Reports from the (progressive metal) underground: January 2019

Hello there good readers! It’s a bit late, but happy new year! The Progressive Subway finally starts making strides in 2019 releases, and we have some changes this time. As I said on last edition, Nostrebor68 left due to personal reasons. However, since our review team is actually a hydra, we got two new reviewers to replace him. Let me introduce you to Daniel and Jango! Well Jango was actually rather short-lived as he had to cancel this due to real life getting in the way, so we’re again looking for a new reviewer.
So… January eh? What can I say? Together with the other winter months, January is usually a quiet month as far as major prog metal releases go. But that nature also means that there’s more stuff for us! Surely there will be some amazing things slipping through the radar? Last December turned out amazing for it had a good bunch of really phenomenal releases (Keor, Riverwood among others), and January 2018 also had some very good material (Phendrana, Howling Sycamore, etc.). So the question is: can January 2019 keep up with this trend? Let’s find out!

But first, some of my usual ramblings. What is this place? In short, we use metal-archives’ advanced search function to find good underground progressive, post or avantgarde metal released in a certain month, and make a selection of it which we review. In long, take a look at our about page! All the info’s in there.
Also, I will not be linking to previous editions anymore from now on, as the new website design is clear enough to easily find everything. We will also soon start transcribing the posts which were done on Reddit to this website, so it’ll be even easier to find.
Lastly, here’s a link to the Spotify playlist with all the recommended songs (at least for as far as the albums are on Spotify). And if you don’t want/have time to read the entire thing, here’s a spreadsheet we made with all the info on the bands and albums you need.

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01-01 Joey Frevola – Gone (US-TN)
Style: rock, cheese (clean vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | RYM page
Review by: Daniel

If you enjoy musicals, then I would say that you probably have the greatest chance of like Joey Frevola’s Gone just because of the cheese factor in his music. Cheese isn’t always bad, it can be great sometimes, but bad music is bad, and I think even the most ardent lovers of musicals and progressive rock will be hard pressed to like all of Gone.

Altogether, Joey Frevola has done some ok things in this album, but his accomplishments are diminished by messy songwriting and blatant stealing from other artists.
I’m going to take a minute to catalogue everything I’ve heard him take:

1. The main theme in Empty is pretty much directly taken from Dancing Queen.
2. A sax chimes in Find Him with the theme of The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
3. The main theme in Elise’s Song sounds ripped off from Pictures at an Exhibition by Modest Mussorgsky (guy who composed Night on Bald Mountain, which is featured in Fantasia).
4. I swear I’ve heard the main theme in Lonely somewhere else before…
5. Same thing for Lonely as for the final theme in “Friends”/main theme in Someone Like You. It sounds like it’s from a Disney movie, and I can’t really tell which one.
6. I’m sure I’m missing more just because I don’t know where all he takes all of his “inspirations” from.

But the blatant stealing in this record isn’t the only sin. His music often feels chunky and awkward, with poor transitions. For example, Rooftops is a song with clear Dream Theater influences. The beginning has this random polyrhythm thing that never rears its ugly head again in the song. Other than showing that polyrhythms are a thing I don’t really know what the point of this intro is. It makes no musical sense. After this, the song gets off the ground and gets pretty ok but is then ruined by a couple of weird transitions in the end. It just feels like the music is at least a couple iterations away from being a finished product.

But it’s not just Rooftops that feels like this. Just like the music, the album feels all over the place and lacks much cohesion. But it’s not all bad for Mr. Frevola. I definitely see some sparks of genius in his music. In my opinion Lonely stands out as the best track on this album. As I mentioned previously, I swear I’ve heard the main theme in Lonely before, but that doesn’t take away from the quality of the song. It’s undeniably beautiful, and I believe that Joey Frevola has his best vocal performance on the album in it.

I’m intrigued to see what output Joey Frevola will have in the future. If he cleans up his act, I think he’s capable of making something good. For now, I would only recommend Lonely to the casual reader.

Recommended tracks: Lonely
Recommended for fans of: musicals, Disney
Final verdict: 4/10

01-01 Quercus – Verferum (Czechia)
Style: funeral doom/avantgarde (harsh vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Official Website | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Daniel

If you can take the time to get into the world that Quercus has created in this album, you should listen to Verferum. It takes you on an intense musical experience that is reflective and powerful without coming across as pretentious, making it easily accessible to folks who don’t often listen to this style of music.

