Album Review: Leprous – Melodies of Atonement

Band: Leprous | Album: Melodies of Atonement | Genre: Art rock | Year: 2024

From: Notodden, Norway | Label: InsideOut Music

Leprous have returned three years after their last release. I’ve been pretty blunt in my disappointment with Aphelion, Pitfalls, and Malina. (Malina came out before I started this site, but I’ve mentioned it.) They went from being an inventive, dynamic metal act with some creative songwriting to a rather bland art-rock act that leaned way too heavily on sudden quiet-loud contrasts. Bilateral is one of my favorite albums of all time, so the last decade or so has been rather disappointing.

Vocalist and primary songwriter Einar Solberg said he wanted to strip away the orchestral elements that have been prominent on their last few records for this release, and that experiment largely pays dividends. Melodies of Atonement is Leprous’s best album since The Congregation, though I wouldn’t quite call this “good” as a whole. They’re on the right path, however!

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Album Review: Ætheria Conscientia – The Blossoming

Band: Ætheria Conscientia | Album: The Blossoming | Genre: Progressive metal, Atmospheric black metal | Year: 2024

From: Nantes, France | Label: Frozen Records

For fans of: ‘70s King Crimson, Krallice, Mare Cognitum

Bandcamp

I always like it when bands work in non-conventional rock instruments to their music. Even if it’s just a one-off solo in one song, that sort of timbral variation can go a long way in making a band’s music that much more enjoyable. What I like even more is when a band can fully integrate a non-typical rock instrument into their music in a key way, like Kansas’s violin, or Titus Groan’s many wind and reed instruments.

Ætheria Conscientia is a band that does an excellent job of integrating saxophone into their music. Their 2021 release, Corrupted Pillars of Vanity, saw them weaving saxes into every nook and cranny of their compositions. That warm, reedy buzziness complemented the chug and crunch of their guitars, while also underscoring their jazz influences. Saxophone remains prominent on The Blossoming, their new release; it is an integral part of their overall sound.

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Album Review: Ulcerate – Cutting the Throat of God

Band: Ulcerate | Album: Cutting the Throat of God | Genre: Death metal, Progressive metal | Year: 2024

From: Auckland, New Zealand | Label: Debemur Morti

For fans of: Gorguts, Artificial Brain, Blood Incantation

Bandcamp

Barely a month ago, I commented on how infrequently New Zealand shows up on this site. (Indeed, that was the first time I had featured any Kiwis here in three-and-a-half years.) And now here I am, covering (what is most likely) that country’s most respected metal band!

I covered Ulcerate’s last album, 2020’s Stare into Death and Be Still, and I liked it. I didn’t revere it quite as much as many others, but it’s a solid album overall. My thoughts on it haven’t moved much since my original review. This trio’s new release though, Cutting the Throat of God, takes the thundering, intelligent death metal of their last album and further refines it into something spectacular.

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Album Review: Hail Spirit Noir – Fossil Gardens

Band: Hail Spirit Noir | Album: Fossil Gardens | Genre: Psychedelic black metal | Year: 2024

From: Thessaloniki, Greece | Label: Agonia Records

For fans of: Sigh, Riverside, Thy Catafalque

Bandcamp

Hail Spirit Noir is a Greek experimental metal act hailing from the Macedonian city of Thessaloniki. I have briefly touched on Greece’s relative influence within the metal scene before, and I have covered Hail Spirit Noir once before, as well. HSN is one of my favorite contemporary metal bands, and they are responsible for two of my favorite albums of the 2010s: their 2012 debut, Pneuma, and their 2016 third album, Mayhem in Blue. 2020’s Eden in Reverse was a solid release, too, though their last album–2021’s Mannequins–was a weird, one-off synthwave project. And I’m really not a fan of synthwave.

Fossil Gardens, the band’s sixth full-length release, sees HSN get back to their core sound. I once saw someone describe their music as “blackened psychedelic folk,” and while I don’t necessarily agree with that description, they were admittedly onto something. This band’s sound is undoubtedly and undeniably metallic, but influences from psychedelic rock pervade their music more than any metal band this side of Sigh.

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Album Review: Ulls – Cripta nau

Band: Ulls | Album: Cripta nau | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2024

From: Barcelona, Spain | Label: Independent

For fans of: Pink Floyd, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, The Mars Volta

Bandcamp

One of my primary motivations for starting this site was highlighting small-time bands that are easy to overlook. One such act is Ulls. Ulls (Catalan for “eyes”) is a one-man project based out of Barcelona that plays a somewhat heavy, eerie, organ-fueled variety of prog. The music often leans heavily on atmosphere, evoking certain acts who have scored films, like Goblin or early Pink Floyd.

Their 2019 LP, Anoia s’apodera (“Boredom sets in”) was one of my favorites of that year. However, it was released in December 2019, and I didn’t discover it until a few months into 2020. Thus, all it got on this site was a brief Odds & Ends entry. That is a big reason why my year-end best-of lists now cover December-to-November. When I got the alert from the Bandcamp app that Ulls was releasing a new record, titled Cripta nau (“Ship crypt”), I was quick to pre-order it.

