Style: Progressive rock, progressive metal (mostly clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Haken, prog rock Opeth, Porcupine Tree, Riverside
Country: Norway
Release date: 13 June 2025

What do you know about America’s tenth president, John Tyler? I’m willing to bet the answer is ‘not much.’ Succeeding William Henry Harrison, who died a month after his own inauguration, Tyler’s leadership was mocked for the unorthodox—and, at the time, unprecedented—way he had come to power. Fearful of alienating political allies, he kept his predecessor’s cabinet despite the fact many of them actively disliked him. At the same time, he took stances in such flagrant opposition to his own party’s platform that they tried to impeach him. Generally regarded as an unremarkable president with a few minor achievements to his name, he carries the ignominious honour of being the only president whose death wasn’t officially recognised in Washington (because of his allegiance to the Confederacy). You haven’t heard of him because historical memory rewards the noteworthy, be they good or bad. The John Tylers of history tend to be forgotten. 

Vying for the title of “the John Tyler of prog” comes Norwegian outfit Avkrvst with their sophomore effort Waving at the Sky. Like their peers in Altesia and Moon Machine, Avkrvst’s sound sits somewhere between prog rock-era Opeth and early Haken with splashes of Porcupine Tree and Riverside for good measure, straddling that thin marigold line between prog rock and prog metal. If my memory serves me correctly, we didn’t end up covering their 2022 debut The Approbation because the writer who had opted to review them suddenly left the site. If that sounds like an inauspicious start for Avkrvst in our dank, poorly-lit halls, then I’m afraid all that talk of John Tyler up top isn’t a harbinger of any improvement.

Instrumental opener “Preceding” gives a flavour of things to come: wonky time signatures and staccato riffing plus melodic lead guitar and synth lines backed by whimsical Mellotron. Like so many intro tracks, it adds little to the overall album. At least follow-up “The Trauma” gives us some galloping drums and a tension-building riff to feast on before presenting Waving at the Sky’s predominant issue which, like the band, we’ll avoid for a hot minute. Tracks like “Families are Forever”¹ and “Conflating Memories” offer us some melodic, almost Floydian guitar solos, the latter also featuring a spicy flute cameo, while a couple of synth leads adorn “Waving at the Sky”. “Ghosts of Yesteryear” offers an adrenaline booster of much-needed energy with strong riffing and energetic drumwork. Indeed, the rhythm section in particular excels throughout the record, with the low-tuned, Yes-inspired bass work (credited to both Simon Bergseth and Øystein Aadland) thrumming pleasingly in the mix at all times, and the energetic drumming of Martin Utby being the most obvious plumes in Avkrvst’s cap. 

These better angels of Avkrvst’s nature, however, are the exception rather than the rule. It takes Waving at the Sky five minutes to introduce the vocals, and when they do arrive you can see why the band filibustered with instrumental prevarication. There’s no sugar-coating the fact that Simon Bergseth’s vocal performance is bland². He invariably sticks to safe, tried-and-tested vocal lines, singing whole notes in a barely varying cadence and with a near-total lack of expression. Every note is extended long beyond the point at which any interest could be maintained and he never varies from this mode of delivery. Harsh vocals are used sparingly, which is for the best because they’re always superfluous to the band’s sound; Avkrvst don’t need them, and they hang awkwardly every time. 

“Families are Forever” is by far the worst offender in this vein. In practice, the restrained instrumental work, the low burr of the bass and the nuance of the drumwork, is perfect for this sort of track. But Bergseth’s utterly lifeless vocal melodies, which should be the focal point of this section, instead rob the song of any intrigue. And this happens every time, the band members almost sabotage themselves in trying to match the soporific quality of the vocals. Historically, I haven’t been all that kind to Ross Jennings’ guest appearances (will his turn on the upcoming Scardust change that track record?), and I’m hardly going to start now, but his cliched and rather unremarkable contribution to “The Malevolent” is leaps and bounds ahead of any other vocal performance on this record. Whatever mitochondrial deficit the band were suffering from heretofore briefly abates and the band finally finds some damned energy which certainly helps “The Malevolent” as well as Jennings’ chances to steal the show.

That same energy rears its head a few times and always sees Avkrvst at their most compelling. “Ghosts of Yesteryear” features some sick bass, animated drumming, and big guitar chords all with a flavour of Porcupine Tree’s iconic “Deadwing”. Strong riffing and an ominous lead motif with an almost saxy timbre all make for a standout track—like John Tyler’s annexation of Texas, it’s probably their greatest achievement on the record. Naturally, the vocal-led sections are still a dirge, but the band at least manage to vary the track enough to keep it interesting. Twelve minute closer “Waving at the Sky” possesses a certain portentousness absent from the rest of the record, and the sense of a compositional goal in mind. With a wealth of solos and ominous riffing in its instrumental back half, it’s hardly surprising that it’s one of the better tracks. But the track also features a moderately interesting chorus. That may sound like damning with faint praise—probably because it is—but on a record with vocal performances this expressionless, moderate intrigue is a win. 

Ultimately proving as insipid as its title, Waving at the Sky contains flashes of compositional talent and energy in an album that, for the most part, has a contrarian tendency to be uninteresting in spite of the obvious potential that occasionally rears its head. And yet, I don’t want to sound too harsh; Avkrvst’s main sin is John Tyler-style blandness, not James Buchanan-esque badness. A focus on strengthening and varying vocal melodies in a way that matches the rest of the band’s talents would provide a much-needed shot of energy to the compositions. Then again, why should Avkrvst listen to me? After all, a certain president never listened to his haters³. Can you guess which one?

Recommended tracks: Ghosts of Yesteryear, Conflating Memories
You may also like: Altesia, Moon Machine, Keor, Novena
Final verdict: 5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOutMusic – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Avkrvst is:
– Simon Bergseth (lead vocalist, guitars, bass guitar)
– Martin Utby (drums, synthesizer)
– Øystein Aadland (bass guitar, keyboards)
– Edvard Seim (guitars)
– Auver Gaaren (keyboards)

1.  You know who might have something to say about this song title? John Tyler! He was both the first president to lose his wife in office and the first to get married in office (to his second wife). Woodrow Wilson would later become the second and only other president to become both widowed and remarried while in office. ︎
2.  Unlike John Tyler, who reportedly had a rather pleasant singing voice and could play many instruments. Given how much everyone seemed to dislike him, we can assume he really must’ve been quite good. ︎
3.  “My own personal popularity can have no influence over me when the dictates of my best judgment and the obligations of an oath require of me a particular course. Under such circumstances, whether I sink or swim on the tide of popular favor is, to me, a matter of inferior consideration.” God, what a bore.  ︎

The post Review: Avkrvst – Waving at the Sky appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive rock, neo-prog, soft rock (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Transatlantic, Genesis, Yes, Neal Morse, Spock’s Beard
Country: Sweden
Release date: 2 May 2025

In the contexts of politics, education, the visual arts, and various other disciplines, the term “progressive” has a similar connotation to terms like “forward-thinking” or “experimental”. In this tradition, and in the context of rock music, the mid-1960s saw the term “progressive” being attached to compositions with more complex structure, new and unusual instrumentation¹, and virtuosic instrumental performances. The term “progressive rock” was coined in 1968 and the label was applied to some of the biggest rock bands of the next decade.

