Style:  progressive black metal, electronica, industrial metal, symphonic metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Mechina, Thy Catafalque, Sigh
Country: France
Release date: 1 August 2025

I love when an artist has a philosophical vision that the music matches. The man behind Creatvre, Raphaël Fournier, knows exactly what he wants Toujours Humain (Always Human) to represent: a deep tension between being human and being part of the fast-approaching technological future. In I, Voidhanger’s Bandcamp blurb for the record, Fournier drops some absolutely fire explanations like “It [Toujours Humain] echoes the cries of those no longer heard, fragments of tweets turned into prayers” and “It’s an allegory of self-erasure for individuals, as programmed by those who set the agenda… The shame of still being biological.” A bit pretentious? Absolutely. But the description is undoubtedly poetic, and Toujours Humain definitely walks the walk.

As a writer at a blog of luddites, I am naturally drawn far more to the side of Creatvre that looks toward the past and not the imminent technocratic future. The project’s 2020 record, Ex Cathedra, is brilliant Baroque-inspired black metal with flute and real strings; in 2025, the Baroque aspect of Creatvre’s sound is wrapped into synthwave à la Keygen Church, the only remnants of non-electronic instruments being sax and trumpet in tracks like “R+X,” “Diffimation,” and “Shaïna.” Toujours Humain successfully distorts their classical compositional style rooted in human tradition into an industrial, synthesized album that sounds like it could be from the future.

Synths and synthesized choirs, off-kilter electronic beats, and industrial metal barking harshes lay down the foundation for Toujours Humain and its view of technology. Atop that base, Creatvre creatively branches out in a couple ways: the aforementioned Baroque influence in impressive counterpoint (“Hope Inc.”, “Chant des Limbes”), dancey industrial beats under trem picking (“Plus Humain”), vocoder (“Plus Humain”) and dynamic synthwave (“Toujours en Bas,” “Diffamation”). Fournier also explores several compositional assets that don’t work in his favor, like the constant industrial sections focused on rhythm much more than melody, the latter of which is Creatvre’s strong suit. Some tracks rely too much on those industrial cliches, too, leading them to be completely forgettable on the tracklist (“R+X” aside from its trumpet part, “810-M4SS”). Fournier’s vocals are also one-note, staying entirely within a small span of mid-range harsh growls, with an odd whispered quality from multilayering, that feel out of place compared to the often exploratory and dynamic music on Toujours Humain. 

Exacerbating the middling industrial metal sections is a loud, fittingly over-produced sound. The strong guitar leads on “Syntropie” and “Chant des Limbes” get buried in a dozen different synth tones, which bleep, bloop, arpeggio, and provide a fat bottom end to the sound. No room is left for breathing in the mix—not that our cyborg counterparts will need air—in favor of a full, epic sound. The choral moments are the only ones that benefit from the loud mix, as they achieve a bombastic score-like quality, similar to Neurotech. The rare moments where fewer elements are moving around the sonic space in parallel are clearly where Creatvre excels; for instance, at 1:12 in “Hope Inc.”, Fournier isolates the main lead guitar with a single synth line to go into the Baroque-infused main melody in the “chorus” of sorts. The track also has a much more energetic swing than much of the rest of the album, mostly avoiding the industrial slog. 

Fournier gets his point across on Toujours Humain that man and machine are on an imminent collision course with his blend of old and new, but I hope that he rediscovers his more human composition because my still-unchipped brain prefers the symphonic black metal of Ex Cathedra over the industrial synthiness of Toujours Humain. Or, perhaps, I’m just too slow at evolving to fit the new technology and will be left behind as an embarrassing remnant of what our species was, fleshy and reliant on oxygen.

Recommended tracks: Hope Inc., Chant des Limbes, Diffamation
You may also like: Grey Aura, Neurotech, Keygen Church, Les Chants du Hasard
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Creatvre is:
– Raphaël Fournier (voice, guitars, bass, synths, drums, trombones, trumpet, saxophone)
With guests:
– Ombre Ecarlate (additional composition)
– Cédric Sebastian (additional vocals on tracks 6-7)

The post Review: Creatvre – Toujours Humain appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: experimental black metal, psychedelic black metal, dissonant black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Oranssi Pazuzu, Blut Aus Nord, Ulcerate
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 1 August 2025

A couple of my non-metal friends asked me the difference between black metal and death metal at dinner the other day, and I struggled to come up with a sufficient answer before finally deciding on “black metal focuses on atmosphere; death metal on bludgeoning.” It’s a drastic oversimplification, but how else would you describe the minutiae of extreme metal subgenres to people who would hear both as offensive noise? I was relatively proud of my off-the-cuff answer. British psychedelic black metal band Sea Mosquito certainly fit my miniature description of black metal as a wave of guitar, synth, and drums washes over the listener for forty-four minutes on Majestas. The record can be oppressively nightmarish, but without many distinct riffs, the atmosphere the group conjures is key to their success. 