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Album Review: Half Empty Glasshouse – The Exit Is Over There!

Band: Half Empty Glasshouse | Album: The Exit Is Over There! | Genre: Avant-prog | Year: 2024

From: Auckland, New Zealand | Label: Uncharted Sounds

For fans of: black midi, Arcturus, 5uu’s

Bandcamp

I swear I cover more than just avant-prog. Please ignore the fact that this is the fourth consecutive full-length review I’ve posted of an avant-prog act. 2024 is shaping up to be kind of a slow year in most of the other pico-genres I cover, but the crazy stuff is having a decent one. But you know what I don’t cover that often? New Zealanders!

Half Empty Glasshouse is a New Zealandic avant-prog and experimental metal band that takes the classical influences of bands like Eunuchs and integrates it even more. The Exit Is Over There! is their second full-length release, and it’s a concept album about public backlash to experimental music throughout history. The twisted, disgusted and disgusting faces on the album’s cover are a perfect complement to this theme.

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Album Review: Perfect – Monkey Jockey Man and the Safari Tick Sugar

Band: Perfect | Album: Monkey Jockey Man and the Safari Tick Sugar | Genre: Avant-prog | Year: 2024

From: Akron, USA | Label: Independent

For fans of: black midi, The Mars Volta, Yes

Bandcamp

People make fun of Ohio a lot (especially online), but it’s not without its contributions. They gave us Devo and, uh, chili on spaghetti and…multiple mediocre presidents. But Perfect! Now there’s something Ohio can hold its head high about! Perfect is an Akron-based quintet that plays a daring, experimental variety of jazz-inflected rock. Monkey Jockey Man and the Safari Tick Sugar is their sophomore album. Since their debut, they’ve ditched brass instruments in favor of some intriguing noise influences, and the results are quite strong.

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Album Review: Eunuchs – Harbour Century

Band: Eunuchs | Album: Harbour Century | Genre: Avant-prog | Year: 2024

From: Sydney, Australia | Label: Independent

For fans of: black midi, Squid, Frank Zappa

Bandcamp

Eunuchs are an Australian quartet who employ a whole host of assisting musicians to construct dense, symphonic soundscapes. At the heart of things, they are a rock band, but traditional rock instrumentation is often minimized or buried beneath dense layers of strings, woodwinds, and reeds. Bubbling up amidst all that is a chaotic, angry energy that provides for unique contrasting effects.

In many ways, these Aussies remind me of black midi, the foremost band in the current avant-prog scene (insofar as there even is such a scene). These guys lean even harder into non-traditional instrumentation, though. Large swathes of this album push the very definition of “rock.”

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Album Review: Present – This Is NOT the End

Band: Present | Album: This Is NOT the End | Genre: Avant-prog, RIO | Year: 2024

From: Brussels, Belgium | Label: Cuneiform Records

For fans of: Univers Zero, 5uu’s, Magma

Bandcamp

Rock in Opposition (usually shortened to RIO) is a movement I’ve referred to a few times, but I’ve never really delved into it too deeply. Narrowly speaking, it refers to a specific group of five (initially, later expanded to eight) experimental rock bands who toured and played together in 1978 and 1979. These oddball bands (including Univers Zero, Henry Cow, and Samla Mammas Manna) were opposed to the music industry’s “refusal” to promote them. This stance, to me, comes off as a bit petty and self-centered. These bands played weird, aggressively un-commercial music. At a certain point, one needs to be realistic about their target audience. A major label isn’t going to promote an album like Hérésie. More broadly speaking, though, RIO now refers to the bands which are stylistically descended from these initial bands. I’ve used that label to refer to acts like PoiL, Cratophane, and Ahleuchatistas.

Though not a member of the eight “official” RIO bands, Present appeared not long after. It was founded in 1979 by Roger Trigaux, a founding member of Univers Zero, which is a band I respect more than I enjoy (and that sentiment can largely be applied to the original RIO movement as a whole). They’re often minimal and moody and influenced by chamber music. I can appreciate it on a certain artistic level, but I don’t really like it that much.

This Is NOT the End was my first exposure to Present, and I like it a lot. It has a lot less of the chamber music-influenced stuff I associate with Univers Zero, but it has plenty of exciting, experimental, and overall-weird passages. This release is the band’s first since 2009, but it is, despite its title, the band’s final release. Trigaux, the band’s driving force, passed away in March of 2021, in the midst of recording.

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Album Review: Chief Bromden – In/tense Logic

Band: Chief Bromden | Album: In/tense Logic | Genre: Art rock, Post-punk | Year: 2024

From: Czechia | Label: Full Moon Forum

For fans of: Atsuko Chiba, The Mars Volta, RX Bandits

Bandcamp

Chief Bromden is a Czech post-punk act that integrates a lot of progressive rock into their music. They’ve got inventive, unorthodox structures, and their instrumental passages are exciting and masterfully played. I liked their debut album Slunovrat a lot, so I was excited to hear their follow-up. In/tense Logic comes about four years after their debut (and two years after their Noise Forever EP, which I simply just never got around to).

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