The Italian science-fiction atmospheric black metal trio Progenie terrestre pura will soon release their second full-length album, oltreLuna. With this opus, we see them at their most diversified and confident. Between the blast beats and the atmospheric keyboard pads, you’ll find elements of folk music like the flute on ‘[.Pianeta.Zero.]’, electronic dance music like the dubstep part of ‘[.oltreLuna.]’, and industrial metal. All these make for a really interesting and varied experience, something that is cruelly lacking in the atmospheric black metal landscape. The instruments on there sound very angular, almost mechanical, synthetic, but embedded in all that futuristic, … Read more
Category Archives: Mini-Review
Sheen Marina – Travel Lightly
Sheen Marina describe themselves as a ‘surf-noise’ band. However, I think that’s doing their music a disfavour, as it cannot be completely covered by this umbrella term. In their upcoming album, Travel Lightly, there are also strong flavours of math rock and avant-prog, which can hardly be foreseen with the ‘surf noise’ label. This thirty-minute album consists of nine tracks with varying degrees of interbreeding with the other aforementioned genres, all over a pretty clear, reverb-drenched surf rock basis. ‘WYSC’, for example, is almost a straight-up math rock song, with complex rhythms and odd time signatures, while ‘Nose Ring … Read more
The Blight – Meditations on Insignificance
Out on July twenty-eighth, Meditations on Insignificance is the latest experiment by noise metal artists The Blight. This full-length release explores the Lovecraftian themes of cosmic insignificance and the nihilistic views that nothing we will ever do will matter the slightest bit in the end. Their approach to music consists of improvised noise layered with atmospheric pads and supported by an impressive display of drumming skills, not too far from an actual drum solo. Thematically, the album goes from small scale, with ‘Self’, to a gigantic one, with ‘Galaxy’. Themes that are exploited without uttering a single word – … Read more
Asylon Terra – Blind Man Running
French quartet Asylon Terra recently released Blind Man Running, their first, full-length release. Between contemporary jazz, ambient music, and progressive rock, the compositions of Pierre Lordet, clarinetist of the group, take shape on this entrancing album. Anne Quillier, about whose sextet we already wrote, takes seat behind the omnipresent keyboards – the Rhodes and Moog -, while Lucas Hercberg takes bass duties, and Clément Black takes care of the drums. The whole is an astounding result. Blind Man Running will take your breath away. The vast soundscapes played here will submerge you, and even the harder-hitting compositions – … Read more
Bubblemath – Edit Peptide
Edit Peptide is the latest achievement of American eclectic and hectic progressive act Bubblemath. Out on May twenty-sixth through Cuneiform Records, this set of intellectual compositions might burn a fuse or two in your brain. That’s prog done right, and giving back the literal epithet of the genre. Complicated multi-part harmonies and melodies go over compound and conflicting rhythmics with an ease only before seen with King Crimson, and some new bands from that truly-prog resurgence movement. However difficult they are to play and however deeply they have been written, the songs are incredibly accessible and don’t feel like … Read more