But the very act of defining a new genre of music solidifies it. Today, “progressive rock” and “experimental rock” evoke two quite different styles. Even at the end of the 1970s, when the heyday of progressive rock was nearing its end, the genre had become a caricature of itself. But as any street fair or amusement park will attest to, some people eat that shit up. Self-proclaimed “progressive” rockers The Flower Kings’ latest album, LOVE, seems—superficially, at least—to fall into those well-worn ruts of 1960s-style prog rock. But is there anything under that veneer? Was this caricature painted by Paulie, down on the Atlantic City boardwalk? Or Picasso?

LOVE ticks many of the boxes on the progressive rock checklist…

synths heavily featured on basically every song
multiple seven-plus-minute-long pieces
unusual percussion (wood blocks, marimba, glockenspiel)
instrumental and lyrical reprises across multiple tracks

…and at times is quite reminiscent of classic prog acts; “World Spinning” is like a lower-energy version of ELP’s “Hoedown”; the outro of “Burning Both Edges” could be a reference to the intro of Rush’s “Xanadu”, but without Neil Peart’s varied percussion; around 7:15 in “Kaiser Razor”, there’s a riff that sounds almost identical to the one at 3:55 in Genesis’ “Firth of Fifth”.

While The Flower Kings (consciously or otherwise) pay homage to their forebears on LOVE, they lack the compositional prowess which propelled those acts into the prog rock pantheon in the first place. On “We Claim the Moon”, a four-phrase melody is introduced early on, played in sync by guitar, bass, synth, and percussion. That exact musical idea is repeated as-is three times in the first ninety seconds of this six-and-a-half-minute track, and then abandoned wholesale—it is never repeated again. Just after this, a shorter, eight-note phrase is introduced, and that phrase is repeated twenty times throughout the remainder of the song. Neither of these two extremes is ideal. Despite the proverb which states otherwise, familiarity breeds appreciation: listeners want hooks, callbacks, and reprises. At the same time, we need a bit of variation to maintain interest. This is something that the aforementioned “Firth of Fifth” does so well: a primary melody is repeated multiple times throughout the song, but at different tempos and with different timbres as it’s played on different instruments. This keeps the listener engaged without boring them. Safe to say, The Flower Kings are no Genesis.

The dynamic range of LOVE leaves something to be desired, as well. For comparison, consider a piece like Yes‘s “Close to the Edge”: the first minute is almost entirely birdsong and chimes; then absolutely frenetic synths, driving bass, and frantic guitars; then a vocal break into a mellower, airy section; another break into an almost reggae-inspired verse, and so on. This wide variety of moods is nowhere to be found on LOVE, let alone in quick succession in a single song. Consider the introductions of a few tracks on this album: “The Elder” has a tempo of 112 bpm and begins slowly with vocals, bells, and piano; “The Phoenix” has a tempo of 120 bpm and begins slowly with strings, acoustic guitar, and vocals; “The Promise” has a tempo of 127 bpm and begins slowly with acoustic guitar and vocals. Some people might say they’ve written the same song eleven times for this album, but they’d be lying, it’s actually the same song twelve times.

Now, dear reader, you may think that it is unfair of me to compare The Flower Kings to prog rock legends like Yes, Genesis, and Rush, as I’ve done above. Let me tell you why it’s not: The Flower Kings call themselves “prog-rock legends” in their own Spotify bio. If that’s not an invitation to compare them to the greats, then I do not know what is.

All of that being said, there are a few small highlights on LOVE, but they come with caveats. The two instrumental tracks, “World Spinning” and “Kaiser Razor” are good examples. These are the two fastest tracks on the album (both exceeding 230 bpm), bringing a breath of fresh air to the otherwise steady trudge through seventy-one minutes of low-energy prog rock. “World Spinning” is a vibrant synth solo that pulls you in and then stops far too abruptly—an obvious missed opportunity. “Kaiser Razor” is also infectious: the main riff is a climb up a scale, repeated over and over, building up to… again, nothing. The song just kind of disintegrates after about two minutes. Both of these tracks feel like they are incredible seeds of ideas, which hadn’t yet been fully fleshed out before they were recorded as-is for LOVE.

The Flower Kings’ LOVE is a surface-level tribute to a nearly sixty-year-old genre of music. It lacks both the dynamism and the compositional acuity of the prior art which inspired it. LOVE is like the generic version of your favourite brand-name prog rock acts—it may contain the same ingredients, but it doesn’t have quite the same flavour. After LOVE, you’ll soon find yourself reaching for “real” progressive rock to get that imitation taste out of your mouth.

Recommended Tracks: Kaiser Razor, We Claim the Moon
You may also like: Neal Morse Band, Pattern-Seeking Animals, Jacob Roberge, Cosmic Cathedral
Final verdict: 4.5/10

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

Label: InsideOutMusic – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

The Flower Kings is

• Mirko DeMaio (Drums, Percussion)
• Lalle Larson (Grand Piano, Rhodes Piano, Hammond B3 & Synthesizers)
• Hans Fröberg (Vocals)
• Michael Stolt (Bass, Moogbass, Vocals)
• Roine Stolt (Vocals, Electric & Acoustic 6 & 12-string Guitars, Ukulele)

LOVE also features

• Hasse Bruniusson (Percussion)
• Jannica Lund (Vocals)
• Aliaksandr Yasinski (Accordion)

1. The Moog synthesizer, a staple of 1970s progressive rock, only began to be mass-produced in 1967, and was therefore genuinely cutting-edge at the time. The Doors’ “Strange Days” (1967) is an early example of its usage. ︎

The post Review: The Flower Kings – LOVE appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive rock (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Neal Morse, Spock’s Beard, The Flower Kings
Country: United States
Release date: 25 April 2025

Some artists are instantly recognizable. No matter what assemblage of (international) musicians Neal Morse brings together, I can tell a project is his within thirty seconds, guaranteed, even without taking into account his distinct timbre; resultantly, his projects like Spock’s Beard, Neal Morse Band, and Transatlantic have long been a sort of comfort music for me. They’re predictable, familiar, and, for the most part, consistently quite good¹. Since 2019, though, ol Nealy’s disappointed me with a string of bland music, under his own name, with Transatlantic, and with DM&J. But Morse has proved himself time and time again over the past thirty years, so I’ll still give any new album of his a good shake.

Cosmic Cathedral is Morse’s newest assemblage of musicians: joining the main man are prolific Christian guitarist and vocalist Phil Keaggy, session bassist Bryon House, and jazz drummer Chester Thompson (Weather Report, Genesis, Santana). Naturally, no matter who’s in the group, Deep Water is still a Neal Morse album at its core. In modern times, that means Christian lyrics, sweeping epics (Deep Water concludes with its thirty-eight-minute title suite), tons of solos, and a suffocating level of cheese—neo-prog at its finest and gaudiest (and God-iest!). Moreover, Deep Water has some energy to the performances, the album largely recorded during jam sessions. It seems all set up to be a return to form for Morse, and as I will detail shortly, Deep Water is a definite improvement on his last string of drivel. Yet, it stumbles into the same pitfalls I could have told you it would before hearing a note.

In the promo material for Deep Water, Cosmic Cathedral are supposedly melding progressive rock, The Beatles, and yacht rock, but other than the yacht rock banger “Time to Fly,” the album is entirely the same neo-prog you’d expect. Morse does not beat the allegation that each of his albums sounds the same. Sleek, jazzy, and suave, “Time to Fly” is a fun experiment, with highlights including a brassy, Stevie Wonder-ish instrumentation, jammy flow, and a gospel choir in the chorus. The track doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it’s a welcome addition to break up the monotony of a seventy-minute album of over-the-top progressive rock. Cosmic Cathedral attain some giddy highs within the Morse-paradigm, too. The hulking, thirteen-minute opener “The Heart of Life” could be from a Transatlantic album it’s so bombastic. Starting with Morse’s jubilant synths, slick piano, and plethora of keys during an overture of sorts, the track transitions to a tight jazzy section led by House on bass and with a Santana-ish guitar solo from Keaggy, all held down by Thompson’s tasteful grooves. The vocals are harmonized and gospel-like, the instrumentals straight from my favorite era of Morse’s career (00s Transatlantic), the songwriting hitting all of my favorite neo-prog cliches.

