Artwork by Chris Williams

Style: Thall, Djent, Progressive Metal (mixed vocals, mostly harsh)
Recommended for fans of: Meshuggah, Frontierer, Humanity’s Last Breath, Car Bomb
Country: Sweden
Release date: 30 May 2025

Metal suffers from an unfortunate theme where genre pioneers eventually fall prey to the very scenes they helped create, buckling under the weight of their own stagnating influence. Look no further than Morbid Angel’s Illud Divinum Insanus, Dream Theater’s The Astonishing, or Metallica’s Lulu or St. Anger. Metal seems to carry with it a curse of longevity for such foundational acts; surviving long enough nearly ensures an artist will produce one of their pioneered genre’s worst releases to go along with whatever classics they may have created in the past. 

Vildhjarta are one such foundational act, single-handedly pioneering the sound of thall, an offshoot style of djent. Even today, there are arguments about whether or not thall should be classified as a genre proper, but whatever side of the argument one falls on, there is an undeniable and clearly defined difference between the two sounds. Thall started as an in-joke between Vildhjarta members in 2009—a mispronunciation of “Thrall” (a World of Warcraft character)—following the viral success of their Omnislash demo within the then burgeoning djent scene, using it as a descriptor for their music but keeping silent about the term’s meaning. Other groups picked up on the new terminology, using it to describe their own sound as well, even if that sound was nowhere near Vildhjarta’s particular style. Thall was essentially memed into existence, coming to a head in 2011 with Uneven Structure featuring a thall sticker on one of their guitars in the music video for “Awaken”; Vildhjarta would also release their debut LP Måsstaden, clearly defining the sound for the first time, officially partitioning it off from djent. 

Since then, thall has grown into its own scene, with bands such as Frostbitt, Mirar, Indistinct, FRACTALIZE, and Allt exploring the sound’s limits and applications. Vildhjarta themselves would once again further thall’s horizons in 2013 with the release of their Thousands of Evils EP. At this point, thall had achieved a clear distinction from djent: gratuitous bends, pitch-shifted leads, wide interval jumps, a post-metal-inspired focus on ambience, an even more stilted rhythmic conceit, and a slowly evolving tonal language all its own. Vildhjarta would fall silent for eight more years before releasing their 2021 follow-up to Måsstaden—Måsstaden Under Vatten—signaling thall’s largest evolution in sound since 2013. Now in 2025, we are subject to + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +, raising the question: Was Måsstaden Under Vatten a portent of continuing inspired evolution, or will Vildhjarta fall prey to metal’s ever-looming curse of longevity?

+ Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar + is, in some ways, a continuation of the sound explored on Måsstaden Under Vatten, which saw Vildhjarta take a step back from their more traditionally structured phrases and riff patterns, replacing their dense riff focus with a sparse, somber, and patient approach to songwriting. The songs were noticeably slower, with a reaffirmed focus on building a darker atmosphere and tension through synth textures and background guitar harmonies. + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar + continues the focus on atmosphere, utilizing the same techniques as before, but ramping the riff density back up past even Måsstaden’s levels while maintaining the somber, meandering songwriting approach.

The marriage of labyrinthine riff passages and patient atmosphere feels like Vildhjarta’s most complete sound yet, but the more I listen to + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +, the more I realize that this sound has also been forcibly repurposed as a contextual backdrop for them to fervently explore a budding new tonal language. Short staccato rhythmic bursts, off-kilter legato scale runs, and huge nauseating interval jumps remain Vildhjarta’s primary riffing style, though with a realigned focus on evolving their—and therefore thall’s—unique melodic sensibilities. The long legato lines halfway through “+ Sargasso +” are where the cracks in the tonal foundation first start to show, with odd, seemingly “wrong” note choices slipping their way into the melody. Right afterward, “+ Ylva +” blows the sound wide open, with the back half especially braving previously unexplored tonal territory within thall. The riff starting around two and a half minutes in is less of a riff and more of a schizophrenic inner dialogue, the cadence of which feels not quite call and response, but vaguely conversational. A hazy backing guitar harmony wraps itself around the entire second half of the track, adding to the feverishness, the entire section marking the first true declaration of significant evolution within the genre in years. 

While before, Vildhjarta’s sense of melody seemed to emerge from a rhythmic foundation, this time around it feels like the rhythms are blooming from a tonal center, acting primarily as a jagged vessel for the off-kilter melody to nestle within. The ramped-up syncopation feels intrinsic and primordial, necessitated by nascent tonality instead of the deliberate desideratum of a style. Vildhjarta have successfully shifted their core direction from a post-Meshuggah rhythmic ideology to a fully realized evolution of the somber, brooding melancholy that was germinating onMåsstaden Under Vatten. Guitarist Calle Thomer has crafted a unique melodic language all his own, mixing expansive open intervals with dense pulsing chromaticism that often has seemingly little to nothing to do with the accompanying atmospheric harmony. Riffs not only completely ignore the tonic, but drag it down into the bubbling tar pit from which they seemingly emerged. Backing guitar and synth provide what context they can, but the lead guitar will often be on another planet entirely, having a conversation with itself, compartmentalizing whatever grotesqueries it had beheld while stargazing from its cosmic perch. 

There has always been a fragmentation between Vildhjarta’s riff-craft and their surrounding performances, but it’s taken to further extremes on + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +, leading even to pockets of polyphony within some of the busier phrases. Take the opening riff of “+ röda läppar, söta äpplen +”, which sounds as if one had just woken up and was hearing a muffled conversation from the other side of a door. The interstitial melody that weaves between the traditional djent chugs mimics the tonality and cadence of hushed discord, as if there were secrets lurking just beneath the auditory surface. Cascading approximations of a broken arpeggio follow shortly after, straying even further from any sense of diatonic comfort. 

