Brighton’s Plaintoid are black with their sophomore album, Flare, two years after their debut. The band maintained their lush, jazzy air while also imbuing their sound with a bit more muscle. On repeated listens of Terrapath, at times I do wish the band had a bit more contrast in their sound. Here, they’ve successfully added a bit more while also maintaining their unique character.
Holotropic is a Slovak extreme metal five-piece that skillfully weaves a base of technical death metal with elements from further afield, ranging from classic prog to ambient to Middle Eastern folk. Individual is their second release, and this short-but-mighty album demonstrates impressive breadth and depth of skill.
Has it really been ten years since the last time Corima released a record? Not quite, actually, but close enough; nine years and three months is a massive gap for any band that isn’t Tool. Their fourth release overall and their third on Soleil Zeuhl, Hunab Ku, continues with the naming conventions of their previous two releases.
Hunab Ku is a Yucatec Maya term meaning “The One God.” Corima’s previous album, 2016’s Amaterasu, was named after the chief deity in the Shinto pantheon, and their 2012 album, Quetzalcoatl, took its name from a prominent Aztec deity. It should be noted that “Hunab Ku” is a colonial-era term used primarily to refer to the Christian God, and it later found use in New Age beliefs. Some have tried to use this term to assert the existence of a precolonial Maya monotheism, but as far as I can tell, this is not a well-supported historical position. I recommend reading the Wikipedia article I linked. (I’m hardly an expert on the Maya, but I’d love to learn more. Should there be any Mayanists in my audience, drop your book recommendations in the comments!)
Thank you for indulging me in the anthropological aside; I did study to be an archaeologist, so I love stuff like this.
The music on Hunab Ku is an exhilarating brand of zeuhl. The band’s Magmatic influences are plainly worn on their sleeves, but they infuse a lot more crunch and grit into their music. Violins and saxophones bring some tonal distinctiveness, and everything here flows together smoothly as one continuous composition.
I don’t know what keeps drawing progressive and technical thrash metal bands to outer space, but it seems to be working. Vektor, Droid, Voivod, Obliveon, and plenty of others have plumbed the depths of the night sky for inspiration, and Cryptic Shift continues in this proud tradition. Their 2020 debut, Visitations from Enceladus, is a phenomenal work, with the 25-minute “Moonbelt Immolator” being one of the greatest metal epics of this century.
Their newest release, Overspace & Supertime, is a monumental work, clocking in at nearly 80 minutes over just five songs. Their brand of cosmic, death-tinged thrash is a powerful canvas for their sci-fi storytelling.
Fleshvessel’s 2023 debut was an incredible statement in modern progressive metal. This Chicagoan act wove together black metal, jazz, modern classical, and experimental music to create a striking, singular record. This ambition (and tendency toward prolix album titles) continues on their sophomore release, Obstinacy: Sisyphean Dreams Unfolded.
Mirkwood Spiders is a Swiss band that continues in the proud tradition of bands like King Gizzard and (sometimes) Stoned Jesus. Fuzz-drenched, occasionally-bluesy psychedelia swirls and storms as this four-piece weaves their magic.
Yurt is a band I’ve been following for a while, and I have featured them on this site once before. They’re an experimental rock band based out of Dublin, and they’ve always got something exciting up their sleeves. Their music draws inspiration from various strains of metal, punk, psychedelia, and avant-garde styles of music. My personal favorite of theirs is III – Molluskkepok, but their new record, VI – Rippling Mirrors of the Other, is a solid addition to their discography.
Gros Coeur is a band out of Belgium, and Vague Scélérate (Eng.: Rogue Wave) is their sophomore release. Belgium isn’t exactly some hotbed of prog; to my recollection, Neptunian Maximalism is the only Belgian band I’ve featured on here before. And even the other Belgian bands in my library are kind of…marginal. Nessie, Phylter, and Womega are hardly essential acts; and I just don’t like Univers Zero that much.
Vague Scélérate, however, is a great record. It’s rather diverse with a wonderful, distinctive sound.
Stinkbug is a prime example of why I like going to live music. I discovered them about five days ago (at time of writing) when I went to see Dust Mice perform. (Dust Mice is a Seattle-based space rock band very heavily influenced by Hawkwind, and I only discovered them when I went to go see Everything Oscillating play. And I only know about Everything Oscillating because they’re a Moon Letters side project, whom I first discovered opening for Pinkish Black. Support local live music, folks!) Stinkbug was the second band on the bill, and I was absolutely blown away.
Their sound is definitely rooted in a lot of classic progressive rock, and all four members have experience in jazz. Accordingly, there is a ton of speedy, technical playing and unconventional songwriting on their debut record, Between Timid and Timbuktu. They also add in heavier music, especially thrash metal and punk, but the sound is overall rather sunny and bright.
As I’ve noted before, progressive thrash is currently one of the less-popular varieties of metal out there. A few bands still carry the torch (like Vektor and Anarchÿ), but black, death, and sludge bands are much more likely to fold progressive elements into their music. For a while in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, prog-thrash was relatively more vibrant. Bands like Dark Angel, Toxik, Voivod, Watchtower, and even Metallica wrote long, multiparted compositions and demonstrated some major artistic ambitions.
One of those classic early prog-thrash bands was the Swiss trio Coroner. Their songs were usually relatively to-the-point, only rarely going over six minutes. But their composition was some of the most varied and intellectual in all of thrash metal. Jazz, classical, and avant-garde elements often found their way into the band’s riffs. The last time Coroner put out an album was their self-titled quasi-compilation album from 1995. They broke up and went on an extended hiatus. I wasn’t even aware they’d reunited!
The Elite Extremophile 