Yet “The Heart of Life” suffers because of the lyricism—as does the rest of Deep Water. Famously, Neal Morse and his projects are flamboyantly Christian, but the Jesus-y lyrics are frustratingly banal. Only so much creativity can be had writing about the same subject twenty albums straight, and the constant evangelizing is distracting. Deep Water isn’t even a concept album like some of the other too-Christian Morse albums of late; the songs are really just an endless string of preaching. Jeez Louise, can Cosmic Cathedral get saccharine, as well. The ballad “I Won’t Make It” is so disgustingly sweet it becomes bitter, like stevia. Again, these aspects of the album aren’t unexpected, but they are disappointing.

The thirty-eight-minute title suite, meanwhile, has high highs and low lows. Several movements feature shreddy solos and/or gospel choirs, and the sound reminds me of Morse’s modern magnum opus, 2016’s The Similitude of a Dream. However, the suite is quite disjointed, and the entire concluding movement is annoying: it contains an UNGODLY amount of proselytizing, and the ending is incredibly cliche with five minutes spent unconvincingly attempting to conclude as bombastically as possible. At some point, just ending the track rather than reprising a buildup ad nauseam is the stronger songwriting move. “Deep Water” is a mighty enjoyable suite, but in a career filled with 25+ minute tracks, Cosmic Cathedral’s album-length epic is not a standout for Morse. 

With his new Christian crew, ol’ Nealy feels like he has some inspiration back, but the old adage rings true: you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. The man is a consistency king, a true disciple of Christ, and a prog rock icon. While I don’t wholeheartedly recommend this and would rank it near the middle of his extensive discography, Cosmic Cathedral’s Deep Water is a good album, prog rock for prog rock’s sake, an easy listen for any fan of neo-prog. But if you read this Neal, try the yacht rock more…

Recommended tracks: The Heart of Life, Time to Fly
You may also like: Pattern-Seeking Animals, Jacob Roberge, The Twenty Committee, Transatlantic, Mandoki Soulmates, Southern Empire, Moon Safari
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOut Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Cosmic Cathedral is:
Neal Morse – keyboards, guitars, vocals
Phil Keaggy – guitars, vocals
Bryon House – bass
Chester Thompson – drums and percussion

1. Reaching their zenith with 2009’s Transatlantic release The Whirlwind, a bona fide 10/10. Be on the lookout for a Lost in Time later this year *wink wink* ︎

The post Review: Cosmic Cathedral – Deep Water appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Progressive metal, mathcore, djent (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Tesseract, The Dillinger Escape Plan, The Contortionist, Rolo Tomassi, Protest the Hero, The Mars Volta, Ions
Country: Italy
Release date: 11 March, 2025

Contrary to the wisdom of everyone’s favourite mad shredder, Yngwie Malmsteen, more isn’t more; less is more. Take the 1993 classic film, Jurassic Park, a landmark in special effects and everyone’s favourite dinosaur-laden romp. You’re probably picturing the T-Rex breaking out of the paddock, the majestic reveal of the brachiosaurus, or any number of iconic raptor scenes. You might be surprised, then, to hear that over the course of the film’s 127-minute runtime¹, dinosaurs grace the screen for a mere 15 minutes—or roughly 12% of the film. Everything you remember about that iconic piece of cinema you remember for its brevity, and the same is true of music; sometimes your sound can be defined by the thing you do sparingly.

Such an approach was certainly the aim on the debut of Italian prog metallers Benthos, but the confusingly-titled II struggled to break free of the shadow of their main influence, The Contortionist. Reinvigorated some four years on, their sophomore emphasises the nascent elements in their debut and brings them to the fore: mathy moments redolent of The Dillinger Escape Plan or Rolo Tomassi vie with djenting grooves and softer atmospheres, occasionally even segueing into The Mars Volta-esque trippy interludes. Some tracks flow rather gracefully (“From Nothing”), others are stitched together monstrosities (“Perpetual Drone Monkeys”), abrasive metal rubbing up against strange ambiences, alternately exploding and collapsing. 

Fittingly, “Fossil” may best demonstrate that Jurassic Park style less-is-more approach: abrasive, discordant math metal passages perforate the song’s facade at many junctures, but, despite being the defining feature of the music, they’re not the most common element. Across From Nothing, Gabriele Landillo’s soft, Dan Tompkins-esque cleans are utilised far more often than his harshes, and the composition remains legibly melodic for the most part, veering into total pandemonium for emphasis, rather than as a crutch. Comparisons to the likes of The Dillinger Escape Plan, then, should be taken with a pinch of salt. There are moments that sing from the hymn sheet of mathcore’s greatest group, but for the most part, Benthos stick to a more mellow register, recalling groups like Ions and The Safety Fire. 

Take “Let Me Plunge”, for example. At around the two minute mark, a heretofore measured riff suddenly mutates into discordant chaos. It takes all of about six seconds, but that sudden abrasiveness keeps the listener on their toes. Like getting a glimpse of a raptor’s claw in the opening of Spielberg’s iconic blockbuster², Benthos’ interjections of cacophony may not last long, but they’re a warning to the listener. And the listener is rewarded with their 12%: “As a Cordyceps” erupts repeatedly into hardcore-inspired vocals and blunt dissonant chords, “Fossil” opens in truly madcap Dillinger fashion and explodes into a chaotic crescendo before some much-needed respite, and “Perpetual Drone Monkeys” might be the most relentless track on the album; energetic and jarring as it whiplashes from djent to hardcore to math and back again with abandon. Nevertheless, this trio of tracks contains the vast bulk of the heavier and chaotic work on From Nothing.

Much of the rest of the time, From Nothing is defined by a jangling chorus effect on the chords and slightly off-kilter vocal harmonies, sitting somewhere between The Contortionist and Ions. “The Giant Child” is straightforward structurally and is arguably the record’s softest track, the band almost relaxed, Alessandro Tagliani’s intricate percussion notwithstanding. “Pure” follows with a mathier Tesseract vibe, but nevertheless eschewing heaviness until an explosive finale. The only exception to the light/heavy contrast running through the album is “Athletic Worms” which is simply insane. Robotic vocals play over zany instrumentation that sounds more like Igorrr. It’s an oddity on an otherwise more serious record, and likely to be the one that polarises listeners, but it nevertheless showcases the band’s creativity. And if that ain’t chaos theory then what is?

The most unexpected influence on Benthos is The Mars Volta. There’s a chaotic jazzy psychedelia undergirding many of From Nothing’s sonic decisions. When “Fossil” isn’t doing Dillinger-style mathcore, it’s exploring rapid jazz chord play and watery chorus effects. There’s also frenetic jazzy riffing juxtaposed with psychedelic, almost shoegaze moments in “To Everything”. Meanwhile, Landillo’s highest notes even have a touch of Bixler-Zavala to them, most notably in the opening to “Perpetual Drone Monkeys” which sounds like it just escaped from the comatorium. This facet of Benthos’ sound is what truly sets them apart from their contemporaries, injecting something slightly deranged into a more familiar facade. 