Before we dive into this album, a quick FYI. The album is long, and there are only four tracks on it, coming in at ~10:00 to ~23:00. To do this music justice, I think you have to be prepared to give it some time. That being said, let’s get into it.

Quercus’ classical influence on this album, as well as their judicious use of a pipe organ really make this album for me. I don’t think I would have ever expected to see an organ on a metal album. “Ok,” you ask, “they use it, but does it sound good?” Yes. It never feels like a gimmick or a novelty. They use an organ in Ceremony of the Night and Passacaglia D minor, White and Black Darkness, and its primary musical role is to play an ostinato, a term for a musical phrase that is continuously repeated. In this way, it has a similar role to the bass in most bands, which is what makes the organ fit into the music so seamlessly, but its tone gives the music a much heavier, somber vibe to it.

But the organ isn’t the only time Quercus looks back to western musical roots to step forward in their own work. They combine classical styles with funeral doom to make something that’s much darker and heavier than their counterparts. Their classical influence is particularly evident on “Passacaglia D minor, White and Black Darkness,” which is, effectively, a doom metal cover of Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, BWV 582. Just the fact that they attempted something this ambitious is a good reason to at least give them a shot.

For its genre, the album is certainly good, but it does have its weaknesses. I wasn’t very impressed with the two other tracks on this album Journey of the Eyes and The Pu-erh Exhumed. They’re not bad, but they simply don’t really stand out like the other tracks do.

The other weakness the album has is that the track often repeat the same simple lines too often. I understand that they want to create an atmosphere, but sometimes they just do it too much, and I think that this repetition saps some of the energy this music would otherwise have.

The mix works well, but it’s nothing to write home about. The music is often so simple that mixing it isn’t nearly as complex as, say, something like Periphery IV. Because of this, the recording quality is very exposed, and it isn’t that great. That’s really just an issue of getting better mics, but fortunately that would be an easy fix. The organ also has some timing issues that stand out in the Passacaglia, but I can forgive them for this.

In a time where metal has increasingly greater electronic influences, this album offers a very interesting, ultra old-fashioned take on the funeral doom metal genre, a take that I think many of our readers will find refreshing.  

Recommended tracks: Ceremony of the Night; Passacaglia D minor, White and Black Darkness
Recommended for fans of: Ahab
Final verdict: 7/10

01-03 PhonoPaths – Sandwich, Ducks and Dishwasher: The Chronicles of Supertaste (France)
Style: metalcore/avantgarde (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Dylan

I’ve been writing this blog for about 7 months now, and so far I’ve never had an album left me utterly speechless. Until now. Phonopaths made a concept album… about food… with Metalcore-esque songwriting with comedy elements mixed in. Needless to say, I wasn’t sure if what I was hearing was the most brilliant thing ever written, or the biggest piece of garbage I ever found.

Let’s get one thing out of the way; the songwriting here is extremely competent, so it’s not like the guy just yells food names without riffs and a good amount of interesting instrumentation. The problem is that it is hard to walk the fine line between good comedy music, and unbearable comedy music. And I’m still not sure where this falls. I love the chaotic segments but then an interlude with quirky falsetto comes in talking about ducks and radish and I’m just like…..

Thanks to all that, for now I’m not gonna rate this album. It’s got good BTBAM worship instrumentation wise, but the comedy present in the album is something everyone will digest differently.

If I end up loving the album, it’ll probably be on my end of the year list. If it’s not there, assume the worst :p

Recommended tracks: Chasing the Big Sandwich, Readysh
Recommended for fans of: Between the Buried and Me, Unexpect + FOOD
Final verdict: ???/10

01-05 Cloudbreaker – Confinement Is Finite (Germany)
Style: melodeath (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Daniel

If someone were to play “stock” music of melodic death metal, Cloudbreaker would be what you’d hear. The music is generally tasteful, the musicianship is good, but they don’t explore new territory or make themselves stand out. And this is my main issue with this band.

This lack of exploration brings me to one of the biggest issues I have with this band: their self proclaimed classification as progressive metal. To me the only progressive aspects of their music are their lyrics (focus on sci-fi and dystopian themes with obscure references), but I believe that this really isn’t enough to make them qualify as Progressive Metal. Sure, I spotted a couple grooves in 7 for a few bars, but I would argue that even the use of odd time signatures for a couple bars in a single song isn’t enough to make something immediately classify as Progressive.