The guitar parts function in the same manner as the synths—a background for the drums and rare lead guitars. From the swirly album opener “Organs Dissolved in Lacquer” to the dissonant closer “To Look upon Your Own Skeleton,” you are baptized in tremolo picking, awash in ambient synths. Occasionally, Sea Mosquito blesses the listener with a cleaner guitar tone, providing a lead above the murk like on “In Reverence of Pain.” Those moments with something more concrete to grab onto are godsends amidst the dark, hellish undercurrent. Beyond the guitars, the drums on Majestas are strong and dynamic. The drummer transitions between nice blast beats like on “In Reverence of Pain” to being the center focus like at 3:00 in “Organs Dissolved in Lacquer,” where he does monstrous cascading lines as if he provides the riff. While the rest of the band waffles about on their instruments, he carries Sea Mosquito’s inertia and rhythm—without him, Majestas has no movement.

Weirdly, Sea Mosquito leave the vocals drowning in the shadows while the acerbic highs would do well to create some clearer tension in their sound. When the vocals take center stage—the spoken harshes heralding the climax of “Ascension” and the spoken Arabic in the ghazal in “Ode to Wine” notably—are the moments when Majestas reaches its full potential. The lyrics, while difficult to parse except when vocalist Nuun switches into a more spoken register, are always interesting, contributing excellently to the cult-like atmosphere. My favorite track, “Ascension,” is elevated by its critique of postmodernism, with a crystal-clear uttering of “you will never feel the power of the sublime” leading into a bright, expansive, yet oppressive wall of sound as a climax. Many of the lyrics are inspired by Romanian religious scholar Mircea Eliade, and the literary slant is one of the album’s strongest assets in terms of atmosphere-crafting. 

But despite the many atmospheric strengths of Majestas, the emphasis on that aspect of their sound is the record’s downfall. Hardly a memorable moment is to be found in most of the tracks on the record, as it becomes an amorphous slog, more focused on textural style than songwriting substance. The album is nightmarish, psychedelic, and literary, yet the lack of sharp songwriting and forgettable riffs, while also mixing the vocals too low, is too much to overlook, leaving Sea Mosquito to be just another dissoblack album to add to the pile.

Recommended tracks: Ascension, In Reverence of Pain, Ode to Wine
You may also like: Decline of the I, The Great Old Ones, Haar, Omega Infinity, Noise Trail Immersion
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Sea Mosquito is:
– Nuun – Voice
– Fas – Spirit
– Akmonas – Soma

The post Review: Sea Mosquito – Majestas appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: dissonant black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Deathspell Omega, Blut Aus Nord, Mgła¹, Misþyrming, Behemoth
Country: Poland
Release date: 27 June 2025

Polish art would have you believe the country is the most depressing place on Earth. Sculptor Alina Szapocznikow documented human suffering, fragmenting the female form and criticizing labor practices and war; filmmaker Artur Zmijewski looks into the traumatic past of his nation; and every metal fan is well-acquainted with the dystopian surrealist painters Zdzislaw Beksinski and Mariusz Lewandowski. Naturally, the nihilism of visual art has wormed its way deep into the heart of Polish metal with the country’s distinct black metal scene leading the charge, with notable artists like Mgła, Behemoth, and Batushka. Digging a little deeper into the scene’s catacombs, one will find K.M.’s dissonant black metal project Ars Magna Umbrae, full of existential dread yet fraying at the seams with the slightest twinkle of melody.

K.M. joins forces with vocalist E (Cultum Inferitum) to form a new band Thanatorean. Their debut record Ekstasis of Subterranean Curren picks up the writhing dissonance from K.M.’s main project, certainly, and at first glance is another inimically opaque record, styled after diabolical black metal icons, like Mgła and Deathspell Omega. On the surface, Ekstasisof Subterranean Currents seems like another solid entry into the canon of Polish black metal, and that’s that, end of story. And one wouldn’t be wrong for reading the record that way. The record opens on “The Descent” with creepy ambience suddenly racing into second-wave black metal riffery, swirling tremolos peaking their way above the seedy underbelly of the mix. E lets out well-enunciated beastly growls and gralloching highs across the record, cutting through the filthy, deathened black metal. Stormy bouts of chaotic noise overwhelm the senses at times like at the end of “With Tongues of the Underworld” and “Tranquil Trueness of End.” And throughout Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents, riffs contort unexpectedly to create a haunting atmosphere, permeated with dissonance. That’s the Polish black metal experience.

Thanatorean are more than meets the ear, however, and Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents is—dare I say—a fun record at heart. As opposed to the grim philosophy and anti-religious sentiments of the other bands mentioned, Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents plays around with death cults in their lyrics, utilizing dramatic vocabulary, camp rhyme schemes, and occasional dramatic spoken word (the final four stanzas of “To Abyss Sacrosanct” each open with an infinitive verb spoken before three short lines of E’s beastly harsh vocals. It’s incredibly sick, and Thanatorean don’t overuse the songwriting device). The attempt at high-brow lyricism is (perhaps unintentionally) funny as hell in a good way, the duo not taking themselves too seriously.