Less is more, Jurassic Park is a masterpiece, and From Nothing is a consistently intense, tightly composed paragon of modern progressive metal. With the agility of a pack of raptors, Benthos have cemented their own style and then some on a distinguished sophomore guaranteed to pull them into the scene’s limelight. They might not render their peers and predecessors extinct, but they’re certainly clever boys.

Recommended tracks: Let Me Plunge, As A Cordyceps, Perpetual Drone Monkeys, To Everything
You may also like: Without Waves, Exotic Animal Petting Zoo, The Hirsch Effekt
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | YouTube | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOut Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Benthos is:
– Gabriele Landillo (vocals)
– Gabriele Papagni (guitars)
– Enrico Tripodi (guitars)
– Alberto Fiorani (bass)
– Alessandro Tagliani (drums)

1.  This includes credits. Assuming that without credits the runtime is closer to 120 minutes, the percentage creeps up to 12.5%. ︎
2.  “Shoooot heeeeerrrr!” ︎

The post Review: Benthos – From Nothing appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive rock, folk rock (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Genesis, Gentle Giant, Kansas
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 7 March 2025

They say to respect your elders, yet despite Jethro Tull’s number of studio albums exceeding that of years I’ve been alive, the band’s recent output has not garnered my admiration; in fact, ever since Tull’s 2022 album, The Zealot Gene, my group chat with my parents has been titled “Disappointed by Jethro Tull.” Why my parents found that text so funny three years ago I do not know, but anytime I contact my mom and dad, I am reminded that the Jethro Tull who made a prog masterpiece like Thick as a Brick and radio hits like those on Aqualung is no longer with us. (Perhaps predictably with such a terrible album title) 2023’s follow-up to The Zealot Game, RökFlöte, was even worse. So now here in 2025 celebrating Jethro Tull’s twenty-fourth studio album, the question to begin the review is obvious: does my immortalized text ring true? Will I remain Disappointed by Jethro Tull, or is Curious Ruminant a desperately needed improvement on their last two albums?

Everybody and their moms are familiar with Jethro Tull, but for those who aren’t, Curious Ruminant elaborates on what Jethro Tull have made a 50+ year career out of: being the premier flute rock band. Saturated with Ian Anderson’s flute, Curious Ruminant has a folk backbone provided by the jubilant whimsy of his playing. The delicate woodwind almost exclusively performs the non-vocal melodies; to be frank, the record suffers for it. The strongest moments on the entire album are a memorable guitar riff at around 1:30 in the title track and an actual rock chorus on “The Tipu House” because, for the most part, Curious Ruminant is a slow, soporific affair compounded by a brittle flute tone and several sections that sound like Zamfir’s legendary 80s new age pan flute. Moreover, the melodies themselves are on the irritating side of things, the bland and bouncy flute ingratiating itself with the most stereotypical of Celtic folk music—Tull even include some accordian to hammer home the stylistic similarities.

With a vocal style that borders on spoken word throughout Curious Ruminant (often becoming actually spoken like on closer “Interim Sleep”), Ian Anderson’s bardic storytelling matches the vibe of the fluty folkiness. That is to say it is profoundly boring—and annoying. Although his timbre has remained steady for the last five decades, Anderson has lost his range and charm, sticking almost entirely (or entirely) within one mid-range octave. Most singers do once they reach a certain age, and there’s a sadness to it: he wants the band to continue clearly—and he has passion—but Jethro Tull only ever sounds more desiccated. While I’d of course rather him stay in a comfortable range than strain for notes he can’t reach, a more energetic vocal style would do wonders for Curious Ruminant because as is, Anderson may as well be singing lullabies. 

After his spoken word and flute contributions to Opeth’s return to pseudo-death metal last year, I hoped to no avail that Anderson would be inspired to try something a bit more rock-oriented. The inclusion of more than a singular riff or a return to something more akin to their 70s prog rock would have drastically improved Curious Ruminant, but Jethro Tull have one trick up their sleeves to potentially save the record: “Drink from the Same Well.” Tull’s first song over ten minutes since “Budapest” in 1987, I had high hopes going into the new sixteen-minute epic. After a lengthy intro section, the track endlessly meanders, often repeating a new age motif as well as the line “I drink… from the same as you.” The track goes nowhere, the sense of composition haphazard. Poor transitions link uninspired flute melodies which act as a reprisal of all that came before on the record. This is the band with literally the first one-track progressive rock album (Thick as a Brick), a timeless masterpiece and triumph of long-form songwriting. How the mighty have fallen. 

I have tremendous respect for Ian Anderson as a musician despite my distaste for post-hiatus Jethro Tull: not many people are still rocking in their late seventies. Well, Curious Ruminant would be more engaging if he were still rocking rather than playing tepid flute music. However, eventually one has to introspect and realize it may be time to stop writing new music, and Jethro Tull are creatively destitute now. Rock away at live performances and rest on the laurels of your past greatness rather than churn out drivel! But with Curious Ruminant, it’s safe to say I’m more Disappointed in Jethro Tull than ever.

Recommended tracks: Puppet and the Puppet Master, Curious Ruminant, The Tipu House
You may also like: Flor de Loto, Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate, Mandoki Soulmates
Final verdict: 4/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOut Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Jethro Tull is:
Ian Anderson – Flutes, vocals, acoustic guitar, tenor guitar, mandolin, odds and sods, bits and bobs
David Goodier – Bass guitar
John O’Hara – Piano, keyboards, accordion
Scott Hammond – Drums
Jack Clark – Electric guitar

The album also features:
James Duncan – Drums, cajón, percussion
Andrew Giddings – Piano, keyboards, accordion

The post Review: Jethro Tull – Curious Ruminant appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Progressive metal, heavy metal, thrash metal (mixed vocals, mostly clean)
Recommended for fans of: Megadeth, Metallica, Testament, Haken, Between the Buried and Me
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 14 March 2025

When prog metal nerds gather and chat about music, an inevitable topic is how each got into the genre. Two particular paths seem to be the most common: from the prog rock side, beginning with Rush, Pink Floyd, Yes, et al. (thank your parents for that); or from the metal side, beginning with Maiden, Priest, Metallica, Megadeth, and all the usual suspects. Dream Theater tend to be the point at which the two paths intersect—and, these days, perhaps Haken too. 

My path to progressive metal follows the latter group. At age twelve, Rust in Peace and The Number of the Beast pulled me away from mainstream alternative rock and set me on the course that eventually led here, writing about obscure prog albums that a relative few will ever hear. I have a tremendous amount of reverence for the metal classics, and twenty-one years later there’s still a big spot in my rotation for the old school. So, I was more than a little excited when Charlie Griffiths, guitarist of Haken fame, announced that his sophomore solo album, Gods of Pangaea, would be a love letter to the classic metal bands responsible for my plunge into heavier music.  

Let’s get a bit of housekeeping out of the way—Griffiths’ first solo album, Tiktaalika, was released under the moniker Charlie Griffiths. This time, Gods of Pangaea is released under the moniker Tiktaalika. (Thanks, Charlie, for choosing the most confusing possible way to release this one.) Tiktaalika, the album, featured a roster of vocalists who traded duties depending on the track. If Haken plays progressive metal, Griffiths’ solo debut was progressive metal—heavier, but not eschewing progressive songwriting or moving away completely from Haken’s wackiness.¹ Now, Griffiths has stripped things back another layer with Gods of Pangaea, releasing an album that pays tribute to late ‘80s and early ‘90s metal and the art of the riff. The vocals are again split among a few powerhouses, most of whom also appeared on the debut:

• Daniël de Jongh (Textures): “Tyrannicide,” “Gods of Pangaea,” “Give up the Ghost”
• Rody Walker (Protest the Hero): “Fault Lines”
• Tommy Rogers (Between the Buried and Me): “Lost Continent”
• Vladimir Lalić (Organised Chaos, David Maxim Micic): “Mesozoic Mantras”
• Vladimir Lalić and Neil Purdy (Luna’s Call): “The Forbidden Zone”

On bass is Conner Green (Haken), and Darby Todd (currently touring with Devin Townsend) is behind the kit. On paper, this all adds up to a dream album for me. But in practice, could this all-star roster capture the magic of heavy metal’s golden era?