Thomer’s guitar-wizardry is certainly the centerpiece of + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +, but this doesn’t mean the other performances are anything to sneer at. Frontman Vilhelm Bladin’s ever-improving vocal performance continues to provide texture, acting as an anchor point for the cacophonous instrumentals. His clean singing in particular is more emotive than ever (“Där mossan möter havet,” “Kristallfågel,” “Viktlös & evig”), adding yet another layer of melodicism for the riffs to sink their consonance-decaying claws into. Drummer Buster Odeholm’s performance is phenomenal; he has a striking ability to toe the line between insidious groove and near-arbitrary syncopation, unifying the two extremes in distinct manner. My favorite example of Odeholm’s particular style begins about a minute and a half into “+Sargasso +”: A constant eighth note hi-hat keeps tempo while shifting crash cymbals swell alongside the kick drum, which follows the guitar’s intense syncopation. As the phrase continues, it threatens to fall apart completely as the pattern becomes more and more intricate with Odeholm adding his own ornamentation on top of it all, before finally collapsing into a breathing, pulsing synth break as the song passes the two-minute mark.

Vildhjarta slowly and consistently poke and prod at the corners of thall’s melodic language over the runtime of + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar +, culminating in closing track “+ den spanska känslan +”, which climaxes around two-thirds of the way through with a phrase that fully lifts the veil off the previously gestural polyphony, opting to embrace it outright. A patiently funereal harmonized acoustic guitar line is introduced, only to be unceremoniously interrupted by a massive truck of a riff that completely ignores any mournful pretenses set up just moments beforehand. The acoustic line trudges on behind the mammoth tone of Thomer’s distortion, the most undiluted proclamation of Vildhjarta’s marriage between somber ambience, surreal tonality, and idiosyncratic rhythmic ideology to date. Moments like the above are eminently memorable but, as a whole, + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar + is less about the big standout moments than previous releases. The main focus this time around is on creating an alienating atmosphere through vague tonality, an atmosphere that ends up being antagonistic to genre newbies and veterans alike, perhaps not intentionally but as a result of its sheer otherness. 

+ Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar + is—much like its cover art—rigorously technical and feverishly psychedelic, traits that are caught in a war of attrition, proliferating each other through constant battle-metamorphosis. These traits, along with every other trait mentioned thus far, form a howling constellation of stars that are connected through Vildhjarta’s paradoxical stylistic throughline of tonality by way of consistent dis-melodicism. Stare long enough into the night sky, and this constellation spirals into a whorling vortex, spilling forth hallucinatory aural terror from an eerie unknown. Indeed, Vildhjarta have convincingly eluded metal’s persistent curse of longevity, once again taking a leaping stride of innovation, dragging the entirety of thall behind them.

Recommended tracks: + Två vackra svanar +, + Sargasso +, + Den spanska känslan +
You may also like: Frostbitt, Mirar, Reflections, Uneven Structure
Final verdict: 10/10

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

Label: Century Media Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Vildhjarta is:
– Vilhelm Bladin (vocals)
– Calle Thomer (guitars, bass)
– Buster Odeholm (drums, bass)

The post Review: Vildhjarta – + Där skogen sjunger under evighetens granar + appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: brutal death metal, progressive death metal, technical death metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Hate Eternal, Cattle Decapitation, Job for a Cowboy, Rivers of Nihil
Country: Oregon, United States
Release date: 26 January 2024

From the very first guitar driven musings of opener “Shame and its Afterbirth,” one gets the sense that Suffer & Become is an album that needed to be made, as though Vitriol and its frontman Kyle Rasmussen were a cyst taut with all the anger and anxieties of the modern age ready to burst at slightest prodding. From each track, wickedly technical riffage and densely metaphorical lyrics spew forth propelled by the sheer rage of Rasmussen’s guitar and vocal deliveries, the absolutely gravitational drum performance by Matt Kilner of Nithing and Inquisitous Deeds, and the hefty bass and backing vocals of Adam Roethlisberger. While the pure density of riffs across this album is quite unlike anything—the nearest comparison I can draw would be Hate Eternal if Erik Rutan took a nap in a rapid evolution chamber for a few thousand years—the album toes the fine line between intensity and incomprehensibility.

As its title suggests, Suffer & Become is as transcendent as it is brutal, and it is from that friction that some of the best moments on this album are born. The solos on tracks like “Shame and its Afterbirth” and the “The Isolating Lie of Learning Another” (Did I mention this album has the hardest track names?) are such moments where Rasmussen’s almost desperate style of lead work hits the listener like the dawn after a long night of contemplating suicide. Be it the neoclassical sweeping that closes out “Shame…” or the aching upper fretboard stabs that occur in “The Isolating Lie…” Rasmussen treats each chance at a solo as though it were his swan song. Even the more chaotic solos a la Kerry King have a propulsion that pushes hard and fast into the song’s next passage, a regular failing of shred based solos. I could prattle on about the lead work on this album for a very long time, but to put it shortly it is refreshing to hear leads so unique in a genre as convergent as technical death metal. Besides, the leadwork is not the only thing providing this album’s sublime qualities. Tracks like “Survival’s Careening Inertia” and “He Will Fight Savagely” (Again with those song titles!) both feature building song structures where the awe comes not from single elements but from the heft of the band operating as a whole, much in the same way that several tracks off of Rivers of Nihil’s Where Owls Know My Name operate.

Working in tandem with the instrumentals are the album’s lyrics. While Rasmussen and Roethlisberger enunciate just enough for me to catch the odd word or two, I had to follow along with the lyrics to get the full picture, and I am sure glad that I did. Those familiar with my review style know how little weight I often place on lyrics, so it takes something special to make me pay attention. That being said, every single line features a unique and vivid turn of phrase that I can’t help but ponder long after I stop listening. The track “Nursing from the Mother Wound” is particularly notable for this; I’ll never again view disdain as anything other than a “burdening mantle.”