But even though this band isn’t very progressive and they aren’t the most original sounding, they have some great riffs and grooves. Maurice Arnhold, the vocalist, is very powerful, but I’m not familiar enough with the genre to make a clear determination on the quality of his singing. Deniz Nitt, the lead guitarist has some great chops, but sometimes his solos sound too “shreddy” for my delicate traditional prog ears. Julian Dietrich kills it on drums and the man has some serious chops, but often his parts sound far too formulaic, and this makes the drumming come across as “boring” or “lazy.” I’m sure the bass player is great, but I can’t hear him in the mix whatsoever…

Clearly, all of these musicians are great at their instruments, but unfortunately the songwriting is where this album really suffers. The structure of the songs are totally predictable and this really prevents them from going outside of the box and getting a progressive sound to their band. Their transitions also need, well, much improvement. In particular, they like the “bell of death” transition, and at this point it’s so trite and predictable that it’s just painful, even for someone that is new to this subgenre like I am.

Overall, this album is an easy listen, and I think only the most ardent lovers of melodic death can appreciate the album, as this really is bog standard.

Recommended tracks: Dystopia/The Sunken Moon, Confinement is Finite
Recommended for fans of: Children of Bodom, Wintersun, Dark Tranquillity
Final verdict: 5/10

01-05 Thousand Sun Sky – The Aurora Complex (Australia)
Style: instrumental
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Sam

A while back for the June edition of this blog I mentioned in a review how I came across this totally-not-biased 95% score guest musician review on metal-archives on the band I was reviewing. That band was called Thousand Sun Sky, and this is their second album. Or rather, her second album as this band is a solo project by Eva Sanchez. This will be the first time ever I’ve reviewed the same band twice on this blog. Last review was on the template of the videos about competitive Pokemon from False Swipe Gaming, and this one will be too. So now again, we ask ourselves: How GOOD was Thousand Sun Sky – The Aurora Complex ACTUALLY?

Her album was a solid slab of instrumental symphonic progressive metal, and with The Aurora Complex Eva continues down this path. What we have here is a mixture of solid metal riffs, great shredding and different electronic and symphonic elements in the atmosphere. Eva really did an amazing job programming the synths. There is piano playing, trance music styled soundscapes, video game sounds and some lovely lead melodies. Speaking of video game music, this would be excellent OST for a fantasy or a sci fi game. I could easily see myself playing a Final Fantasy boss battle to this. I’d also again like to highlight her soloing ability, as it stays captivating the whole time. She brings the shred, but also slows it down when needed and utilizes a plethora of different styles I couldn’t tell you the name of because I don’t play guitar. All I know is that it works.

What’s the most important factor which makes this album enjoyable though is her compositional ability. Most instrumental metal bores me immensely, but TSS is always a joy to listen to. The songs are eventful and switch things up plenty. Not once does this feel like a guitar wank-fest, which is exactly what plagues instrumetal acts so often. The melodies on this album are absolute ear candy.
However, this album is not without its flaws. The programmed drums don’t sound as ear-crushing anymore as on the debut, but they’re still very, very far from being good. The snare is a bit better than last time, but still definitely nothing to write home about; and the kick drums just sound awful. Not to mention the awful cymbal sounds. Hiring a drummer would definitely be something to look out for next album. What I’m also missing on this record is a bit more rhythmic variation. It mostly just stays in 4/4, making it a bit flat. I’d love some crazy proggy odd-time signature shenanigans in this. Also here having an actual drummer could help immensely. Then lastly, my final complaint about this album is in its length. It’s 3 minutes shorter than the debut, but even then it feels like this goes on a good 10 minutes too long.

So, to come back to a conclusion: How GOOD was Thousand Sun Sky – The Aurora Complex ACTUALLY? It was… pretty solid. While it has some rough programmed drums and definitely goes on longer than it should, the melodies, excellent symphonic elements and great guitar playing more than make up for it. I doubt this will reach anyone’s album of the year list, as it mostly plays like background music, but it’s very good background music nonetheless. Definitely worth spinning a couple of times.

Recommended tracks: Hollow, Aurora, Pt. I-III
Recommended for fans of: video game OST, background music
Final verdict: 7/10

01-08 Althea – The Art of Trees (Italy)
Style: Art Rock (clean vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Daniel

If you like Pink Floyd, or any other traditional progressive rock band, listen to this album. No, I’m serious. You need to listen to this band, now. This isn’t to say that Althea isn’t original – quite the opposite actually. The best way I would describe them is that they take the progressive art rock sound from the 70’s and 80’s and progressed that sound, fusing it with modern elements to make something totally new.