More importantly, the music is a rowdily great time. K.M. demonstrates his fealty to the riff as second-wave black metal and evolved dissonance collide—Thanatorean are at their most interesting and engaging when they experiment on the Ars Magna Umbrae side of the sound more than the traditional one. The angsty black metal musicians often still have excellent riffing, but Thanatorean separate themselves from their Polish kin with their occasional flashes of swagger. “The Descent” has a ripping guitar solo; every track has endlessly mutating and intricate guitar parts with silvering leads; and “De Profundis” and “To Abyss Sacrosanct” open with abhorrently tasty bass licks. In opposition to the complexity of the guitar lines, the songwriting on Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents is tame, with little variation in track-length or tempo among the nine short tracks. A few tracks also conclude with fadeouts, frustrating for the quality of progressive song evolutions K.M. has proven to be capable of with Ars Magna Umbrae. 

I’m pleasantly surprised at how Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents defied my expectations for it. K.M.’s mastery of warped atmospheres and E’s filthy vocals go together perfectly, blending to make Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents a record sonically evil but tonally more of a headbanger than a brooder-in-the-corner. Thanatorean’s debut is a solid proof of concept and a breath of fresh air for the Polish scene—I just hope they lean into a bit more weirdness going forward.

Recommended tracks: The Descent, De Profundis, To Abyss Sacrosanct
You may also like: Ars Magna Umbrae, Fryktelig Støy, Haar, Spectral Voice, Zhrine, Thy Darkened Shade, Kriegsmaschine, Negative Plane, Mānbryne
Final verdict: 7/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Metal-Archives

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Thanatorean is:
– K.M. (everything)
– E (vocals)

1. We are aware of DSO and Mgła‘s sketchy ties and do NOT support these bands and are merely using them as a sonic reference. ︎

The post Review: Thanatorean – Ekstasis of Subterranean Currents appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive death metal, doom metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Blood Incantation, Tomb Mold, Esoteric
Country: New York, United States
Release date: 30 May 2025

When I was fourteen—ready to start high school baseball and with aspirations of playing beyond—I totaled my shoulder: my growth plate separated and fractured (colloquially known as Little League shoulder), and I had recurrent biceps tendinitis during recovery. Years of physical therapy didn’t fully fix it, so my baseball career was over just as it was going to truly begin. Seven years ago, while recording Weeping Sore’s debut False Confession, guitarist and vocalist Doug Moore seriously injured his shoulder, leaving him unable to play guitar. Many of his frustrations and pains are easy for me to empathize with, but some of what Moore was feeling I can only imagine. Planning on going to law school after his graduation from an Ivy league, Moore veered paths to become a full time death metal vocalist and guitarist (for Pyrrhon, Seputus, recently Scarcity). Famously a tenuous, financially risky career, pursuing music couldn’t have been an easy choice for Moore. Thus, by losing out on a fundamental asset to his livelihood and passion—the ability to play guitar—Moore’s late nights of shoulder pain must have been filled with potential regrets along with the typical pesky discouragements of recovery. 

Born of six years of work and bestowed with a fitting title, The Convalescence Agonies is Moore’s triumphant yet deliberate return to guitar playing and a sonic diary of his recovery of sorts, written during the excruciating reunion with his guitar. Doom-y riffs lurch forward in tumultuous, lumpy strides, utilizing both shimmering, bright tones (“Empty Vessel Hymn”) and tasteful amplifier feedback (“Pleading for the Scythe”) in equal measure for that sweet juxtaposition between heartaching beauty and pain. Despite the extended time away from his instrument, Moore’s guitar playing would have you believe it’s an extension of his body on The Convalescence Agonies. The mixing and mastering from Chris Grigg and Greg Chandler capture the earthiness of Moore’s guitar tones while the lead guitars absolutely sing when they appear—there is a guitar lead in “Sprawl in the City of Sorrow” that somehow feels as vibrant as a trumpet during the best climax on the album, and the main riff of “Empty Vessel Hymn” is a gilded swing with the most succulent guitar tone on a doom metal record since Worm’s half of the Starpath split. I even hear hints of Schuldiner in Moore’s playing on The Convalescence Agonies.

Delivered through a mix of septic, cavernous gurgles and acerbically vitriolic shrieks, Moore’s imagery in the record’s lyrics—long one of his strongest attributes as a musician and band leader—details chronic pain, as well as the physical and mental transformations that go along with it. Fading in and out of metaphor and bitter dysphemism, Moore gets his point across clearly yet artfully. Together with Steve Schwegler’s drumming, the vocals on The Convalescence Agonies ground the record and help the record effortlessly transition between doom metal to death metal. Swirling and blasty drums and piercing highs announce the arrival of death metal sections like clockwork, with cascading pounding on the drums and vocals from the nadir of Moore’s extensive range heralding the decadently heavy doom metal. 

With a dramatic flair, Weeping Sores incorporate Annie Blythe’s cello into several tracks, adding luxurious texture to the songs. The epic title track features my favorite moment on the record as Blythe imposes herself atop a blackened storm of tremolos, the effect similar to Ne Obliviscaris sans clean vocals. In addition to Blythe’s contributions, Brendon Randall-Myers (Scarcity) guests on nearly every track as a keyboard player for Weeping Sores; his spooky tones contribute to a haunting atmosphere reminiscent of Bedsore’s Dreaming the Strife for Love in their retro progginess. Randall-Myers’ playing is understated, relegated to the background, but it’s essential to The Convalescence Agonies’ atmosphere and mood—he’s sorely missed on “Sprawl in the City of Love,” the lone track without his feature. In fact, the weakest aspect of The Convalescence Agonies is when Weeping Sores plays into unembellished death/doom for extended periods of time. The proggy gothiness from the keys, cellos, and lead solos clandestinely makes itself an indispensable quality for the record.