Ultimately, Suffer & Become delivers the full package. The harmony between its themes, lyrics, and instrumentals, the gorgeous artwork, and clearly meticulous effort that went into its creation all combine to create what is without a doubt my favorite album of 2024, a true testament to the genre of death metal and of music as a whole as a cohesive art form. The theme of evolution through hardship is one often attempted in the metal genre, but never before has it been so fully realized so truthfully and vividly. Vitriol has crafted a work that truly challenges the artistic boundaries of technical death metal. In a genre often obsessed with complexity for its own sake, this is a rare reminder of the raw emotion and storytelling that make metal an enduring art form. A masterpiece like this doesn’t deserve to be missed—it demands to be heard.

Recommended tracks: Shame and its Afterbirth, The Isolating Lie of Learning Another
You may also like: Afterbirth, Hideous Divinity, Black Crown Initiate
Final verdict: 10/10

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

Label: Century Media Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Vitriol is:
– Adam Roethlisberger (bass, vocals)
– Kyle Rasmussen (guitars, vocals)
– Matt Kilner (drums)
– Stephen Ellis (guitars)

The post Review: Vitriol – Suffer & Become appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Progressive death metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Death, Atheist
Review by: Zach
Country: Pennsylvania/South Carolina, United States
Release date: 18 August, 2023

The line between a copycat and showing influence on your sleeve is razor thin. Take Cowboy Bebop for example, which has shot-for-shot references of old westerns that Shinichiro Watanabe enjoyed when he was growing up. Is the finished product one of the most original pieces of media I’ve ever seen? On the surface, not really. Bounty hunters in space, big whoop. It’s the theming and narrative structure of Bebop that make it special. Watanabe examined his influences, took note of what made them work, and translated that into his own writing. Point is, you don’t have to make original to make good.

Horrendous are, on the surface, not that original. A progressive death metal band influenced by the likes of Death and Atheist. That sure narrows it down, doesn’t it? They could easily be written off as another Schuldiner wannabe if not for the absolutely ridiculous track record they have. Five albums deep, and Horrendous have yet to release an album that I wouldn’t at least call good, with most of them landing closer to great. Why are they so good you may ask? Because these boys have examined the great titans of old prog-death, and they’ve clearly figured something out that us mortals haven’t caught onto yet.

Let’s start off with my favorite aspect of every Horrendous album. Damian Herring, one half of this band’s riff factory, is probably one of the best producers working right now. Every record sounds nothing short of stellar, and Ontological is no exception. Not only is every instrument perfectly balanced, everything sounds so organic. Clicky kicks and computerized guitar tones have never been Horrendous’s shtick, and they’re better off for it. The fact that this may be the best sounding record Herring has ever produced says a ton about his talent and Ontological Mysterium.

However, a polished turd is still a turd. All the production in the world can’t hide blemishes, and thankfully this album has practically none. ‘Chrysopoeia (The Archeology of Dawn)’ showcases Horrendous at their most proggy, including the best riff I’ve heard all year that they thankfully use a few times. Right off the bat, this song sets up everything you’re about to experience summarized in seven minutes: Clean vocals, fretless bass straight from the school of DiGiorgio, and a sheer sense of badassery emanating from every pore.

Herring’s characteristic shrieks have never sounded better than on ‘Neon Leviathan’, which should’ve been called ‘The Second Coming of Atheist’. I’ve seen many bands try to impersonate this style of 90s prog-death songwriting, and nobody’s got it this right on. Ever. The jazzy, chaotic songwriting is such a great contrast to the more melodic opener, and an even better contrast to chilled out fourth song ‘Aurora Neoterica’.

The songwriting on this album is crazy diverse for death metal. Horrendous even dip their toes into what’s probably the only prog-death ballad I’ve ever heard in ‘Preterition Hymn’. The rock-esque riffs on this song meld perfectly with the noodly bass and complete lack of double kicks. But they make sure you don’t get too comfortable as the last four songs all pummel you back down to hell. When the final bell tolled on closer, ‘The Death Knell Ringeth,’ I started Ontological Mysterium right back from the beginning.

Horrendous continue to cement themselves straight into the death metal hall of fame with each release. They are, without a single doubt in my mind, the current kings of old school, Schuldiner-esque prog-death. Nobody since Sweven has gotten this style so dead on, and so fresh at the same time. Horrendous are far, far more than a copycat, they have breathed life into the genre that hasn’t been seen since the 90s. Don’t sleep on this one, I promise it’s worth it. 

Recommended tracks: Neon Leviathan, Chrysopoeia (The Archaeology of Dawn), Cult of Shaad’oah, The Death Knell Ringeth, Preterition Hymn
You may also like: Ulthar, Hooded Menace, Skyglow
Final verdict: 10/10

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

Label: Season of Mist – Facebook | Official Website

Horrendous is:
– Jamie Knox (drums)
– Matt Knox (guitars, vocals)
– Damian Herring (guitars, vocals)
– Alex Kulick (bass)

The post Missed Album Review: Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Brutal death metal, progressive metal (gurgle vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Devourment, alt rock and synth in your brutal death metal
Review by: Zach
Country: US-NY
Release date: October 20th, 2023

Think about your top band in every metal subgenre. I know Andy probably has his immediately recalled from memory or on an endless spreadsheet. Then, think about why they’re the best at what they do. Are they Opeth and did they do the coolest shit by mixing prog rock and death metal? Are they Dissection, and did they add beauty into icy black metal riffs? But brutal death is never a genre I’ve thought of super highly, so a favorite would probably be one of the long standers. Cryptopsy is always a good choice, and I’ve considered None So Vile to be not only one of the best brutal death metal albums but one of my favorite albums in general.