Gods of Pangaea may be influenced by a dozen metal bands, ranging from Metallica to Mercyful Fate, but Megadeth are the most noticeable—the riffing is tight, sharp, and often more technical than you’d expect from the old school. Opener “Tyrannicide” has a verse that bites and a ripping instrumental bridge and solo, channeling the energy and instrumental prowess that catapulted Megadeth into the Big Four. Indeed, the track’s intro might well have come directly from Rust in Peace. The choruses in “Fault Lines” and the title track, meanwhile, bring the more melodic parts of Countdown to Extinction to mind. Slowing things down slightly, “The Forbidden Zone” leans further into groove with its chugging verse and stomping chorus, and opts for a modern feel as Lalić trades his cleans with Purdy’s harshes. Although a common, overtly “metal” thread connects the songs, they’re all different in feel, helped along by the rotating vocal cast. And each track has at least a few components that any fan of traditional metal will have fun attributing back to one of the classic bands.

In his respective tracks, Daniël de Jongh’s versatile vocals extend from Mustaine-esque cleans to ballsier harshes. Lalić’s vocals, on the other hand, have a power-metal feel, with an expressive tone and operatic flourishes that sit pleasantly on top of both the heavier riffs in “The Forbidden Zone” and the melodic, proggier ones in “Mesozoic Mantras.” Really harkening back to the early days of metal, Lalić’s twenty-second wail at the end of the latter track is something to behold. Rody Walker may turn in the most enjoyable performance of all with “Fault Lines,” adding his own melodic take on thrashy vocals resembling those of Joey Belladonna (Anthrax) and then capping off the track with some climactic, throaty yelling. And, of course, Tommy Rogers sounds as good as we’ve come to expect, his trademark vocals putting an exclamation point on closing track “Lost Continent.” Gods of Pangaea does have some vocal stumbling points: most obvious is the repetitive, mundane chorus of “Give up the Ghost” that cements it as the album’s weakest track, and a close second is the verse of “The Forbidden Zone” that plods vocally and lyrically without much inspiration.² But on the whole, Griffiths’ roster of vocalists keeps the album fresh and dynamic without losing a cohesive flow from track to track. 

Despite Gods of Pangaea being a tribute to the classic metal sound, Griffiths couldn’t help but indulge his progressive background—Tiktaalika are a bunch of prog musicians, after all. “Mesozoic Mantras” begins with a winding two minutes of primarily acoustic guitars, some complex drum chops and rhythmic variance, a bit of play with the meter, and even short, soft vocal accents in the Haken style—reminiscent of “Earthlings” or any Haken track in that vein. “Lost Continent” loses the classic metal plot completely and is straight-up modern progressive metal, sounding quite a lot like Between the Buried and Me, and not just because Tommy Rogers is providing the vocals. As one of the album’s best tracks, I can’t complain. Less successfully, the title track spans nearly nine minutes due to a collection of middle passages that wander longer than they hold interest. In general, all the songs are a little more complicated in structure, and the riffs and drumming are a little more technical, than you’d get from late ‘80s and early ‘90s metal. The progressive elements peppered—or at times dumped—into the album are well done, and the result is an album for prog metal fans who appreciate the old school more than one for classic metal fans who appreciate prog.

Paying tribute to the past is tough work: it requires capturing a resonant aura of authenticity while also injecting enough originality to avoid the label “rip off.” And, transparently, describing why something does or doesn’t feel authentic is also tough and often overly subjective. Nevertheless, to me, Gods of Pangaea succeeds in the “originality” part of the balance but not in its authenticity—even despite its sick, Ed Repka-inspired cover art.³ Griffiths’ ideas are carried out and connected with surgical precision. The riffs throw a barrage of notes at you, and the drums seem to follow each one until a spotless transition takes you into the next section. The album lacks those huge, sustained chords that give so many classic tracks character (pick any prime-era Metallica song); there’s very little of the simple drumming and totally stripped-back rhythms that let riffs and vocals shine and provide older metal its loose, flowing feel (think Anthrax’s Among the Living); and the album’s pristine production is devoid of the old school grit crucial to the era’s aesthetic. These things are hardly criticisms of a prog album. In fact, they’re things prog albums actively seek to avoid. But having approached Gods of Pangaea with its context in mind, I felt some slight disappointment in terms of authenticity—and then I remembered that, whatever his intent, Griffiths still delivered a solid record.

Ultimately, Gods of Pangaea is modern progressive metal that gives a nod to the classics. The album has no shortage of strong riffs, catchy choruses, or impressive performances—vocally and from each instrumentalist. The tracks are dynamic enough to remain engaging, and the energy stays high throughout. Maybe Gods of Pangaea doesn’t capture the magic of heavy metal’s golden era—it doesn’t bring me back to high school, blasting Screaming for Vengeance while driving my beat-up pickup truck through the hills of Los Angeles—but we can still chalk it up as another win for Griffiths.

Recommended tracks: Tyrannicide, Fault Lines, Lost Continent
You may also like: Paradox, Crimson Glory, and Wolf (Swe) if you’re a fan of this album’s classic influences
Final verdict: 7/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page

Label: Inside Out Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Tiktaalika is:
– Charlie Griffiths (guitars)
– Darby Todd (drums)
– Conner Green (bass)

1. Here at The Subway, Tiktaalika garnered a double review, scoring a rare 9/10 in both. I didn’t quite share the same level of enthusiasm, but I’ll say it was undeniably a very strong album. ︎
2. “I am Triassic, I’m Jurassic. Always adapting and counterattacking. I am voracious, I am Cretaceous…” doesn’t quite do it for me. But hey, repetitive choruses and bumbling verses are practically staples of classic metal. ︎
3. The album artwork, done by Dan Goldsworthy, is directly inspired by Ed Repka—the artist responsible for the covers of Death’s early work, Peace Sells, Rust in Peace, and so many other iconic albums of the era. Goldsworthy and Griffiths share a love for Repka’s work, and they felt his style captured what Gods of Pangaea aimed to be. ︎

The post Review: Tiktaalika – Gods of Pangaea appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Artwork by Hugh Syme

Style: Traditional progressive metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Rush, Metallica, Iron Maiden, virtuoso musicianship, uhhh well IT’S DREAM THEATER, WHAT DO YOU NEED FFO FOR?
Country: United States-New York
Release date: 7 February 2025

Dream Theater, huh? Where do I even begin… Should I talk about the kind instructor at a summer camp who introduced me to them, my subsequent obsession with the band, and eventually progressive metal as a whole? Do I go over their recent history and how often their output has been underwhelming in the Mangini era—an era that has now come to a close with the reintroduction of Mike Portnoy? Or do I discuss their enormous impact on progressive metal? I could easily write a ten-paragraph long introduction if I were to cover all this, but we don’t have all day. What’s most remarkable to me about their new album Parasomnia is the fact that I’m reviewing this in the first place. Now, nearly seven years after I founded this blog, we’ve decided to stop solely covering underground prog. I remember thinking in 2022 that raising our Spotify monthly listener cap to 20.000 was a huge deal (it was only 5.000 when we started!), and today we’re covering Dream Theater?! Well, here goes nothing.

