Band: beauty is the end | Album: White Knuckle Dress | Genre: Art rock, Progressive pop | Bandcamp
Ever wonder what Spock’s Beard might sound like if they were a lightly-folky art-pop band? Well, I think beauty is the end is a pretty good approximation of that idea. Their songs are long and complexly-structured, with some flashy and emotive instrumentalism. Tones are mostly bright, but they also ably deploy tense, minor-key moments well. I really enjoy how prominent violin is throughout the record, and melodies are pretty consistently catchy. Certain passages are a bit cheesier than I’d normally go for, but this record is an overall success. The 10-minute “Domesticated” is a definite highlight.
Score: 76/100
Band: Brass Camel | Album: Brass Camel | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp
Brass Camel’s third album is a peppy, punchy, enthusiastic, and unashamedly retro-sounding record. They lean heavily into classic rock, hard rock, and glam rock tropes and imbue it with Yes-like technical flashiness. They remind me a lot of acts like (early) Kansas or some of Queen’s more ambitious moments. The sound is maximal and bright, and they effortlessly weave catchy pop melodies alongside complex instrumental displays. I wouldn’t call this an essential release, but it’s a lot of fun, and it’s an example of how to do proggy retro-rock well.
Score: 75/100
Artist: Me El-Ma | Album: Forward Owner | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp
The newest solo album from Israeli drummer and composer Me El-Ma demonstrates a lot of ambition and some stellar performances. The music is complex and diverse, drawing from classic prog, avant-garde influences, folk, classical, and Levantine music. Unfortunately, this can frequently result in a lot of songs coming off as muddled, unfocused, and complicated for complication’s sake. The vocals are also strikingly similar to those of Jon Anderson, and the credit being given to “VIRJA” makes me think they may be artificially-generated. (I’m guessing VIRJA stands for something like Virtual Intelligent Recreation of Jon Anderson.) And I wonder if Jon Anderson gave his okay for his voice to be used like this. (I’m also fairly confident that the guitars are programmed, but I have no real issue with that, as El-Ma says all this was written by him.)
Score: 53/100
Band: Korbo | Album: Amnésiste | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp
This French quartet plays an energetic, relatively heavy variety of progressive rock. Their sound is impactful and powerful, drawing from classic hard rock, punk, and metal. Occasional jazzy licks serve as nice points of contrast. “Chaînes” sees the band dip into some mild doom and sludge flavors, though parts of this particular cut can feel a bit dragged-out. In general, though, despite the long runtimes, most of the songs feel well-structured.
Score: 74/100
Band: Osees | Album: Cara Maluco EP | Genre: Krautrock, Psychedelic rock | Bandcamp
Ever-prolific psych-punks Osees are back with a new EP of wiry psychedelia. Elements of punk, post-punk, and noise rock are prominent here. This is Osees at a moment when they’ve shifted their focus back to guitar-based music, in contrast to their frequent synth excursions. The sprawling title track is energetic and fun, if a bit unfocused, and I love the twangy tones of “Joro”. “Synaptic Static” is bright and sunny, but it feels a little underbaked. The closing “Joy in Oblivion” is the weirdest and wildest cut on this release, despite clocking in at under two minutes, and it’s probably my favorite here.
Score: 73/100
Band: Tortue | Album: Mëändyou | Genre: Zeuhl, Progressive electronic | Bandcamp
This one-man act from St. Louis presents a completely unexpected but deeply enjoyable vision for zeuhl on this album. The album title is taken from The Turtles’ “Happy Together”, vocal samples from which play a prominent role on this album. In addition to Magmatic repetition and jazzy instrumental tones, high-energy electronica (which I think might be classifiable as drum-and-bass; I’m not 100%, as I’m hardly an expert) keeps this sonic experiment zipping along. This 40-minute, four-part suite has moments of both great intensity with maximal arrangements and more restrained passages that often cultivate dread. My one real gripe about Mëändyou is its length. There are a lot of cool ideas, but parts of this record can feel a bit on the needlessly-drawn-out side of things, even by the standards of a repetition-loving genre like zeuhl.
Score: 70/100
The Elite Extremophile 