The Convalescence Agonies is a record of passion. The suffering that inspired it and persisted throughout the writing and recording process is embedded in the album’s DNA. The songs are dark and moody. Yet, an air of triumph overrides the negativity by the LP’s end with the title track’s bombastic symphonic black metal midsection and climax before slinking back down into moody keyboards. Moore pours his heart into this record as he perseveres through chronic pain, and even without regaining full use of his shoulder yet, he has crafted an instant death/doom classic.

Recommended tracks: Empty Vessel Hymn, Sprawl in the City of Sorrow, The Convalescence Agonies
You may also like: Pyrrhon, Dream Unending & Worm, Civerous, Kayo Dot, Seputus, Bedsore, Felgrave, Scarcity
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Weeping Sores is:
– Doug Moore – guitar, bass, vocals
– Steve Schwegler – drums
With guests:
– Annie Blythe – cello (tracks 1, 3, 5)
– Brendon Randall-Myers – keyboards (tracks 1, 2, 4, 5)
– Lev Sloujitel – prepared banjo (track 2)
– Pete Lloyd – additional guitars (track 3)

The post Review: Weeping Sores – The Convalescence Agonies appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: free jazz, avant-garde drone, Hindustani classical music, ritual ambient (mostly instrumental, clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Sunn O))), Sun Ra, Ravi Shankar
Country: Belgium
Release date: 11 April 2025

Art is subjecti… shut the fuck up. My viewpoint is certainly colored by being a reviewer, but while the enjoyment of art is subjective, I certainly believe that there are objective qualities to the form. The Belgian collective Neptunian Maximalism (NNMM) released one of the best and most important experimental albums of the 20s thus far, Éons. While I do find it a pleasure to listen to on occasion, at three disks long and about two hours of free jazz/drone metal/ritual ambient, simply considering another listen sometimes feels nauseating. But removed from the plane of subjectivities like taste (preferring to listen to a shorter album, for instance), Éons is genre redefining, taking drone metal to the zenith of its creativity and then some. With several engaging and trippy live releases since then, the collective have released their newest live-ish work, La Sacre du Soleil Invaincu (LSDSI). Listening to LSDSI is practically a spiritual experience. NNMM lived in St John’s on Bethnal Green church in London for four days to integrate themselves within the space, to meld with its architecture and energy. Over the course of that stay, LSDSI was born. While it’s guaranteed to be a difficult listen, does LSDSI reach the objectively amazing heights NNMM attained in 2020?

Like Éons, LSDSI is an intimidating triple album comprised of three classical Hindustani ragas¹: Marwa, Todi, and Bairagi, interpreted by NNMM as “Dusk,” “Arcana,” and “Dawn,” respectively. Its music is ecstatic, thrumming with an indescribable energy; that NNMM were divinely inspired by their sanctuarial sojourn is clear, yet unlike Éons, LSDSI doesn’t wield a chaotic, primordial energy with brusque free jazz and tribal ambient. In place of the power of nature—Éons details an apocalyptic event—is the power of a deity (or deities). The Church-setting of the recording is translated by the Hindustani overtones—music for the soul. Meditative classical passages such as at the first movement of “Arcana” are not merely imitations of traditional Indian music; project supervisor Sundip Balraj Singh Aujla as well as the instrumental masterminds behind NNMM all have experience with the medium—I’d recommend Czlt, Hindustani drone metal project of NNMM’s guitarist, vocalist, trumpeter, and zurna and surbahar player, Guillaume Cazalet. He is a true student of the tradition.

Along with the Hindustani classical music sections, heavy guitar drones reverberating through the Church form the base of NNMM’s sound, upon which the collective painstakingly layer a variety of other instruments to perfect their sonic tapestry, including a diverse collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian instruments: electric saz, daf, zurna, and surbahar. LSDSI is improvisational, too, letting whatever divine muse resides in St John’s on Bethnal Green use them as a mouthpiece, yet NNMM always remain grounded in the ragas. 

Starting with “At Dusk : Raag Marwa,” the plot of all three tracks is unveiled—slowly. While the larger-than-life, rapturous crescendos, such as the vocals seven minutes into “Vilambit Laya Alaap” or the faster-paced metal in the second movement “Drut Laya, Chaotic Polyphonic Taan Combinations” in “Arcana” are divine, so many of the album’s hundred minutes are vacuous buildups serving only as a way to set the stage. It’s difficult to call them pointless; they have meditative power and are clearly integral to NNMM’s experience of the Church and the live performance. However, the length of time between noteworthy sections grows tedious almost immediately. The guitar tones are your average drone, and drone they do, typically without accompaniment from enough of the ensemble to maintain my attention more than a Sunn O))) album would. Even when the rest of the collective joins the fray, the result can still be incredibly arduous to get through, the longform compositions a bit too challenging. The second and third movements of “At Dawn” are incredibly satisfying when they hit, the grumbling electric bass and stoner-y guitar parts giving way to rapturous vocal parts; but I can’t help but compare these moments to Wyatt E.’s stellar tribal drone release from January which accomplished as much spiritually captivating drone… in a third of the time commitment of LSDSI. The highs on LSDSI match any drone release ever—listen to the buildup of “At Dawn” culminating in “Sthayi & Antara Composition”—but with so much empty space as a fan not present in the Church during the recording, the album seems impossible to approach. 