However, I’m a prog guy through and through. I need something genre bending, something that’ll floor me with its innovation. An album where I can say, “holy shit, I’ve never heard something like that.” Afterbirth isn’t exactly a band who’s sound I’ve never heard before. However, they may have just struck gold. Brutal, slimy, swamp-laden gold.

Let’s back up for a second. Afterbirth is considered a progenitor of the “toilet bowl” vocals the brutal death and slam genres are associated with. So, yeah, if I were the first brutal death listener in existence, that’s something I’d never heard before. But brutal death is very reliant on the standard CHUG-CHUG riffs, compressed production and programmed-sounding drums. I would be lying if I said I didn’t like a few generic BDM bands myself.

Starting with Four-Dimensional Flesh, they added a few synths whirls here and there, and some spacey ambience. But that clearly wasn’t enough. We have the synths on this album, and they sound like something Vangelis would compose. We’ve got alternative rock riffs, post-rock sections, Voivod-esque thrash riffs, emotive guitar solos. All on top of the brutality at its core. There is so much diversity in this album’s guitarwork alone that it boggles my fucking mind. Everything from black metal trem-picking, slam-y chugs, and actual melody can be found here.

Opener ‘Tightening the Screws’ made me want to start a mosh pit in my apartment, but it was ‘Devils With Dead Eyes’ that made my jaw drop. This is a progressive epic squished into four minutes of brutal death metal, but giving it that label isn’t sufficient. I’ve talked about how I want prog to surprise me and how it rarely does that anymore. This album, though, is completely unpredictable. No songs sound completely alike, and each section of this winding, proggy odyssey of gurgle vocals left me nearly speechless.

No album this year has better riffs, all five-hundred of them on this album are downright incredible. The drumming is varied. Will Smith’s disgusting, frog-like vocals have never sounded better, courtesy of one of Colin Marston’s best production jobs. Some people will see this as a drawback of the record, but those people are cowards. This is the biggest leap I’ve ever seen brutal death metal take in joining the many prog styles as a mainstay for me. As I write this, I’m on my eighth or ninth listen, and I’m still finding so many new sections that I’ve missed. Never before has a slam album made me think “that’s a beautiful melody,” even though the entire genre of brutal death metal is to make you shrivel in disgust.

None of it should work. The switching between a beautiful synth right into gurgles in ‘Hovering Human Head Drones’ should be stupid and cheesy, but they’ve gotten it so right. And just as you think the album’s back to being standard brutality, they hit you with a lush atmosphere that wouldn’t sound out of place on an Alcest album. The title track sounds like Queens of the Stone Age! There were multiple points where I had to make sure I hadn’t accidentally switched albums.

I can safely give this a coveted score, because I genuinely believe this to be, right now, the best the genre has to offer. Afterbirth is the unlikely hero of this arc. Should they continue on with pioneering the genre, this album is going to be insanely difficult to top. However, they’ve proven themselves to be geniuses among cavemen riffs. The next one shouldn’t be any trouble.

Recommended tracks: Devils With Dead Eyes, In But not Of, Angels Feast on Flies, Time Enough Tomorrow
You may also like: Artificial Brain, Analepsy, Wormhole
Final verdict: 10/10

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

Label: Willowtip – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Afterbirth is:
– David Case (bass)
– Keith Harris (drums)
– Cody Dresser (guitars)
– Will Smith (gurgles)

The post Review: Afterbirth – In But not Of appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Experimental Black Metal, Free Jazz, “World” Music (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Blut Aus Nord, Neptunian Maximalism
Review by: Cooper
Country: Japan
Release date: 4 August, 2023

Oftentimes, when one is tasked with describing their own music, promises are made that are rarely kept. Every day, I read Bandcamp album descriptions promising me nirvana if I were to just listen to these few songs, yet I still suffer in this mortal world. So when an album refers to itself as “an enigmatic and playfully formulaic quandary of deconstructed, visionary counter-music reminding us a simple concept: that reality is dictated by perception” and “an exploration of the notions of self-reflection, intuition, phobia, luck, and failure in the context of the evil eye, its historical, cultural, physical and metaphysical meanings, as well as its psychological effects, carefully unraveled and revealed,” it’s fair to understand why I may be a bit skeptical; after all, those sound more like the abstract for someone’s thesis than it does an album description. And yet, despite how doubtful I may have been of the promises made by the album’s description, here I sit, wonderstruck, by the magnitude of what was achieved on Skopofoboexoskelett, the fourth EP from 夢遊病者 (pronounced “Mèngyóu bìng zhě” and Chinese for sleepwalker).

Within the first moments of opening track “Mirrors Turned Inward”, 夢遊病者 makes it abundantly clear what sort of audio experience you’ve gotten yourself into. After a brief industrial soundscape, you are submerged into the dark and murky waters of amorphous free jazz-esque guitar and drum work, only able to come up for air on the rare occasion that the instruments lock into a perceptible rhythm, orienting you beneath the dark surface. But even when the song forms into rhythmic normality, its harmonic content is still jarring enough to always leave you uneasy; you may now be treading water, but something still lurks beneath the surface. Slowly though, “Mirrors Turned Inward” moves closer to the realm of what most may refer to as music, jagged guitar motifs blooming open and saxophone entering to bring the song to its more melodically driven conclusion. After just the first song, Skopofoboexoskelett’s goal of unraveling the nature of music itself is coming to fruition with its deeply opposing elements that only work when in conjunction. Like a chef slaughtering a cow in front of his guests before feeding them a burger, it is as though the EP is capturing the essence of anti-music in its entirety by not only showing us music’s deconstruction, but by then showing us how intensely beautiful music can simply be.

