Album Review: Le Grand Sbam – Janus

Band: Le Grand Sbam | Album: Janus | Genre: Zeuhl, Avant-prog | Year: 2026

From: Lyon, France | Label: Dur et Doux

For fans of: Magma, PoiL, Frank Zappa

Le Grand Sbam is a band I’ve been aware of since their founding. I’ve listened to their previous two albums, but neither one really quite clicked with me. I could tell there were a lot of elements I liked. This is a band I should like, but it just didn’t quite coalesce.

I went into Janus, their third full-length release, with my usual hopefulness for a good experience. There have been no major changes to their sound, but something just hit a bit different this time, and I wound up really enjoying it.

This work is apparently an excerpt of a “Chthulu opera”–also titled Janus–written by Antoine Arnera, keyboardist for both this band and PoiL. It flows together as one massive, unified piece, and it shows incredible vision and ambition. This opera–about environmentalism, feminism, and flatulence–is paired with music that is simultaneously serious, complex, and whimsical.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Deathspiral of Inherited Suffering / Elysian Blaze / Panegyrist / Maerund – Sunthema

Bands: Deathspiral of Inherited Suffering, Elysian Blaze, Panegyrist, Maerund | Album: Sunthema | Genre: Black metal, Progressive metal, Post-metal | Year: 2026

From: Memphis, USA; Adelaide, Australia; Chicago, USA; Tallinn, Estonia | Label: Rubeus Obex (USA); I, Voidhanger (Europe)

For fans of: Cormorant, Enslaved, Batushka

Bandcamp

I first found out about this record through Rate Your Music’s handy “Upcoming Releases” feature. It was there that I saw Panegyrist had their first new music since 2018 coming out! Their lone LP, Hierurgy, is a stunning, unique release. It blends avant-garde black metal with liturgical music and lyrics so dense and obscure that I feel like I need a theology degree to understand them.

Sunthema, the four-way split LP with Panegyrist and three other acts, continues on that trend. (Side note: Personally, I would have transliterated the Greek “συνθεμα” as “synthema,” but to each their own. The word is more often found in its plural form, synthemata, and it refers to any signs, symbols, or material tokens, especially those associated with certain rituals. Esoteric terms and ideas are prominent on this record.) All four acts here weave their brands of forward-thinking metal with Christian mysticism to make something powerful and enthralling.

Continue reading →

Album Review: A Forest of Stars – Stack Overflow in Corpse Pile Interface

Band: A Forest of Stars | Album: Stack Overflow in Corpse Pile Interface | Genre: Progressive metal, Post-metal | Year: 2026

From: Manchester, UK | Label: Prophecy

For fans of: Arcturus, Ashenspire, Primordial

Bandcamp

A Forest of Stars has been around for nearly 20 years, but this record is my first exposure to them. It is their first release in eight years, so, in my defense, they have been quiet lately. Stack Overflow in Corpse Pile Interface is their sixth full-length release, and it’s full of theatrical, abstract, and highly emotive music that draws from classic prog, folk metal, folk, and avant-garde music. It’s a demanding record: the six songs range between nine and 17 minutes in length, and all the compositions are dense as hell. But it’s well worth your time and attention.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Elder – Through Zero

Band: Elder | Album: Through Zero | Genre: Progressive rock, Heavy psych | Year: 2026

From: Berlin, Germany | Label: Blues Funeral

Bandcamp

I’ve found Elder’s work to be a bit inconsistent over their last few releases. After the stellar Lore and Reflections of a Floating World, Omens was spotty and failed to deliver on the band’s promise of change. The Gold and Silver Sessions were an interesting (if unnecessary) foray into krautrock. ELDOVAR was a neat collaboration album; and while I liked Innate Passage, it’s not a record I’ve found myself returning to. Last year’s EP was also a bit of a split decision from me, with one good-but-not-exactly-memorable song and one fantastic one.

Across the span of these last few releases, I’ve sensed that Elder has had a desire to more fully embrace progressive rock, but they’ve had a hard time escaping some of the songwriting tricks and patterns they’ve long utilized.