I don’t think that LSDSI is an objective masterpiece like Éons, and it’s certainly also a difficult album to turn on unless you like meditating to distortion—in which case, LSDSI is right for you. However, LSDSI is still worth listening to, capturing the energy and power of a spiritual place and only further cementing the group at the top of my bucket-list of bands to see live. NNMM are clearly one of the most forward-thinking groups in metal, and I look forward to what they offer us next, even if it’ll certainly be a hefty time commitment of ambitious and challenging music.

Recommended tracks: Arcana, At Dawn
You may also like: Wyatt E., Zaaar, Czlt, Sol
Final verdict: 6.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Neptunian Maximalism is:
Stephane Fedele : Drums, Gong
Didié Nietzsch : Synthetiser, iPads
Romain Martini : Rythm Electric Guitar
Reshma Goolamy : Electric Bass Guitar, Vocals
Joaquin Bermudez : Electric Saz, Ebowed Electric Guitar, Daf
Guillaume Cazalet : Lead Electric Guitar, Vocals, Trumpet, Zurna, Surbahar

1. A raga is the underlying structure of Hindustani classical music, each one containing specific motifs allowing the musician to improvise on a provided melodic framework. The theory behind Indian classical music is vastly different from Western classical but extremely interesting. Please feel free to read up on it here! ︎

The post Review: Neptunian Maximalism – Le Sacre du Soleil Invaincu (LSDSI) appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Artwork by Derek Setzer

Style: doom metal, drone, experimental (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Krallice, Sunn O))), Earth
Country: United States
Release date: 28 March 2025

Hey, are you a big fuckin’ weirdo? Yeah, me too.

Did you enjoy Krallice‘s 2017 release Go Be Forgotten? Me too.

Because you’re a big fuckin’ weirdo, did you get stuck on “Outro” and wish that there was an entire album that sounded like it? Well first of all, if you answered yes to this question please reach out to me because boy that is an extremely niche group we both belong to. Second of all, I have some great news for you!

The Overmold is an experimental doom/drone duo featuring Mick Barr (Krallice) and Tim Wyskida (Khanate), who have come together under the I, Voidhanger banner to present their collaborative efforts to big fuckin’ weirdos like you and me. Barr’s unique, ambiguous harmonic guitar stylings are at the forefront of the sound on The Overmold, and are perfectly complemented by Wyskinda’s freeform drum performance, which propels the compositions forward and breathes life into them. The compositions themselves range from sprawling labyrinthian soundscapes to more structured evocative vignettes, but the interplay between Barr and Wyskinda is always the focal point from which these structures take shape. While the compositional prowess on display is nothing to sneer at, The Overmold is distinctive in its reliance on performance and technique to effectively extract every last drop of meaning from its songs. 

The bulk of The Overmold is comprised of “The Overmold” (written by The Overmold, in case you forgot), a semi-improvisational, thirty-five-minute foray into sinister, tension-building atmosphere. Barr’s guitar playing is akin to a lighthouse lamp cutting through thick fog, utilizing repeated motifs around which bass and vocal harmonies dance in and out. Wyskinda’s drumming is strikingly delicate; even his kick drum is barely audible at times. Freeform fills and agile cymbal work builds and releases tension, adding motion to an otherwise glacial pace. Monotone choral/whispered vocals subtly weave in and out of the background, adding emotional depth without distracting from the main performances, equally pacifying and paralyzing. All of these performance techniques on their own already build a compelling, uneasy ambience, but there is an acute attention to the small details that pushes “The Overmold” from good to great. 

Barr and Wyskida are frighteningly in sync and are able to pull off a massive range of dynamics that are not often heard in metal or metal-adjacent music, at least to the extent explored on The Overmold. Deeply intimate moments build into explosive crescendos and die back down again like an undulating vista of rolling hills. Even more rare is the gratuitous use of rubato; phrases swell in and out, trailing off in ritardandos that catch back up at the start of the next phrase. During more structured moments the dynamics or tempo remain constantly in flux, as if we were not listening to a piece of music but to a massive living, breathing organism. Even the song structure adheres to this conceit, with the most brazen moments of movement and overwhelming climaxes appearing in the middle of the track. Equal attention is given to both the music and the empty space that surrounds it, resulting in an extremely intimate experience. 

The production from Colin Marston perfectly captures all of the intricacies held within “The Overmold”. Every tiny detail of the performances are given space to breathe, and it is a joy to be able to hear the reverberations of a kick drum or the overtones of a held note so regularly. There is even a subtle use of panning that only revealed itself to me around my third listen. Marston’s attention to detail rivals that of the compositions themselves, and both in conjunction result in a truly special listening experience. 