“Silesian Fur Coat”, track two, begins with the incredibly addictive musical texture that is the combination of swampy slide guitar, dark, pounding, broody bass, and reverb laden “world” instruments such as the ney, the qanun, and the nyckelharpa – instruments I have never once heard before – and then, using that initial texture as clay, sculpts the rest of the song, slowly adding in layers of strings and inevitably cutting away all unnecessary elements until the song reaches its glorious melodic climax, a climax able to ring so purely only juxtaposed against the squall that preceded it. The next track, “The Eagle Flies”, despite being the shortest song on Skopofoboexoskelett at just 3 minutes, delivers a musical journey of untold length; the use of didgeridoo, worldly percussion, and sleigh bells especially gave the song an exotic and airy texture, a reprieve from the darker tones present elsewhere.

When closing track, “The Bad Luck That Saved You From Worse Luck” finally begins, its more predictable patterns may be surprising after the chaos that came prior, but do not be mistaken; something evil dwells here, too. For after a tasteful guitar solo with an even tastier cello accompaniment, the song turns on its heels as blisteringly distorted guitars and vocals enter to seemingly destroy the song’s established groove only for everything to shift once again, lurching forward into a much quicker pace. It really is stellar songwriting. From here, the tension and chaos build up to the point of no return only to give way to a climax of strings and guitar that will almost certainly go down as the most beautiful musical moment I’ll hear all year.

With Skopofoboexoskelett, 夢遊病者 have left me craving more. The music on display here is powerful and the more I listen and the more I ponder, the more meaningful it seems to become, as though its memory is more poignant than its presence. The fact that I am now pondering the nature of music itself means that this album has more than achieved its desired effect on me and that I will surely return to this for years to come. In 25 minutes, 夢遊病者 have revealed to me more about than the nature of music than countless hours of listening prior, and although I may not be able to articulate it, as though it were something deep and instinctual, I feel its importance. If you have your doubts, open your mind and see for yourself.

Recommended tracks: Listen to it all! It’s only 25 minutes!
You may also like: Salqiu, Imperial Triumphant, A.M.E.N.
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | YouTube

Label: Sentient Ruin Laboratories – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

夢遊病者 is:
– PBV (fretted and fretless acoustic and electric guitars, vocals, dulcimer, harmonica, effects, field recording)
– NN (fretted and fretless basses, xylophone, prepared piano, vocals)
– KJM (drums, percussion, objects, polivoks, vocals)

Guests include:
– EB (saxophone)
– IK (ney)
– SH (qanun)
– WY (didgeridoo)
– DSV (nyckelharpa)
– EJ (harmonium, harp)
– SA (cello)
– AN (bassoon)
– DTM (vocals)
– The Plovdiv PVVP Choir (vocals)
– DW (spoken word)
– H/TS (spoken word)
– KK (translation to Polish)
– BB (German translation consult)
– DA (vocals)
– RR (vocals)
– MA (vocals)
– RA (vocals)

The post Review: 夢遊病者 – Skopofoboexoskelett appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Thrash metal, Progressive metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Voivod, Coroner, Vektor
Review by: Francesco
Country: USA
Release date: 20 October, 2022

Anarchÿ comes out swinging with their full-length debut Sentïence. There is little and less to find fault with in this release and Anarchÿ outdo themselves at every turn. With a blurring of genre boundaries and blending of musical influences, this album steps outside of the oft-rigid structures of thrash and metal, and coupled with lyrical themes touching upon the human experience and other enigmatic subjects, the whole package becomes an engrossing and mystical listen. 

One thing this album does really well is playing with its song lengths. The majority of Sentïence is contained in songs that vary in duration from the Napalm Death inspired, seconds-long “Ë”, to the more conventional 7-minute length of “The Greatest Curse” – and on the album, you’ll find various elements that include a quasi-baroque synthesized string piece, hand percussion, and a couple of short, instrumental shred tracks. But it is the 32-minute odyssey “The Spectrum of Human Emotion” that becomes the album’s highlight, comprising enough movements to make your head spin. The half-hour composition, a rock opera interpretation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, is chock-full of twisting thrash metal riffs that accompany the song’s unconventional structure as it detours effortlessly into off-genre adventures, evolving into soft, finger-picked acoustic guitar passages; dissonant jazz chord resolutions; a cappella harsh vocal phrases; and even a cleanly sung denouement perhaps evocative of Bowie.

If there’s a downside to a release that incorporates this many moving parts, it’s only that it may not leave much room for expansion and elaboration. Clocking in at the nearly 1-hour mark, more than half the album plays out in their one epic, the aforementioned “The Spectrum”. What experimentation is present in that track is largely absent from the rest of the album outside of a snippet here and there, as in the classical piano outro of “The Greatest Curse”, or the brief rasgueado intro to “Waylaid”, but the rest of the track listing manages well to retain its progressive metal fashion with less genre-bending whimsy, opting instead for complex riffing and composition.

Anarchÿ shift frequently on this release from the more irregular and avant-garde to the straight-forward fast-tempo shred with as much influence from Megadeth as Vektor. Intense, exciting, and eccentric, Sentïence packs about as much into a thrash album as humanly possible. This is a must for any fan of technical, progressive thrash metal.

Recommended tracks: The Spectrum of Human Emotion, D.E.S.T.R.O.Y., The Greatest Curse
You may also like: Toxik, VENUS, Vorbid
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | YouTube | Instagram | Metal-Archives page

Label: Independent

Anarchÿ is:
– Fionn McAuliffe (vocals)
– Reese Tiller (guitars. bass, keyboards)

The post Review: Anarchÿ – Sentïence appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Death / Doom (mixed vocals)
Review by: Will
Country: France
Release date: 11 April, 2022

“II”, French death doom metal band Epitaphe’s simply titled second album, is a triumph of composition and innovation. The band draws from their roots in the French Alps where they were surrounded by the sublime, awesome and often terrifying beauty and power of nature and channelled it into an album that is rooted in tradition and Romanticism while at the same time sounding thoroughly contemporary and innovative.