Over the past fifteen years, Dream Theater has developed something of a reputation for being stale and predictable. Leaving aside the dumpster fire experiment that was The Astonishing (mostly—there was a great 45 minute album in there, I swear), the band has by and large played a “back to the roots” sort of melodic prog metal. Mike Portnoy fans hoped that his reintroduction would inject a renewed creativity into the band, but Parasomnia is just as safe as (if not more than) A View From the Top of the World was, just a little heavier and darker with slightly different drumming. I would even go so far as to say that Parasomnia contains so many nods to older work that it almost feels like self-plagiarism. You’ve got the Metallica-esque riffs from Systematic Chaos; dark synths redolent of Black Clouds & Silver Linings; and “Dead Asleep”, whose bridge feels like a rehash of “Beyond This Life”. Then there’s “Midnight Messiah”, whose chorus riff is a less interesting reskin of “S2N”; and the abuse of that same “open the song with hard riffs and dynamic proggery and then let Petrucci lead into the meat of the song with a melodic guitar solo” intro they’ve used a million times now on “In the Arms of Morpheus”, “Dead Asleep”, and “The Shadow Man Incident”. Even the more eclectic parts like the swing section in “A Broken Man” have been done before at this point, such as on Distance Over Time’s “Viper King”. Many bands like to go back and reference their older material, but Parasomnia‘s reliance on these references feels less like fun little easter eggs for the fans and more like it’s patching up a lack of inspiration.

Questionable self-homages aside, Dream Theater doing Dream Theater things as Dream Theater does will always give rise to moments of mind-bending complexity and musicality, and there are plenty to be found on Parasomnia. “Night Terror” is a thoroughly successful track with energetic riffage, interesting verses, and a catchy chorus, as well as an inspired instrumental bridge with an insanely cool solo from Petrucci over a sexy bass-driven groove. Similarly, “A Broken Man” opens with the hardest riff on the album and cleverly recontextualizes its pattern in a number of ways as a guiding thread for the song to build around, while “Dead Asleep” is just a well constructed epic according to the classic Dream Theater formula. On the softer end, “Bend the Clock” is an excellent ballad with an ‘80s feel and a straightforward Gilmourian solo.

If anything, Parasomnia feels like a smoothed out version of their output of the past fifteen years, but molded in a Black Clouds era sound. Vocal clunkers are gone as James LaBrie no longer tries to sing outside his range; Portnoy has ditched the ‘tough guy’ vocals, sticking solely to background harmonies with Petrucci; I spotted no severe cringe in the lyrics; and of course as I mentioned earlier, Dream Theater are still world class instrumentalists. If Parasomnia is your introduction to Dream Theater, I can well imagine the record leaving a big impression on you. For the experienced listener though, Parasomnia lacks both the creativity and the compositional brilliance of Dream Theater’s previous work. All this is to say that nothing offends, but nothing transcends, either: the vocals are fine but mostly unremarkable in lyrics, melody writing, and execution as LaBrie plays it far too safely. Only “Night Terror” has a truly catchy chorus but even that suffers from a monotonous cadence. Compositionally, the band throws way too many ideas at the wall to make much of anything stick, and when ideas do stick, they have to fight an uphill battle to build into anything more than a mere display of virtuosity. “A Broken Man” exemplifies this, squandering an amazingly moody cinematic intro with unremarkable vocal melodies and the most bog standard Dream Theater bridge you can think of whose mood is at best tenuously connected to the rest of the song.

What perhaps annoys me most about Parasomnia, though, is its overall packaging. Prog metal fans rarely give them credit for it, but Dream Theater were quite eclectic for their first twenty years. Whether it was Images and Words with its ‘80s synths and funk influences, Train of Thought’s  balls-to-the-wall approach, or Falling Into Infinity indulging in a ‘90s commercial rock sound, each album had its own distinct identity. Unless you squint your eyes, Parasomnia fails to set itself apart. Clock samples and other nocturnal sounds are interspersed across the record, but they are of such little conceptual value that they add only negligible amounts of personality to Parasomnia. Most of the sampling feels like wasted space used as an uninspired way to give the listener a brief respite from the riff onslaught (“Are We Dreaming?” might be even more pointless than the NOMAC tracks on The Astonishing). Additionally, the pacing on Parasomnia is also off-balance with all the aggressive Metallica-esque riffage and maximalist songwriting of the first five tracks. In terms of pacing, “Midnight Messiah” and “Are We Dreaming?” could have been cut entirely and the record would have been far better for it, as could have the final two minutes of “Dead Asleep” which starts a nonsensical buildup after the song should have ended. Only the penultimate track, “Bend the Clock”, provides meaningful sonic relief, but by this point, it’s far too late.

The astute reader may have noticed that I have yet to cover the closing epic, “The Shadow Man Incident”. This is because the song deserves its own paragraph. “A View From the Top of the World” has yet to grab me, but that aside, this is easily Dream Theater’s least memorable epic. For most of the song, the band is simply going through the motions; again, it’s enjoyable enough purely by virtue of how talented they are, but like the rest of the album, the song has no substantial musical identity to set it apart. Its intro has a somewhat fresh cinematic twist to it, but the “Metropolis Pt. 1” mimicking rapid fire chugs, bog-standard melodic Petrucci solo, and lame “Octavarium” reimagining of the first verses (“I. Someone Like Him”, anyone?) kill any hope of originality. It lacks any memorable vocal lines, too. They’re pleasant and serviceable, but none come close to iconic lines of previous epics like “Seasons change and so can I”, “TRAPPED INSIDE THIS OC-TA-VA-RI-UM”, or (albeit maybe for the wrong reasons) “All the finest wines IMPROVE WITH AGE!!!” The best part is the jazzy piano section starting at 13:06, which might not be the freshest thing they’ve ever done but kicks major ass regardless. Dream Theater in their old age are better at jamming together in solo sections than they are at writing songs.

When the news of Mike Portnoy’s return broke, I, like many, truly hoped that Dream Theater would push themselves further artistically. Instead, we have what feels like the fourth “back to the basics” album in the last fifteen years. Perhaps if it came out after Black Clouds or A Dramatic Turn of Events, Parasomnia would have felt like a solid addition to their legacy, but as it stands, the album rather feels like A View From the Top of the World: Nocturnal Edition But We Got the Old Mike Back So It’s Really Different We Swear. What I really need from Dream Theater next time is the flavorful eclecticism and personality from the old days. This current incarnation of the band is serviceable, but ultimately toothless, so much so that you could be fooled into thinking they wrote this in their sleep.