The quality of the song writing on this record is stunning. They’ll take a simple melodic or rhythmic idea, develop it, and go down paths that are totally unexpected. This sort of natural song development is what you see in all the greats (think Rush). They never have “too many” ideas they’re trying to shove in one song, and it makes their songs sound clear and gives them a clear forward direction the whole time.

Something else that really stands out to me about this record are singer Alessio Accardo’s fantastic vocals. His vocal style is influenced heavily by the early masters, but it has just enough grit to make it sound human. For pretty much every single track on this record, Accordo records multiple parts for the vocals. When bands do this, they typically have multiple parts in harmony with each other, bolstering the lead. This sort of effect is common and sounds good, but Althea has taken it a step further. Instead of the usual approach the multiple tracks have different parts that fit in with each other like puzzle pieces. This sort of technique is known as counterpoint, and Althea loves to use it not only in their vocal melodies (where it’s most prominent), but in solo instrumental sections (see “The Shade”). It gives Althea a distinctive, original sound that is just stunningly beautiful.

One thing I would like to see a little more from this band, though, is rhythmic experimentation. Pretty much their entire repertoire is in 4 or 3, which can make some more experienced prog fans wanting something a little more. However, I can forgive them for this, because (a) they’re amazing, and (b) the style they derive their sound from doesn’t lend itself to having a song with a thousand time signature changes (e.g. Dream Theater).

Overall the mix is fantastic. The guitars sound like they were taken straight out of Wish You Were Here, and the drums sound natural and full. The vocals are amazing and never overpower the other parts at the wrong time. The strings and synths are also mixed at just the right volume. The only thing that I’m not a fan of is how the bass is recorded. The tone is nice and fat, but the attacks are very harsh and “clicky”; particularly in the softer sections the clicks are distracting. The bass should be taken down a couple db’s.

The Art of the Trees has a universal appeal that I think everyone in the progressive rock/metal community can get behind. They’re refreshing, creative and extremely emotional. I can only hope that Althea won’t disappear into obscurity and that they’ll get the international attention and critical acclaim they clearly deserve. Give them a shot, you won’t be disappointed.

Recommended tracks: The Art of Trees, The Shade, Today, One More Time
Recommended for fans of: Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Genesis, Riverside
Final verdict: 9/10

01-13 Together to the Stars – An Oblivion Above (Sweden)
Style: post black (harsh vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Dylan

As frequent readers may already know, I’m quite the fan of blending post/shoegaze rock with black metal. This mixture of beautiful textured sensations and spine chilling black metal vocals wrapped around tremolo picking and blast beats feels just right.

A post black band doesn’t need to innovate much because the formula is already too complex to experiment with. So, as long as the artist understands the strengths of the genre and exploits them to the max, they’re bound to (in my opinion) be fantastic. With all of this in mind, I’m happy to report that An Oblivion Above meets all of my expectations for the genre.

Together to the Stars made a gorgeous album. This is very dreamy post black, similar to Møl‘s 2018 release, Jord. They both share this snowy/heavenly atmosphere, with high shrieks as vocals. Kind of feels like I’m listening to a man singing in a place that’s all white, desperate to get out of this place, regardless of how heavenly it feels. The build up-climax formula of post rock is used to the max here, and with great effect. I’m not gonna spoil when it happens, but there’s one particular climax that was so fantastic it elevated my general thoughts on the album. It was unlike anything I’ve ever heard, and it left me completely amazed.

That alone, plus everything present on the album, should convince you that this is a release you shouldn’t sleep on.

Recommended tracks: Timeless, Apathy
Recommended for fans of: Møl, Alcest, Deafheaven
Final verdict: 8.5/10

01-15 Ahl Sina – Troops of Pain (Egypt)
Style: oriental (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Sam

I had thought December to be a dull month for this blog, but then I found Riverwood. They played oriental prog metal in what could best be described as a combination between Orphaned Land and Dan Swanö’s Nightingale project. At first I wasn’t convinced about them, but with repeated listens the hooks started to sink in and I couldn’t stop listening. Now it’s one of my most listened to album ever featured on this blog. So when I saw there was another oriental prog metal band for January I was incredibly excited. Enter Ahl Sina.