The band’s Romantic leanings are immediately obvious from the gorgeous album art, created by Petri Ala-Manus. The cover depicts a ferociously wild landscape, devoid of human impact or activity. On one side all is peaceful and calm, under a clear blue sky. To the other side of the frame, however, we see a knotted cluster of ominously dark green trees and, beyond them, the raging glow of a wildfire which fills the air with smoke. In Ala-Manus’ style we can see the influences of Freidrich in the gnarled, bare trees; Turner in the swirling colours and smoke and Böcklin in that ominously dark tangle of trees. The piece speaks to (and stands in awe of) nature’s unrelenting, almost samsaric process of growing, living, dying and regrowing. 

The art here is a beautiful reflection of Epitaphe’s music. In the painting, the asymmetry of the composition is unsettling to the viewer, as is the content. In witnessing a wildfire in the distance, the viewer must ask themselves which way the fire is travelling and how fast and hope that the wind doesn’t capriciously shift and send fiery death hurtling in the viewer’s direction. Epitaphe achieves a similar effect musically. Sudden shifts in tempo and volume on tracks such as “Celestial” and “Insignificant”, keep the listener off balance. Intricate acoustic tracks like “Sycamore” and melodic sections throughout the album offer moments of beauty, calm and reassurance. Crushing death/doom riffs on “Melancholia” speak to moments of pure fury, terror and brutality.

Epitaphe, like Ala-Manus, create their own musical landscape and invite the listener inside. It’s an immersive experience where we are drawn into the painting. We are asked to grow plant-like into a world of sublime natural beauty with gentle acoustic opening track “Sycamore” before experiencing thebeauty, wonder, terror, and fury dispersed throughout the next three 20-minute behemonths of tracks. Finally, we enter that universal constant of entropy with the mournful closing track “Merging Within Nothingness”. The world Epitaphe creates almost seems to ask us to consider nature in its own right. To step outside the perception and preconceptions of humanity. To consider the power of a wildfire from the perspective of a tree, or from the fire’s perspective itself.

Just as the album’s artwork harkens to a now age-old artistic movement, Epitaphe also have their music roots very firmly based in the traditions of death metal. There are echoes of Opeth (particularly Still Life) in the melodic sections of all the tracks as well as the beautiful acoustic pieces that comprise the opening and closing tracks of the song (“Sycamore” and “Merging Within Nothingness”). There are riffs that are pure, vintage death metal with nods to the old gods such as Celtic Frost which are deployed suddenly and without warning, often shattering the melodic and acoustic sections prior.

There are a lot of interesting points to this band which keeps their sound modern and even innovative: Epitaphe’s clever incorporation of Synth into many of their tracks, along with lots of reverb on the guitars gives some sections of the album a very post-metal feel, particularly evident on “Merging Within Nothingness” and especially at the end of “Insignificant” which has some real Toundra vibes.

The sound is beautifully mixed to create a very spacious, full sound. Even at times when the guitars use the characteristic Black Metal ‘hollow’ tone with ‘scooped mids’, the bass and synths offer balance and fill out the rest of the tone. The vocals are mixed low, making them yet another instrument in the band’s repertoire – whether they are clean and chant-like, or screams and guttural growls.

Finally, the album structure is pretty interesting with two short songs bookending three 20-minute monster tracks. This could be a nice stylistic nod to the cyclical manner of the natural world. It’s certainly something interesting to experiment with. Would it have been possible for Epitaphe to have broken some of these songs into shorter tracks? Probably. Is it more Prog if they stay as 20-minute sessions? Definitely.

Epitaphe has, in Pink Floyd fashion, created a deeply introspective album that asks us to consider our place in the universe, our relative smallness compared to both the power of nature and universal processes such as gravity, motion and entropy. It’s an album you simply have to press play and experience all in one go and there is little doubt that this beautifully constructed album will be a contender for album of the year.

Recommended tracks: Listen to all of it in order. Then listen again.
Recommended for fans of: Opeth, Celtic Frost, Bathory, Toundra
You may also like: Hands of Despair, The Fall of Every Season, Izthmi, Fen
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | YouTube | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Label: Gurgling Gore – Bandcamp | Website |

Epitaphe is:
– DRZ (bass, additional vocals)
– VLVR (drums)
– LBK (guitars, additional vocals)
– PBFK (vocals)

The post Review: Epitaphe – II appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Progressive Death/Black Metal (mixed vocals)
Review by: Zach (prelude by Sam)
Country: Canada
Release date: 3 December 2021

Hello there. Sam here. I will not be the one writing this review since I’m in a bit of burnout writing-wise, but this is a very special band for me so I will be writing a small prelude. The previous outing by this band – Well of the Disquieted – is not only my favorite album ever covered on this blog and part of my personal top 10 period, but was also a large factor in starting this blog in the first place. I once found it browsing the depths of Metal-Archives. There were a couple of other good releases, but it was Well which opened my eyes to the quality that could come out of the underground. Back then I did everything myself, and now three years later, one of our earliest readers now turned writer – Zach – is going to tell you all about their new one. 

Let’s go back a few years to 2018. A younger Zach was finishing up his first semester of college and putting far more effort into chipping away at the underground prog scene than his classes. Ever since he started following this brand spanking new blog, The Progressive Subway, he found so many cool new bands that he would’ve never found otherwise. But one stood head and shoulders above the rest. Hands of Despair with their whopping 1 hour and 16 minute Well of the Disquieted. Practically legendary in his eyes. I’d gladly put it among the likes of Blackwater Park and Ne Obliviscaris’ near perfect discography.