The remaining three tracks are shorter, more structured explorations of The Overmold’s sound. “Songs of the Beyonder” starts with a sixteenth note hi-hat against a triplet eighth note strumming riff that is instantly engaging. The main motif is astoundingly pretty and very reminiscent of Krallice, and I love how it comes back at the end with added harmonies and a more bravado performance. “Buildings of Skin” starts out continuing the prettiness, but becomes much more harmonically antagonistic as the song goes on, ending in a jarringly dissonant sung interval. “Withering Other” acts as a sort of palate cleanser and is the most harmonically vague of the three shorter tracks, a “dark unfocused fog of clarity”, and the perfect way to ruminate on the sheer weight of The Overmold’s experience.

Over the course of the past week or two, The Overmold has turned into an experience that I look forward to engaging with every night. I am constantly finding small details that I had missed in previous listening sessions, and the atmosphere is an addictive ambrosia that is a perfect way to wind down at the end of a long day. A good pair of headphones and an hour or so of time to spend really focusing is practically demanded of the listener, but quickly becomes completely justified. The result is that The Overmold has become my favorite listening experience of the year so far, and is a record that I will be habitually returning to for a long while.

Recommended tracks: The Overmold
You may also like: Khanate, Ocrilim, Blind Idiot God
Final verdict: 8.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook

The Overmold is:
– Mick Barr (guitars, bass, vocals)
– Tim Wyskida (drumset, percussion)

The post Review: The Overmold – The Overmold appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive metal, jazz fusion, avant-garde jazz, free jazz, technical death metal (mostly instrumental)
Recommended for fans of: John Coltrane (late era), Weather Report, Imperial Triumphant, John Zorn
Country: New York, United States
Release date: 21 February 2025

Although born out of Western “art music” (i.e. classical and jazz), prog has long shunned a critical aspect of jazz: improvisation. Our favorite bands in the prog and metal scenes are anal with their precise compositions, unwilling to leave a single detail out of their control in an obsessive chasing of perfection. That’s what made the Big Apple’s Sarmat so refreshing when they hit the scene in 2023—although playing something texturally prog metal, the extended live jam session which made up their debut EP Dubious Disk was fully jazz in its improvisational spirit. After a more concentrated, composed tech death release later that year, Sarmat are now back with Upgrade, their second live-in-studio album of improvised fusion metal.

At two tracks and twenty-one minutes, Upgrade is a pocket-sized but powerful statement reaffirming that jazz composition with metal instrumentation can work and should be attempted by more bands. Of course, not all groups have the collective talents of members like Steve Blanco (bass, Imperial Triumphant), Ryan Hale (guitar), and James Jones (drums). That power trio alone present a heroic display on their instruments, contorting modal jazz into a distorted hellscape. Sarmat have other talented collaborators, though, like trumpeters Jerome Burns and Oskar Stenmark, as well as my personal favorite performer on Upgrade, Niko Hasapopoulos on upright bass. The members of this demented jazz collective are clearly all experienced jammers, their playing tight and in sync despite the fluid “compositional” style.

The shorter of the two tracks, “Serum Visions,” is superior to the preceding title track. On “Serum Visions,” Blanco drops his meaty bass for sci-fi synths, allowing for the elegance of the upright bass to clash with the wailing trumpets and power chords, and the synth-laden atmosphere creates a perfect backdrop for Sarmat to spawn their music ex nihilo. “Upgrade” is inferior precisely because of this: it’s less free, more composed. With a long section built around a variation of “Landform” from Determined to Strike (their full-length album), “Upgrade” takes the banger tech death riff and attempts jam variations of it in an unbecoming way. Moreover, Ilya Beklo’s gutturals enter during the last third of the song, making the ending seem completely disjointed from the first two thirds of the track—the vocals sick for a death metal release but more distracting than anything on a proggy release such as this. Their inclusion is frustrating, taking away from the sharp jazz focus and turning to a more Zorn-esque, pretentious eclecticism. The more composed sections suffer next to the organically improvised moments. 

However, what separates Sarmat from the jazz greats of olde is the band’s lack of energy: yes, this group is noisy, benefiting from distortion, but only Jones’ drumming satisfies my craving for the transcendent experience of live free jazz. Upgrade desperately needs more along the lines of his frenetic, chaotic performance. At times, the rest match his intensity—especially Ilya Belko’s haunting screams put through inhuman distortion effects, from there stealthily breaking loose into a dramatic trumpet solo, at 3:40 into “Serum Visions”—but overall, despite the noise, nobody in the group really commands focus. In that sense, Upgrade could benefit from its performers alternating in a roundhouse fashion trading off solos like on Coltrane’s Ascension. Upgrade is too egalitarian with the focus, leading to fewer highlights and not showcasing the performers’ individual excellence. 

Sarmat’s vision is valiant, and Colin Marston’s as-always excellent in-studio production provides the sound with crisp clarity, but the jam doesn’t excite me nearly as much as Dubious Disk did a couple years ago. While the EP isn’t so much an upgrade of Sarmat’s sound, the mission is clear: jazz and metal will collide in improvetory fashion, and Sarmat will lead the charge.