Through Zero, Elder’s seventh (or eighth or ninth, depending on how one counts splits/collaborations) full-length album, is their greatest success since 2017’s Reflections. On this record, they’ve fully embraced progressive rock while also maintaining their unique voice. Synthesizers and other keyboards are integrated more fully here than anywhere else in their discography. Their classic heavy psych stylings are still prominent and an integral part of their music, but they’re supported by a greater diversity of sounds. Literal textures and tones, as well as melodies and songwriting styles, are more varied on this record than they’ve been before.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Yes – Aurora

Band: Yes | Album: Aurora | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2026

From: London, UK | Label: InsideOut Music

Bandcamp

Look, it’s a new Yes album. We all know who Yes are. We know what we’re signing up for. I had low expectations, despite Mirror to the Sky being pretty decent overall. Let’s just get to it.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Crown Lands – Apocalypse

Band: Crown Lands: Album: Apocalypse | Genre: PRogressive rock, Hard rock | Year: 2026

From: Toronto, Canada | Label: InsideOut Music

For fans of: Rush, Led Zeppelin

Bandcamp

Crown Lands is a Toronto-based duo with a sound firmly rooted in mid-70s hard rock and prog rock. Unlike a number of other retro-focused bands I’ve covered here, this pair do a great job at keeping those sounds fresh and lively. Depending on how you want to classify prior releases, Apocalypse is their second, third, or fourth full-length release.

Continue reading →

Album Review: The Magpie Arc – Gil Brenton

Band: The Magpie Arc | Album: Gil Brenton | Genre: Progressive rock, British folk | Year: 2025

From: UK | Label: Independent

For fans of: Strawbs, Comus, Jethro Tull, Steeleye Span

Bandcamp

The Magpie Arc is a British quartet that spins traditional folk songs of the British Isles into hard-hitting, proggy folk rock, and Gil Brenton is their second full-length album. Where many bands I describe as folk rock are primarily rock acts with some folk influences, this band is the inverse. Their vocal style and instrumentalism belie a deep love of British folk music, and that helps give their music a character that stands out from other acts in a similar space.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Tusmørke – Balderdom

Band: Tusmørke | Album: Balderdom | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2026

From: Oslo, Norway | Label: Karisma

For fans of: Jordsjø, Caravan, Yes, Jethro Tull

Bandcamp

Apparently Tusmørke put out an album last year that I missed, but they’re prolific enough, there’s never that long a gap without them on this site. Balderdom (Baldness) follows in a template similar to Dawn of Oberon, in that it consists of a handful of shorter songs and a side-long epic. Tusmørke’s unique Norse-folk-prog is on proud display here, and this is another strong entry in their catalog.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Neurosis – An Undying Love for a Burning World

Band: Neurosis | Album: An Undying Love for a Burning World | Genre: Post-metal | Year: 2026

From: Oakland, USA | Label: Neurot

Bandcamp

I will be totally honest. Neurosis is one of those bands that I know has been massively influential but which I’m simply not that familiar with. I’ve listened to Through Silver in Blood, and that is a fantastic record. I also know they’re considered one of the primary progenitors of post-metal as a distinct genre, along with Isis, whose former vocalist and bassist has joined the band. (I have run across folks trying to insist that post-metal and atmospheric sludge metal (another term frequently used to describe Neurosis’s work) as being distinct. There may be a technical argument to be made there, insofar as there is non-sludgy post-metal, but I don’t think there’s any atmospheric sludge I’ve heard I couldn’t also describe as post-metal.) That is to say, I went into this record blind.

An Undying Love for a Burning World is Neurosis’s 13th full-length release and their first in a decade. I’d heard it getting some positive buzz, so I decided to give it a spin. And boy, am I happy I did!

Continue reading →

Album Review: Witch Ripper – Through the Hourglass

Band: Witch Ripper | Album: Through the Hourglass | Genre: Sludge metal, Progressive metal | Year: 2026

From: Seattle, USA | Label: Magnetic Eye Records

For fans of: Mastodon, Baroness, Coheed & Cambria

Bandcamp

Witch Ripper is one of my favorite local acts, and they’re always near the top of my list of bands to recommend. Through the Hourglass is this quartet’s third full-length release, and it is a direct sequel to their last release, 2023’s The Flight after the Fall. The shared story of these records is obvious, even without looking at the lyrics, with the music here bearing clear throughlines from TFATF.

My first exposure to this record was at Witch Ripper’s album release show earlier this month. They played it in its entirety, and it was a killer performance. On subsequent listens, the album has grown on me even more.

Continue reading →