It would be negligent of me to not talk about Well before we talk about Crimson. That record is sheer sonic perfection. Not a second squandered, every riff hitting when it needs to and never over or under staying its welcome, a duet between death and black metal vocals, beautiful cleans, some of the greatest drumming I’ve ever heard, immaculate production, a 16 minute song that feels like 8. The audible, thick bass deserves its own sentence because of how out-fucking-standing it is. It was worthy of the solid 11/10 my friend and fellow reviewer Sam gave Well many moons ago, a review I credit with slingshotting me headfirst further into the underground.

But, with a record as perfect as Well, one can only think, “Now what?”. You’ve reached the apex as a band, surely you can’t follow up with something better? There’s so much to live up to following a record like Well. Either they pull a Colors II and it’s going to be on rotation for the next millennia, or they pull a The Work and I’m going to be dealing with crushing disappointment for the next six months. As excited as I was for Crimson, I couldn’t help but be cautiously optimistic. Surely, they can’t make something that good again, can they?

I don’t understand this band. I’m fully convinced they came from a different planet to put the best prog death/black on this Earth and leave no room for competition. Hands of Despair need to relax, take it easy for a little while. Let everyone else catch up and then maybe even the playing field a bit. Maybe a vacation in the Bahamas for a little while would do them good?

I can’t possibly fathom any other way they keep putting out consistently amazing material. Surely there must be some magic at play here. Something in the water in Quebec? It’s like they just pull amazing riffs out of thin air! ‘They Say Their Screams Can Still Be Heard’ is just about the best album opener I’ve heard since Cryptodira’s ‘Self-(Affect/Efface)’. It immediately sets the stage for a heavier, (somehow) darker album than Well, while still retaining the HoD identity we all know and love. The thundering, prominent bass is still there. The blast beats and distinctly Opethian riffs are still there. But it’s more refined than ever. Right off the bat, this record’s production is (again, somehow) better than Well. The guitars sound crisp and deliciously bassy, and Jeff Mott sounds scarier than ever. That “MARCH!” breakdown is guaranteed to make you lose your shit.

‘Drowned’ is the perfect counter to that first track. Frantic, fast, nicely encapsulated in 4 minutes on an album of almost all 8+ minute songs. But, even in these measly 4 minutes, HoD pulls out all stops as usual, complete with some beautiful keyboard and lead guitar work. ‘A Taste for Flesh’ is heavy enough to kill three elephants and ‘Aokigahara’ lives up to its name with sheer melancholic brutality dripping from every instrument.

And that leaves us with two songs left. ‘Hecatombe’ is this album’s ‘Doppelganger’, the immediate standout track upon first listen. The buildup starting from a little after the 5-minute mark, into the solo, into one of the heaviest sections I’ve ever heard is pure musical bliss. But ‘The Crimson Boughs’, the 12-minute epic that closes out this album, is what solidifies my score. A showcase of this band’s talent, and how much they’ve matured as songwriters over the years. This is an album that needs an incredible closer, just as the cherry on top to this five-star meal you’re treated to. Gloomy clean notes turn to chugs turn to Mott’s best screams of “CRIMSOOON, CRIMSOOON!”, which precedes the evilest sounding clean vocals section this band has ever produced.

I’m going to be perfectly honest with you. I spun this album for about three weeks straight. Every day, at least once a day. I practically ground this album into a fine powder and snorted the ever-loving shit out of it, trying to find a flaw. None of the songs could be a second shorter. None of the typical prog metal overindulgence. Nothing.

Here’s where I summarize my thoughts by telling you that this album is, once again, sonic perfection. Hopefully, you’ve just saved yourself some time and scrolled down to my score just to get to the album quicker. Can’t say I blame you. Hands of Despair, you should give yourselves a pat on the back. I’m no longer scared of you guys faltering, I’m just scared of how the next album is going to top this.

Recommended tracks: The whole thing
Recommended for fans of: Opeth, Ne Obliviscaris, In Mourning, Hath
You may also like:  Epiphanie, Dragonauta, IER, The Antichrist Imperium
Final verdict: 10/10

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

Label: Independent

Hands of Despair is:
– Maxime Côté (Guitars, Bass)
– Alexandre Primeau (Guitars)
– Jeff Mott (Vocals, Lyrics)
– Michel Bélanger (Drums)
– Samuel Arseneau-Roy, Tobias Netzell, Viky Boyer (Additional vocals)
– Raphael Weinroth-Browne (Cello)

The post Review: Hands of Despair – The Crimson Boughs (And Other Short Tales) appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: progressive rock/psychedelic rock (clean vocals)
Review by: Nick
Country: Norway
Release date: 1 October, 2021

I’ve had some crazy luck with my albums lately. I’ve had a number of killer releases in a few different genres, but none of them have struck me quite like Himmellegeme has. They’re a band out of Norway playing largely typical 2000s style prog rock. Think Porcupine Tree, Pineapple Thief, and so on.

This isn’t to say they don’t have their own sound because they very much do. From the first track alone it’s evident that this is something special. There’s the obvious Pink Floyd/Steven Wilson influences, but there’s just such a unique and personal touch that they bring to one of the most copied sounds in prog. They have a much dreamier atmosphere than their contemporaries do. Their guitars are laden with reverb. The vocals are ethereal and almost other worldly. The solos scream and soar above the other instruments in a way that makes it feel like the guitar itself is singing. The drums and further orchestration make the songs feel epic and almost cinematic. Even if I can barely understand what he’s saying, the songs conjure such vivid imagery by the songwriting alone.

Each song also brings in a taste of variety. From super psychedelic (“Heart Listening”) to borderline disco (“Blowing Raspberries”) to ambient acoustic (“Variola Vera”), you’ll never be bored. This is a much appreciated improvement from their debut which, while featuring the same jaw dropping cinematic sound, was very focused on the Floydian psychedelic style that I mentioned. It makes me almost proud to see the growth of a band from ripping off their inspirations to using them as a base for a completely unique sound. 