Recommended tracks: Serum Visions
You may also like: Behold the Arctopus, A.M.E.N., Dischordia, Tatsuya Yoshida & Risa Takeda, Electric Masada
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram

Label: I, Voidhanger – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

James Jones – Drums: Tracks 1 and 2
Steve Blanco – Bass Guitar: Track 1, Keytar: Track 2
Zachary Blakeslee-Reid – Guitar: Track 1
Ryan Hale – Guitar: Track 2
Niko Hasapopoulos – Arm, Upright Bass: Track  2
Oskar Stenmark – Trumpet: Track 1
Jerome Burns – Trumpet: Track 2
Ilya Belko – Vocals : Track 1

The post Review: Sarmat – Upgrade appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Artwork by Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos

Style: Avant-Garde Black Metal (Harsh)
Recommended for fans of: Blut Aus Nord, Imperial Triumphant, Oranssi Pazuzu
Country: United States-AZ
Release date: 28 February 2025

Babe wake up, the new project from Cerulean mastermind Stephen Knapp just dropped! Er well, rather, it might be better not to let this one anywhere near your sleep schedule. The self-titled debut from Sleep Paralysis is a terrifying gripper of an album that is simultaneously bombastically thrilling and deeply insidious. Aptly named, Sleep Paralysis is a concept album designed to explore the themes of sleep paralysis and anxiety and does a damn good job of inducing anxiety of its own. Swirling, cacophonous guitar playing pushes forward at a frenzied pace, leaving the listener scarcely a moment to catch their breath. Strange perversions of familiar songwriting tropes from a multitude of styles inflicts a reeling confusion. 

The opener “Last Drop of Sunlight” sounds like what listening to a Chopin etude in the Backrooms might feel like, setting the tone by immediately introducing one of the mainstays of this record: programmed piano. Programmed instruments are always a gamble on whether they end up working or not, but there is a manic attention to detail that sets this particular use case apart. The music here sounds feasibly playable by a real person, the dynamics are believable, but the most impressive aspect is the artificial use of a sostenuto pedal. The way the bass notes continue to slightly ring underneath the rest of the performance is convincingly authentic, though it may just be a happy coincidence of certain production choices. At times during later tracks, subtlety is thrown to the wind and the piano is just another tool adding to the hysteria, but this just reinforces the notion that these details are intentional. “Last Drop of Sunlight” ends with some Debussy-esque arpeggios that lead into “Sleep Paralysis”, introducing a second programmed instrument: the drums. These are handled with much less subtlety, but end up working in Sleep Paralysis’ favor, adding to the frantic surrealism.

As Sleep Paralysis continues playing out its runtime it only ramps up this feeling of phantasmagoria as if—get this—you were experiencing sleep paralysis. The bold experimentation on this album pays off practically every time; the songs throw curveball after curveball, and that Sleep Paralysis never becomes grating or fatiguing is a testament to the quality of the songwriting, especially considering how maximalist the experience is. Lead single “Helplessness” sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse took too much acid, started playing a song, and then just kind of forgot what they were doing and started vamping on the intro idea. I love how this piece makes you lose track of the time feel through the constantly rising melodic pattern, making a sort of DIY shepard tone for the vocals to swirl within. 

“Sleep Paralysis” wears its influences with pride: gross (in a good way) Imperial Triumphant-esque quarter note guitar chords punch under the main riff idea, exploding with a jarring energy that feels like a rabid animal scratching against a wall. “You Can Never Run Fast Enough” has a weirdly jaunty intro that turns into a swing feel, eventually leading to a skittering piano solo with the drums just fucking blasting behind it; “Stress” is like a fucked up Joplin ragtime; and “Fever Dream II – Paranoia” sounds like the soundtrack to a cursed Nintendo game cartridge taken straight out of a bad creepypasta. The familiarity littered through all of these tracks is mangled and twisted into an alien amalgamation of what we expect these things to sound like, as if you were listening to them in an alternative mirrored world. 

Also helping along the violated feeling of familiarity is Knapp’s vocal performance, utilizing black metal vocal techniques, guttural yells, gasps and plenty of ominous whispering. Lyrics like the “HRAHHH” ten seconds into “Sleep Paralysis” or “they’re coming for you” in “Fever Dream II – Paranoia” are incredibly effective, but in general the lyrics are a bit on the nose. Subtle swelling choirs permeate the background now and again, adding a cinematic touch in the vein of a horror movie soundtrack. There is a general dreamy (read: nightmare-y) atmosphere that envelops the entire experience; notes that are held out for too long begin dripping, and are those whispers in the background or am I just hearing things? Even the interludes and more chill parts keep up a certain pace or use other compositional techniques to accelerate your heartbeat. The magic here is that all of these delicate textural choices are at war with a frantic pace and searing intensity, a dialectical force tearing open a rift out of which a delirious fever haze pours. 

Sleep Paralysis even weaves a sense of humor throughout the record—like the cartoonish glissando about a minute into “Sleep Paralysis”—but the humor does not detract from the derangement, instead feeling more like the reaction of a broken psyche trying to cope with sleep deprived hallucinations. A couple of particularly egregious sound clips on the last track threaten to push the sense of humor into the realm of eye-rolling campiness, but they’re right at the end of the record so they don’t do much to hinder the albums flow or replayability. 

“Nostalgia” works well as a climax to Sleep Paralysis, being the longest song on the record and dipping into nearly every oddity that has been on display during the previous forty minutes. Really, there are a lot of climaxes on this album, but none of them are cathartic; they just continue to build up the anxiety through smart songwriting decisions rather than relieve any of it. Sleep Paralysis leaves the listener a crumpled, sweating ball of uneasiness, shoving back the bubbling thoughts of Stockholm Syndrome as you hit play on the first track once again.