For a long time I wasn’t sure what I thought about this record. It seemed really good in the beginning (like an 8/10), but there was just something off about it, and it took me ages to find out what it is. Heck, I even had to rewrite my entire review because I put emphasis on the wrong things earlier. But I think I now have an idea where that stems from.

Troops of Pain is an incredibly ambitious album. For starters there are 7 band members, 3 of which play unorthodox instruments (flute, violin and percussion). Most band members come from Egypt, but the violin player, the percussionist and the bass player all hail from Germany. Then the guitarist also does the keyboard parts and you have a huge amount of musical elements present in this band’s music. The record is also quite long at 65 minutes and it’s a concept album. I have not delved into the concept though since a) I couldn’t find the lyrics anywhere and b) I’m terrible at analyzing poetry anyway. The question then of course becomes whether Ahl Sina can live up to the expectations that come with such bold ambition.

In my opinion, the answer to this is a mixed one. I think every element has both its strong and its weak points. So, as always, let’s start with the strong ones. First of all, there’s a plethora of different vocal techniques used. There’s clean singing, gutturals, a really freaky style I have no clue how to describe (eg. The Gift @5:40) and plenty of spoken word sections by different people. The freaky style and the gutturals sound lovely, and the clean singing has a nice phrygian flavor to it which makes it sound more exotic. I think the guitarist also has a very strong performance. His lead melodies are absolute ear-candy (see: Vowed) and he lays down some very strong riffs as well. The metal parts in this album just sound strong in general.

Like I said earlier, Ahl Sina play oriental prog metal. My first review was focused on whether this was a gimmick or not, but after re-listening after a break of a few days I realized this wasn’t fair. The oriental music is ingrained so deep into their sound it becomes impossible to separate. It’s not just that they incorporate straight up oriental parts, but also in how the vocal and guitar melodies are structured and the drumming patterns that the oriental influence becomes apparent. This flavor makes for some really nice moments in the album. There are some beautiful melodies on the violin and the flute (they even have a couple of solos), and the extra percussion is fantastic. I was almost belly dancing to some of the oriental interludes lol.

So it seems this record is all nice and shine, but looks can be deceiving. We now delve into the bad parts. There are two major problems on this album I feel. The first one is the most obvious one (where my previous review centered around) and that is that the vocals, the flute, the violin and the guitar all tend to play the same melodies, at the same time. I am not sure who follows who, but it sounds stale as hell. The clean singing especially lacks memorability, and they really should work on their vocal lines. This record just has a significant lack of catchiness, or rather, memorability, which leads me to my second major critique. And I think this one touches the core of all the problems.
To me, this album just lacks a sense of urgency. The whole 65 minutes it’s either slow or mid-tempo; or there’s an oriental interlude. What I miss is something that just grabs you by the balls with energy and POWER. For example in Dream Theater’s Scenes from a Memory when Beyond This Life comes in you’re just immediately hooked by the power of that main riff, and the verses remain very high energy throughout. There’s no equivalent of that on this album. There are some parts where they speed up the tempo, but it’s only the playing that becomes faster, not the song progression. I’m just missing that “oomph” factor, if that makes sense. So after a while everything just ends up sounding the same, and the 65 minutes long duration (which isn’t even that much for a prog concept album) becomes a drag.

So, there you have it. This band is clearly talented and I love their ambitiousness, but lazy melodic playing, often mediocre vocal lines and a lack of urgency and staying power just hinders me from enjoying this as it’s intended to. My interest in oriental prog metal hasn’t diminished, but I now realize not all is good. That said though, I’m definitely interested to see where this band goes next. Should they improve on their flaws, we might just have a very, very good band on our hands.

Recommended tracks: The Gift, Vowed, Enlightenment Discarded
Recommended for fans of: Orphaned Land, Subterranean Masquerade, traditional prog metal
Final verdict: 6.5/10

01-22 Surtalog – Schwertsturm (Germany)
Style: pagan black (harsh vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Sam

I’m really short on time for this review so let me be quick. This is a quite nice prog black debut EP. There are some really strong black metal riffs, which are a bit on the thrash-y side. I don’t see what’s Pagan about this though. There’s a problem about this album though. They often incorporate proggy passages, but it feels as though they’re not executed very well. The transitions between the odd-time signatures feel a bit off. This band probably needs more practice together. That said though, the songwriting is solid enough to mask those problems. This is a very solid debut EP, and who knows what they’ll come up with when their first full length comes about.

