PROGRESSIVE METAL
DOM LAWSON buckles up for a delve into the darker, heavier side.
There are moments on Cydemind’s debut album The Descent (cydemind.com) when the Canadians sound like a tech-metal Tull. This, incidentally, is a brilliant idea. Entirely instrumental and dominated by the fizzing histrionics of violinist Olivier Allard, epic opener Obsessions and the 14-minute
Hemlock have a liberated, fusion jam-like quality, while also demonstrating the ruthless precision of their virtuoso creators. With more than a passing resemblance to Between The Buried And Me at their most melodic, Parius are upfront about their intentions on The Signal Heard Throughout Space (Willowtip). Leaving no genre untouched and revelling in the contrast between The Signal’s graceful mood-shifts, the brutal pop-metal of Contact! and the unhinged extremes of centrepiece The Acid Lakes Of Ganymede, they have mad ideas and great tunes galore.
Kyle McNeill is best known as guitarist and frontman with UK retro-metallers Seven Sisters, but on Phantom Spell’s first album
Immortal’s Requiem (Wizard Tower), he dons a warlock’s hat and heads straight for the progosphere. With shades of everyone from Uriah Heep and Demon to Kansas and Utopia, there is an air of nostalgic tribute to songs like Seven Sided Mirror and Up The Tower, but McNeill blends all the elements with great skill, and clearly knows his way around a massive, time-defying riff. A nimble cover of Rory Gallagher’s Moonchild is a sweet bonus.
On their 2018 debut Mind, Norwegian quartet Vorbid were a moderately progressive thrash metal band. Four years on, they have evolved into something far more expansive. A Swan At The Edge Of Mandala (Indie) still contains just enough thrash to keep metalheads happy, but the dominant force here is a Voivod-like insistence on taking every idea to its proudly illogical conclusion. On songs like the dreamy Ex Ante and the spiky prog metal of Paradigm, Vorbid have all the power and ingenuity of late-70s Rush.
Another band with a lust for progress, Hammers Of Misfortune may alienate a few fans with their new album,
Overtaker (hammersofmisfortune.bandcamp. com). The progressive eccentricities of previous classics like The August Engine and
17th Street are here in abundance, but the Montana band are clearly in no mood to placate. From the title track onwards, the prevailing vibe is one of face-ripping but profoundly wonky extreme metal, with all the psychedelic trimmings. John Cobbett’s crew haven’t sounded this pissed off since
The Bastard in 2001, and it really suits them.
Finally, former members of psych-doom icons SubRosa have resurfaced as The Otolith. Their debut album, Folium Limina (Blues Funeral) is a stunning piece of work and a violin-fuelled missing link between the primal wizardry of Black Sabbath and Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s widescreen smotherings. Magical, in other words.