, and those grand, dolorous keys return. Like the aforementioned Kardashev and Liminal Rite, Monosphere do an admirable job of conveying a sense of narrative across Amnesia, even if my understanding of it comes from more of an emotional context as opposed to literal. “Limbic” appropriately feels like the midpoint of the album, “Engram” the “return to threshold” (to pull from Dan Harmon’s Story Circle), with “Dissolve” standing as the work’s final denouement; a thunderous, lamenting conclusion that sees the band pulling out all the stops (and Mark Garrett). “Dissolve” brings metalcore chugging, breakdowns, symphonic theatricality, Meshuggah-esque soloing, blast beats, post-metal miasma, and—perhaps better than any track on the album—pulls them all together into a fittingly epic finale.

While Amnesia’s forty-two minutes of devastating progressive metalcore often nails the target, the front half of the album can leave the listener suffering from shellshock. “Collapse”, “Anomia”, “Nadir”, and “Allusion” blend together into one long song whose melding of elements add difficulty in separating out where one track ends and another begins. While hardly an issue if you’re a fan of this sort of continual musical storytelling (which I am), if you enjoy tracks having some separate personality apart from an album’s overarching musical aims, Amnesia’s opening moments may not be the most playlist-friendly. Nor do they lend themselves to any singularly memorable moment—unlike, say, the grooving bassline nestled within “Dissolve”, or the dance-inspired rhythm in ‘’Idiomorph”.

All said, Monosphere surprised me with Amnesia, a decidedly propulsive effort that combines my love of crushing metalcore heft with contemplative and grandiose moments via effective genre blending and potent performances across the board. Conceptually, the album succeeds more figuratively than literally, but the band nonetheless do a solid job of giving Amnesia a narrative ebb and flow that, while diminishing the efficacy of individual tracks, creates a rewarding start-to-finish journey. Whether Amnesia will take root in my mind alongside the likes of a Liminal Rite, only time can say. But memory is a fickle thing, anyway, and so I’m glad to have spent this time with Monosphere.

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Recommended tracks: Nadir, Idiomorph, Zenith, Dissolve
You may also like: Despite Exile, Vestigial, Unethical Dogma, Artifact, Liverum
Final verdict: 7.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram

Label: Independent

Monosphere is:
– Kevin Ernst (vocals)
– Lukas Klotz (guitars)
– Marlon Palm (bass)
– Rodney Fuchs (drums, keyboards)
With guests:
– Jei Doublerice (additional vocals on “Nadir”)
– Mark Garrett (additional vocals on “Dissolve”)
– Justin Felder (additional instruments)

1. Arknights: Endfield is actually a really fun game, like a mashup of Final Fantasy and Soulsbornes with factory automation. Even the gacha elements aren’t terrible. But man, the main character is boring. ↩︎
2. Which also came with a companion book detailing the process, concepts, et cetera. ↩︎