Recommended tracks: Night Terror, Dead Asleep, Bend the Clock
You may also like: Need, Aeon Zen, DGM, Sunburst, Anubis Gate, Lalu, Vanden Plas, Ostura, Tyranny of Hours, Venus in Fear, Max Enix, Eumeria, Altesia, Vicinity, Avandra, Turbulence, Dimhav, Kaiser’s Bart, The Pulse Theory, Vanden Plas, Guardsman, Lunar, Hac San, Odd Logic, Axios, Teramaze, Dark Quarterer, Etrange, Nospun, Paralydium, Dreamwalkers Inc, Beyond the Mirror, Novena, Vanden Plas, Acolyte, Azure, Atomic Symphony, Daydream XI, Royal Hunt, Distorted Harmony, Redshift, Scardust, Course of Fate, Flaming Row, Aural Cadence, Pagan’s Mind, Advent Horizon, Beyond the Bridge, Maestrick, Roman Khrustalev, Triton Project, Pyramid Theorem, The Vicious Head Society, Vanden Plas, Alkera, Universe Effects, Soul Enema, Noveria, Lost in Thought, Headspace, Virtual Symmetry, Sentire, Hephystus, Dakesis
Final verdict: 6.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page

Label: InsideOut Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Dream Theater is:
– James LaBrie (vocals)
– John Petrucci (guitars)
– Jordan Rudess (keyboard)
– John Myung (bass)
– Mike Portnoy (drums)

The post Review: Dream Theater – Parasomnia appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Devin Townsend, SikTh, Bjork, Haken
Country: China
Release date: 26 April 2024

With the world’s second-largest population, China has a musical history spanning thousands of years. In spite of this, relatively few Chinese metal bands have reached Western audiences. OU (pronounced “oh”) is a four-piece group formed in Beijing in 2019. The band released debut album One in 2022; earnest and fresh-sounding, it didn’t register a strong impact on the seismograph of the progressive underground, but set expectations high for those who did take notice. 蘇醒 II: Frailty, released in 2024, sees the quartet return in an attempt to raise the bar again.

On the relatively uncluttered canvas of Chinese metal, OU has plenty of room to establish their own identity. While there are none of the bone flutes and plucked strings pervasive in the most well-known or stereotypical styles of Chinese traditional music, the band nonetheless incorporates the traditional when it comes to musical style and a few featured instruments, amidst a host of influences from across metal and other genres. All the lyrics are in Mandarin, with English translations listed alongside each track title; the overarching themes are inspired by Buddhist theology. The band’s sound flits across the map: their prog-metal core of exuberant, heavy buildups bursting at the seams is contrasted with electronica, ambient soundscapes, and dreamy vocal melodies.

The opening title track, “蘇醒 Frailty,” wastes no time showing us what’s in store, stacking up a wall of heavy, energetic sound that showcases the chops of everyone in the four-piece and then pulls back at all the right moments. Among the diverse musical DNA on display, there are hints of Haken and SiKth, but one of the more prominent influences is that of OU’s mentor/stan, prog metal hall-of-famer Devin Townsend. Having been paired up with the band at the suggestion of InsideOut label head Thomas Waber, Townsend subsequently served as a producer on Frailty, made more than a few posts on social media praising the band, and even made his Mandarin singing debut with a featured vocal performance. And speaking of that vocal feature, blaaaaghh – Heavy Devy starts off “淨化 Purge” with a scream, taking a backseat for the next part of the track before returning to underlay vocalist Lynn Wu’s melody with signature ragged-edged vocals. He feels a bit underused; the potency he brings makes the listener long to hear more of him.

Sometimes on 蘇醒 II: Frailty, you might think you know where a melody is going, but it zigs in a delightfully unexpected direction when you thought it would zag. This happens on a larger scale, too—instead of launching into another heavy riff after the softer, understated “血液 Redemption,” which feels like an interlude, OU takes us on a diversion into electronica-flavoured sounds with “衍生,” intriguingly translated as “Capture and Elongate (Serenity)”.

While 蘇醒 II: Frailty sits at a tight 42 minutes, and calling any of it filler would be a stretch, some tracks are more memorable than others. The second half of the album blurs a bit from one song to the next, with fewer of the Townsendian or Hakenesque buildups to smack you in the face, and the occasional passage that stretches past its natural lifespan, such as in the mostly instrumental track “歪歪地愛 yyds”.

Lyrically, it will be hard for the average Western listener to pull anything but the sparest hints as to the song’s themes, relying only on the English translations of song titles. Your mileage may vary here; prog metal has its fair share of cringey or overwrought lyrics, so it may be a welcome change for some to colour in their own interpretations between the lines of notions like rebirth, redemption, and cleansing.

Singer Lynn Wu’s voice has a thin, delicate quality to it, like a strong thread woven in and out over the instrumentals. Indeed, historically, Chinese vocal music tends to be sung in a non-resonant or falsetto voice. However, there are moments when Wu’s delivery hints at something richer and thicker, and 蘇醒 II: Frailty would benefit from leaning into these moments more. As for the other band members, you can sometimes get an inkling when the drummer is a band’s main songwriter, and that’s certainly the case here: Anthony Vanacore’s drumming is central and unrelenting in the album’s heavier moments. It also has djent-y undertones that might alienate some who dislike that style. By contrast, Zhang Jing on guitar and Chris Cui on bass are more like musical shapeshifters, molding unassumingly to the form of each track’s mood, be it heavy, ambient, or somewhere in between. There are also some tasty synth moments sprinkled throughout; they glitter and pop in “海 Ocean”, and bounce along spryly in “衍生 Capture and Elongate (Serenity)”.

Closer “念 Recall” builds a lush soundscape like falling raindrops, using only various percussion instruments and vocals. Onto this, a ‘recollection’ of a motif from 蘇醒 II: Frailty’s opening track is layered, the effect meditative and even hypnotic. The intricate textures gradually give way to an increasingly spare vocal/rhythmic pulse. “念 Recall” gives the listener plenty of space; perhaps you will use this time to meditate on the album’s overall effect. The countless details woven into 蘇醒 II: Frailty make denying the creativity, musicianship, and fresh, stimulating sound on display in this sophomore album all but impossible.

Recommended tracks: 蘇醒 Frailty, 淨化 Purge, 衍生 Capture and Elongate (Serenity), 念 Recall
You may also like: District 97, Kate NV
Final verdict: 7.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOutMusic – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

OU is:
– Lynn Wu 吴玲玲 (Vocals)
– Jing Zhang 张晶 (Guitar)
– Chris Cui 崔文正 (Bass)
– Anthony Vanacore 安咚咚 (Drums)

The post Missed Album Review: OU – 蘇醒 II: Frailty appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Prog rock, jazz-rock, folk (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Steely Dan, The Flower Kings, Yes, Kamasi Washington, Jethro Tull, Jacob Collier
Country: International
Release date: 10 May 2024

A prog flute legend, 40% of Supertramp, Toto’s drummer, like eight famous jazz musicians, Al di Meola, and Rainbow’s keyboardist walk into a bar. The bartender says, “this is far too specific and unfunny to be a joke.” And indeed, it’s actually A Memory of Our Future, Mandoki Soulmates’ sixth studio LP after over two decades in the biz. This thing is a who’s who of global talent, the supergroup to end all supergroups. Surely the sheer quantity of skill prevents Mandoki Soulmates from falling by the wayside like so many disappointing supergroups before them. 

A Memory of Our Future sounds superb, its completely analog production quality crystal clear and sparing no detail. Balancing eighteen performers weaving in and out of the fray, Mandoki Soulmates never lose track of anything, even perpetually under-mixed and overlooked rhythm instruments like the bass and tabla crisp and loud. Most favored in the mix is Ian Anderson’s (Jethro Tull) flute, taking a clear lead in tracks like “Blood in the Water” and “Devil’s Encyclopedia,” and his reedy lead tone seems as good a candidate as any to be the stock in this melting pot of prog and jazz talents, though I admittedly prefer when the various brass players take a more traditionally jazz-y lead.