One of my favorites may be on the track “Let the Mother Burn”. There’s a solo almost two minutes in that’s Gilmour levels of beauty and the simple lines during the verses are so strong emotionally that it feels like each string plucked is personally jabbing your heart. Another favorite track is “Caligula” which starts with a rhythmically creative riff that wouldn’t feel out of place in a Leprous or Bent Knee track. The chorus though feels like it belongs in a Tame Impala or Arctic Monkeys song. I love the way they pick up the tempo for the chorus and solo, how the drums are just banging away. Big shout out for the changed pattern at the end. I love that sort of stuff especially when it’s done as well as it is here.

After having sat on this album for a couple weeks now and listened and relistened, I just have to say that this is easily the best straight progressive rock album that I’ve heard this year if not the 2020s so far (however young the decade may be). They are up there with their labelmates Airbag who have themselves been proven to be a psychedelic prog powerhouse. If want to hear what it would sound like for a legendary 70s prog band to have started their career in 2017, this is the band for you. Creative, original, and fun. I really hope it doesn’t take another four years for the next entry in their discography to emerge, but if it takes that long to make something of this quality then so be it.

Recommended tracks: Let the Mother Burn, Heart Listening, Caligula
Recommended for fans of: Pink Floyd, Porcupine Tree/Steven Wilson, post-Fish Marillion
You may also like: Meer, Airbag, Glass Kites
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook

Label: Karisma Records – Bandcamp | Website | Facebook

Himmellegeme is:
– Aleksander Vormestrand (guitar and vocals)
– Hein Alexander Olson (guitar)
– Lauritz Isaksen (keyboards)
– Erik Alfredsen (bass)
– Thord Nordli (drums)

The post Review: Himmellegeme – Variola Vera appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Traditional prog metal (mixed vocals)
Review by: Nick
Country: Australia
Release date: 9th April, 2021

Oh boy, where do I begin. The Stranger is an Australian five piece who just put out the follow up to their 2017 debut. Sophomore releases are hard and can often make or break a band, so I was interested to see if they could put out a suitable follow up to their already solid self titled. Well not only is the release suitable, but it absolutely knocked all of my expectations out of the park. Kaleidoscope is an album filled with awe-inspiring performances, deeply introspective lyrics, and a mountain of subtleties that could be picked apart for ages. Conceptually it focuses a lot on the anxieties we face throughout our daily lives. I’m not sure exactly how much of it was written during quarantine, but it’s a theme that is extremely relevant to the world we live in right now.

My first draft had initially expanded a lot not only on those themes, but exactly what each song was about and what I liked about them. I gave it a whole essay, but the final word count ended up being over 1600 so I felt it was best to essentially rewrite what I had to bring you the review you’re reading right now. I only bring this up to say that even if I doubled the length of this review, I wouldn’t be able to say everything I wanted to say. This album is dense and I tried to touch on as much as possible so without further ado, let’s just jump into it.

The best description I can come up with for this album is that it’s kind of like a melting pot of the best that modern prog metal has to offer. Similarities can be drawn to Leprous, Haken, Caligula’s Horse, among others, but to directly compare The Stranger to anyone would be doing them a disservice. They also have a knack for subtle variety. Instead of five second long jazz interludes or big dubstep breakdowns that you may get from other bands, you have songs like the funky “Siren” being followed a couple tracks later by a song like “The Devil You Don’t”, which could easily be compared to mid-2000s Silverstein thanks to the added metalcore elements on the track. Yet through it all they keep a strictly distinct sound that is easily picked out of a line. Natural versatility is what, in my opinion, separates good prog bands from amazing prog bands. It’s not a skill that many have, but The Stranger has it in spades.

Speaking of skills, let’s talk about the musicians here. Tom Frayne has one of the greatest metal voices I’ve ever heard. His tone can kind of be described as a mixture of Ross Jennings and Einar Solberg, a comparison best exemplified with his vocals on “The Gemini”. As for the instruments themselves, each player is among the best in the genre and not in a mindless way. It feels like each and every note was strongly considered to play a part in a larger picture. Nothing was wasted and nothing was added for the sake of showing off. Riffs are focused, solos are melodic even when in the brief moments of shredding, drum fills are tight, the bass comes to the front occasionally but will often act as support when needed. Nobody is overstepping anybody else and they all work together for the greater good.

Compositionally speaking, this album is fantastic. Prog-heads may be skeptical at an album that doesn’t have a single track breaking the seven-minute marker, but the amount of material that they pack into each and every song is unbelievable. It’s the definition of “all killer, no filler”. A point I made in my original draft about a million times is that almost every single song is so jam packed that they feel like ten+ minute tracks contained in half that amount. Take “Jester” for example. It’s just over six and a half minutes and yet has multiple climaxes and at least four distinct sections. This could have easily been expanded into a twenty minute epic if they wanted to, but the fact that they kept it tight and down to the essentials is an impressive display of restraint for one of the most self-indulgent sub-genres ever.

In all, this is an EXTREMELY solid release from one of the most promising up and comers I’ve heard in recent years. Their sense of melody and skill in songwriting helps them stand out musically, but it’s their chemistry and restraint that puts them leagues above their contemporaries. Definitely keep an eye on this group.

Recommended tracks: Jester, Siren, Kaleidoscope
Recommended for fans of: Haken, Leprous, Caligula’s Horse, Dream Theater
Final verdict: 10/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram

Label: Octane Records – Bandcamp | Website | Facebook

The Stranger is:
– Tom Frayne (vocals)
– Daniel O’Brien (drums)
– Linc Morse (bass)
– Andrew Taylor (guitar)
– Kalen Austin (guitar)

The post Review: The Stranger – Kaleidoscope appeared first on The Progressive Subway.