Recommended tracks: Sleep Paralysis, Fever Dream, Helplessness
You may also like: Fleshvessel, Inhumankind, Maybe That’s Why Humans Drink the Darkness That is Coffee?
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp

Label: I, Voidhanger – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Sleep Paralysis is:
– Stephen Knapp (All Instruments, Piano and Drum Programming)
With Guest:
– Lorenzo Kemp (Solo on “Nostalgia”)

The post Review: Sleep Paralysis – Sleep Paralysis appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Genres: dissonant death metal (mostly harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Ulcerate, Blut Aus Nord, Blood Incantation, Tomb Mold, The Ruins of Beverast
Country: Minnesota, United States
Release date: 26 January 2024

I find talking about the album cover as the intro paragraph to be a bit of a cop out, an easy choice when a vast array of other creative options are possible; the cover art for Vampiric Spiritual Drain, the debut album by Feral Light’s front man A.S.’s new band Unsouling, does not allow me the luxury of ignoring it. Thirteen glowing, comatose wolves are being sucked into a giant void in the sky with a subtly colorful red and blue color palette. It’s evocative, shocking, unique, strangely beautiful, intriguing—all things dissonant death metal should strive to be. Unsouling try their hand at achieving all of the above, and Luciana Nedelea sets the stage for them to succeed with her cover painting, worth the price of admission alone. 

Unsouling, too, oozes a fraught spirituality with squelching, dissonant guitars coalescing in melodic sections redolent of Lunar Chamber or, even more interestingly, into goth-infused darkwave sections palpitating with a perverted edge between pain and acceptance. The main body of Vampiric Spiritual Drain is its Voidhanger-core dissonant death metal, recalling the amorphous riffing of Qrixkuor or Acausal Intrusion. These death metal sections seem rather pedestrian at first, seeming like aimless filler between the more interesting genre infusions, but they unveil themselves to reveal a kinetic beast within. Several riffs have the same distinct cadence as the mighty Kostnatěni, and the drumming by A.S. is vicious, opting for more delicate fills and intricate patterns than endless blast beats. They’re pummeling but not suffocating, allowing for the atmospheric synths and swirling guitars to grip your throat instead.

In addition to the metal instrumentation, Unsouling is deft with its usage of eerie synths and organ, allowing them to forge the visceral spiritual pain he aims for. Beyond the two synth-driven interludes—“Taileater” and “Endless Plateau,” the latter of which transitions into intense, ritualistic black metal like modern The Ruins of Beverast—most tracks begin as a standard dissonant death metal song with phlegmy vocals, and then unilaterally they morph from the squirrely sections into clean chants and goth drum beats before coalescing back into metal. The isolated metal sections are by far the least engaging if only because the novelty of creepy, dissonant darkwave is performed so stunningly. Only a couple times does the metal go too long without these transitions—the track “Weightless Immovable Anchor” in particular—and the harsh vocals, especially, would benefit from more stylistic diversity, but each time Unsouling transitions back to more unique things, staving off the occasional death metal monotony. 

Most importantly for an album attempting this style, Vampiric Spiritual Drain sounds amazing with full-bodied production. While I referred to amorphous riffing earlier, Unsouling don’t lose the guitars, bass, and drums in a singular haze like on the most recent Abyssal; no, bass, mids, and treble all come through for a punchy sound in spite of the intentionally blended lower range. Moreover, those synth parts and clean parts come through particularly cleanly, as well. Perhaps no track shows off Unsouling’s production as well as finale and highlight, “The Wolf and Ascension.” The track is spiritual and epic, sprawling with its Tomb Mold-esque guitars and coolly uncomfortable crawling pace, and while the extended synth outro may be excessive, the whole track flies by—really the whole album does. At thirty-five minutes, Vampiric Spiritual Drain is easily relistenable, and as the minutiae aren’t so apparent at first, it easily lends itself to replayability. 

Vampiric Spiritual Drain is stunningly organic sounding for dissodeath, from the production to the spiritual, immense guitar leads, but when Unsouling extends itself outwards with gothic tendrils, the album truly finds its identity. This band has potential to really make a mark on the scene—I really wouldn’t be afraid to call this an attempt at The Thule Grimoires (The Ruins of Beverast) turned dissonant death metal—but not all of the pieces quite click together yet with the inconsistencies between the darkwave and death metal. The songwriting can come across as unfocused, and although the meandering structure isn’t totally problematic, more focused precision, especially regarding transitions between riffs, will yield a more powerful final product. Unsouling could be an AOTY list contender in the future with smoother and more used inclusions of its unique aspects it adds to the game.

Recommended tracks: The Ladder of Broken Backs, Endless Plateau, The Wolf and Ascension
You may also like: Feral Light, Lunar Chamber, Acausal Intrusion, Qrixkuor, Kostnatěni, Devenial Verdict, Haar
Final verdict: 7/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Unsouling is:
– A.S. (everything)

The post Review: Unsouling – Vampiric Spiritual Drain appeared first on The Progressive Subway.