Mandoki Soulmates smoothly mix their members’ prog and jazz heritages along with a distinct “global music” influence à la Anderson/Stolt—mostly from the Hindustani classical tradition with frequently used tabla and infrequent sitar—to create shifting song-structures and varied soundscapes, somewhere between Steely Dan, Jethro Tull, and The Flower Kings. Perhaps closest in ambition, however, is modern jazz titan Kamasi Washington whose several hour long albums similarly gather a huge crew of amazing musicians to ebb and flow with all the drama of the movements of the cosmos. Unfortunately, Mandoki Soulmates, despite being primed to similarly exude charismatic drama, play it safe with standard grooves and an implementation of the jazz instruments which makes A Memory of Our Future sound like hotel lobby music. Rather than stunning climaxes where the whole band builds off one another’s energies, most songs build back to repetitive choruses, all the while at a snail’s pace. If there wasn’t such varied instrumentation, A Memory of Our Future would land somewhere between pop rock and muzak. 

The biggest crutch to creating a bit of pizazz is the vocal performance, which, except for some pleasant harmonizations, is dry with limited range and a stock-standard tone. The choruses are redundant, usually chanting the song title a couple of times before moving on, and the lyrics are cringeworthy, such as calling social media the “Devil’s Encyclopedia”—boomer prog at its finest. Instrumentally, Mandoki Soulmates excel as a group with this much collective experience should. Play it safe they certainly do, but Al di Meola’s acoustic sections are gorgeous, the several keyboardists all have chances to shine—notably on closer “Melting Pot”—and “The Wanderer” highlights some spectacular fretless bass playing, the tone to die for. As an extended jam, A Memory of Our Future works, and if the energy were increased, this thing would be an amazing spiritual jazz album, but with the vocals it’s all filler, no killer. Stellar instrumental ornamentation can’t save a seventy-eight minute, bland album. Mandoki Soulmates have all the most expensive spices but use them in such minute quantities as to be a disappointing tease.

If you want the most expensive sounding muzak ever, A Memory of Our Future is perfect, yacht rock for a prog fan. Its length makes it ideal to throw on during a lazy Sunday afternoon as background music for reading the newspaper, but it’s a shame these eighteen musicians are reduced to this. It’s monstrous at eighty minutes long with as many people as it has, yet it never leans into excess. Something like this needs swagger, gusto, pizazz, and drama: A Memory of Our Future lacks that, a pitifully soulless use of pedigree.

Recommended tracks: The Big Quit, A Memory of My Future, Melting Pot
You may also like: Anderson/Stolt, Transatlantic, Southern Empire
Final verdict: 5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram

Label: InsideOut Music – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Mandoki Soulmates is:
– look at the cover art

The post Review: Mandoki Soulmates – A Memory of Our Future appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Genres: Traditional progressive metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Loudly dropping your weights at the gym, leaving your plates on the barbell when you’re done with the bench, Sons of Apollo, shallow philosophical musings
Country: United States
Release date: 15 March 2024

Ostensibly a spiritual successor of the now-defunct supergroup Sons of Apollo, Whom Gods Destroy takes two of the members remaining from the original five-piece, splices in three guest stars, and cobbles together this Frankenstein’s monster of a progressive metal album Insanium. Aptly titled, this directionless oeuvre alludes to greatness in the same way the made-up word “insanium” alludes to the future-tense of the Latin verb INSANIRE, “insaniam” – that is to say, it displays a middle-schooler’s idea of depth. Insanium is a dinner course served on a platter that shines with a mirror polish, the plating immaculate; but the dish lacking in anything nutritive. Not exactly haute-couture for prog metal, WGD seems rather an outlet for Bumblefoot’s, quite frankly, extraterrestrial ability on the doubleneck. 

The guitar playing on this album is mind-bendingly virtuosic, and simultaneously replete with the type of protruding-brow-ridge syncopated riffing that make any first-time gym-goer proudly want to leave his weights where they fall. If the man doesn’t let out that massive talent I suspect he’s sure to have an aneurysm. The lyrics meanwhile touch on war, death, and the human experience, in a way that is trite and devoid of subtlety: “Death we celebrate, as if it was something we were born for” – yawn – but vocalist Dino Jelusick’s stand-out performance can convincingly deliver a pseudo-intellectual dialogue that would give any sophomore philosophy student goosebumps. I first enjoyed Dino’s work with Michael Romeo on his War of the Worlds Pt. 2 release in 2022, so I was pleased to see him making an appearance in this project. On this release, Dino adds a lot of grit to his vocal performance, in contrast to Jeff Scott Soto’s decidedly more polished cleans. 

Sherinian’s keywork is the powerhouse melodic force of this outfit, creating atmospheric tension with his counterpoint lead melodies and ethereal background elements – I highlight the track “Crawl” for his unnerving, discordant harmonic leads that transition later into distinct melodic chord voicings to deliver a very satisfying sense of resolution. His patch choices never come across as artless or haphazard. I find that his tones are especially engaging, specifically the ones he uses to emulate an electric guitar when trading solos with Bumblefoot. The guy’s a master synth programmer; he dials these sounds in with a specific purpose and they nail it – and cut through the mix extremely well.

On the rhythm side you have Bruno Valverde of Angra fame manning the drums, and bass player Yas Nomura from The Resonance Project. Being a longtime fan of Angra I’m intimately familiar with Valverde’s chops and I dare say he’s underutilized on this release. Bruno’s lightning-fast and precise technique was hardly showcased at all on this album, which really didn’t feature a speedy track for him to go off on. Something in the vein of but not completely like Angra’s discography wouldn’t have gone totally amiss – I mean, it’s not like the two Sons of Apollo discs didn’t have their fair share of then-drummer Mike Portnoy’s off-and-on-again band’s influence. But I digress. Bruno does his duty but never gets too creative with it. On the other hand, I have little and less to say of bassist Nomura, whose role is mostly relegated to beefing up the low end and who wasn’t given an opportunity to truly flex his fingers until he was given a quick solo bass run in the latter half of the album on “Hypernova 158”.

Overall, I think the songwriting on this release can feel a bit uninspiring. The tracks seldom ever really pick up from a slow-to-midtempo pace until the aforementioned “Hypernova 158”, an instrumental piece which sits at about 160bpm (or perhaps 158?). Aside from the typical instrumental mastery we’ve come to expect from the two titans Sherinian and Bumblefoot who were the primary songwriters, there isn’t much that stands out here. There was a certain songwriting ability that I feel Portnoy brought to the previous iteration of this group that is notably lacking. It’s not that the album is bad necessarily, but some of the tracks tend to blend into one another with a similar tonality and structure – intense throughout the start and middle, then with a slow part that comes in about 2/3rds to 3/4s of the way through before picking back up in the final 100yds – and it starts to feel a bit predictable. Not very progressive of ’em to find a convention and stick with it.

Insanium telegraphs “hear how well we can play” and doesn’t back it up with the writing. I hesitate to even want to call this a first offering since it’s hardly different sonically from SOA’s two albums, although tonally darker – and less complex in arrangement and lyrical direction – but nevertheless for a debut from such talented and established musicians it barely manages to leave a lasting impression. It’s heavy for this style of prog, sure, and masterfully played… but ultimately it failed to resonate with me. Honestly not sure if they’ll keep it going after this album, so I shook my Magic 8 Ball: “outlook not so good.” 

Recommended tracks: Crawl, Crucifier, Insanium
You may also like: Stone Leaders, Temic, Nospun
Final verdict: 5/10

Related links: Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Official Website

Label: InsideOut Music – Facebook | Official Website

Whom Gods Destroy is:
– Dino Jelusick (vocals)
– Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal (guitars)
– Derek Sherinian (keyboards)
– Bruno Valverde (drums)
– Yas Nomura (bass)

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