Recommended tracks: Schwertsturm
Recommended for fans of: idk, black metal?
Final verdict: 6.66/10

01-25 Ceild – A View (France)
Style: instrumental
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Dylan

I can’t really write a long review here. Ceild play instrumental prog metal that feels like I’m listening to a standard prog metal album with it’s vocal track removed. The instrumentation is competent, and there are some nice solos here and there, but I wouldn’t recommend this release for more than background noise or studying music.

Recommended tracks: all or nothing
Recommended for fans of: not liking vocals
Final verdict: 5/10

01-30 Cosmic Rain – Seekers (Switzerland)
Style: rock (mixed vocals)
Related links: Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | RYM page
Review by: Dylan

Cosmic Rain are… interesting. The music sounds like heavy prog rock at most times, and on occasion it can get a bit more metal-y. This sound was certainly not what I expected from a band we had labeled as traditional, but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad sound, it’s just vastly different.
The strengths of the album are the general mood/atmosphere present throughout all of the tracks, the competent use of polyrhythms rather than just for the sake of it, and the 10 minute epic The Journey and It’s Tones. This tune starts very ballady, and progressively gets heavier. Once you reach opeth levels of heavy, it’s all toned down with a nice break. I believe this song showcases best this band’s potential.

With all that said, I’m afraid to report that the other tracks can be hit and miss. But overall, it’s a good album that is just not what I really love about Progressive Rock. It’s a bit too moody and “inactive” for my taste, but objectively it’s good music.

Recommended tracks: The Journey and It’s Tones
Recommended for fans of: Ayreon (but less cheesy), Porcupine Tree
Final verdict: 7/10

01-30 Stormhaven – Liquid Imagery (France)
Style: death/extreme (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Sam

There’s a small part of my brain that goes completely crazy every time a band lists Opeth as a major influence. Bands which can pull off extreme progressive metal well are rare, but also extremely special. A lot of my favorite bands play in this style. However, I’m also very picky. Last year for October I reviewed this band called Piah Mater, which was basically Opeth worship, and that didn’t sit well with me at all. So the question for this album is, do Stormhaven give their own take on the genre, or is it just another Piah Mater?

The answer is… somewhere in the middle, but probably more on the worship side. It basically floats in and out of the Opeth worship. This is best exemplified by the intro to the (I don’t count 2 minute interludes) opening track The Storm. It starts with an Opeth riff, then goes into a super cool and unique black metal part, and then reverts back to Opeth riffs. Then the song (like the rest of the album) continues with this on-off style for the rest of its duration.

So now that we established the worship-degree of this album, let’s dive into the music a bit more. There are two primary aspects on this in which they clearly distinguish themselves from Opeth. One is the incorporation of black metal parts in their writing, and the other is the use of piano. I’d say the Black Metal parts by themselves aren’t super interesting, but they’re serviceable enough to elevate the music. The piano is the real draw here though. I (again) wouldn’t say it’s very inventive playing by itself, but they’re done effectively and provide some absolutely beautiful melodies. What’s a shame though is that, softer parts aside, they’re barely audible in the mix. With enough effort you can hear them, but they’re just very far back in the mix.

What I also like about this band is that they clearly have a good grasp on songwriting. Worship comments aside, they make very good use of all the tools at their disposal. The vocal lines are memorable with good delivery. The harsh vocals are like a more raspy, -core like take on Akerfeldt’s devilish guttural vocals. Certainly not as good, but they’re very strong nonetheless. The singing takes more obvious notes from Akerfeldt’s book. Again not as good, but some of the best moments on the album are from their brilliant vocal lines (see Echoes’ chorus, it’s beautiful). And instrumentally they know their shit as well. The riffs are often clearly borrowed, but the placement of every idea is done with significant skill, which makes for some amazing moments.

So to come to a conclusion on my ramble, Opeth worship aspects aside, Liquid Imagery is an excellent album. This is clearly a talented group, and (thus far) this is definitely my favorite album of 2019 yet. However, I’m going to have to mention it anyway, as this album definitely steers too close to Opeth worship to truly justify a high score. Had it not been for this lack of originality this album would have probably been like an 8.5, but as a reviewer I have to be objective. Let’s hope they’ll find their own sound more in the future.

Recommended tracks: The Storm, Starless Night, Sirens, Aurora
Recommended for fans of: Opeth, Piah Mater
Final verdict: 7.2/10