Best of 2025: Top 50 Prog Albums Part 1: 50-26

Welcome to The Elite Extremophile’s Top Prog Albums of 2025! As usual, this is a two-part list of 50 total entries. Part two is here.

As a reminder, the music on this list spans December 2024 through November 2025. Music from December 2025 will be on the 2026 list. I’m sure there is plenty of good music I missed, but when it comes to the reviewing, this is a one-man operation. (My proofreaders/editors, Kelci and Dan, have been very helpful, as always.) There are also certain trends and styles I simply don’t like very much.

2025 was a fantastic year for progressive rock and related genres. I was spoiled for choice with this list, and this may be the overall-strongest batch of recommendations I’ve given to date.

Continue reading →

Album Review: Fer de Lance – Fires on the Mountainside

Band: Fer de Lance | Album: Fires on the Mountainside | Genre: Progressive metal, Power metal | Year: 2025

From: Chicago, USA | Label: Cruz del Sur Music

For fans of: Iron Maiden, Dream Theater, Wytch Hazel, Rainbow

Bandcamp

Power metal and classic heavy metal are styles of music that show up on my site every now and then, but never with a ton of frequency. Fer de Lance is a Chicagoan quartet that uses those genres as the basis for some very big, very epic-sounding metal. They pull in influences from farther afield, too, including various veins of folk music and black metal.

Continue reading →

Odds & Ends: December 30, 2024

Band: Anarchÿ | Album: Xenötech and the Cosmic Anarchÿ | Genre: Progressive thrash metal | Bandcamp

Anarchÿ’s third full-length release sees this St. Louis-based thrash duo both stay in their usual niche and also push some sonic boundaries. Verbose sci-fi storytelling, blazing guitar lines, and more umlauts than any reasonable person would ever use all abound here. Synth pads do a great job at adding richness and lushness to the music, and the occasional acoustic interlude helps to keep this record varied and interesting. There is even a splash of sitar for some truly unexpected sonic variance.

Score: 83/100

Band: Avneya | Album: Road to I | Genre: Progressive death metal | Bandcamp

Avneya’s debut record is a great example of progressive death metal. There’s a strong focus on contrasts between delicate, melodic passages and moments of crushing heaviness. Dashes of strings here and there add some nice contrast, and folk motifs from the band’s native Israel also add to this record’s distinctiveness.

Score: 79/100

Continue reading →

Odds & Ends: May 16, 2022

Band: Cró! | Album:Buah! | Genre: Progressive rock, Psychedelic rock | Bandcamp

On such a short album, this Spanish quartet manages to cover a huge amount of territory. The title track strongly reminds me of classic Italian acts like PFM or BDMS, and “Coia” is slow-moving and creepy. Other songs touch on alt-rock, funk, and jazzy art-rock. It’s a wonderfully diverse release, and all those different styles are played excellently.

Score: 88/100

Band: Envy of None | Album: Envy of None | Genre: Post-rock | Bandcamp

Envy of None is Alex Lifeson’s new band, and it sounds absolutely nothing like Rush. I went in expecting that, based off the lead single. I knew it was going to be a lot spacier, more atmospheric, and mellower. And while there are a few good songs on the album (“Look Inside”, “Spy House”, “Dog’s Life”), most of this album is a bore. It reminds me of trip-hop–a genre I’m really not crazy about–but without much creativity. Most songs are slow and relatively unvaried. This might be good background music, but I was hoping for dynamism.

Score: 52/100

Continue reading →

Odds & Ends: October 4, 2021

Band: Ars de Er | Album:Other Side | Genre: Progressive rock, Avant-prog | Bandcamp

Ars de Er’s last album leaned heavily into avant-prog and RIO, but Other Side is a little more grounded in “traditional” prog. There are especially strong echoes of Porcupine Tree’s heavier stuff, like Fear of a Blank Planet. This album still has plenty of influences from jazz and modern classical music, which makes the overall palette well-balanced and diverse.

Score: 74/100

Band: Bantamweight | Album: Sounds + Haptics | Genre: Experimental rock | Bandcamp

This is a loud, unsubtle record. The mixture of metal, rock, and electronic elements are utilized to pummel the listener. It’s an intense listen, so in this case the album’s short runtime (only 29 minutes) is a virtue. A runtime of more than 30 minutes would have run the risk of becoming too exhausting. Beyond the intensity, the compositions are creative and full of great textural contrasts. The vocals are powerful and impassioned, and the array of synth tones are able to conjure a wide ray of moods and emotions.

Score: 80/100

Continue reading →

Odds & Ends – August 2, 2021

Band: Albion | Album:Pryderi | Genre: Progressive metal, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Albion is the latest in a long line of acts that take the very English genre of progressive rock and make it sound even more English, with a significant injection of folk. Think of bands like (mid-to-late ‘70s) Jethro Tull and Gryphon. This quartet is quite a bit heavier and more bombastic than any of that first wave of prog-folk-rock acts. There are some neat ideas on this EP, but there’s also just a lot of stuff that sounds like it’s been done before. A lot of this is power metal-based, and I will admit, that’s not my favorite metal subgenre. If you’re into some of the more fun-time, corny folk metal acts out there, you might enjoy this.

Score: 62/100

Band: The Dark Monarchy | Album: All Roads Lead to Rome | Genre: Progressive metal, Power metal | Bandcamp

This album has flashes of brilliance, but it never is able to maintain it for too long. The cheese factor on this album is incredibly high, and most of the songs run together into an unidentifiable mush. The opening track, “I Am Lucifer”, is especially strong, but there isn’t enough here to have this record go on for 45 minutes.

Score: 60/100

Continue reading →

Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019, Part 2: 25-1

Welcome back to TheEliteExtremophile’s Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019. If you missed Part 1, covering entries 50-26, you can read it here. Continue reading “Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019, Part 2: 25-1” →

Odds & Ends – December 2, 2019

Band: Legendry | Album: The Wizard and the Tower Keep | Genre: Power metal, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

For all the hackneyed, cliché, sword-and-sorcery heavy metal imagery Pittsburgh’s Legendry evoke in their artwork and lyrics, the music is ambitious and inventive while remaining surprisingly accessible. They walk a fine line straddling traditional metal, power metal, and progressive rock with their speedy riffs, dramatic vocals, and soaring solos. The Hammond organ adds a distinct character that helps Legendry stand out from other traditional metal acts.

Score: 84/100 Continue reading “Odds & Ends – December 2, 2019” →

Album Review: Tanagra – Meridiem

tanagra

Band: Tanagra | Album: Meridiem | Genre: Progressive Metal, Power Metal | Year: 2019

From: Portland, (Oregon,) USA | Label: Independent

For Fans of: Symphony X, Dream Theater

Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon | Apple Music

I often cite the vague concept of “cheesiness” as a fault in a lot of modern progressive rock and metal. Much like actual cheese, I enjoy it in limited amounts, but if I down a wheel of brie or a block of Cheddar, I’ll probably feel at least a little sick. Certain subgenres abuse this more than others, and power metal is one of the most cheese-forward styles out there.

The Oregonian quintet Tanagra whole-heartedly embraces cheesiness on Tanagra, their second full-length release. The earnestness with which the music is played is a huge plus for the band: had they been more self-aware, tongue-in-cheek, or even a little shier about the grandiosity, I don’t think this album would have worked as well as it does. Even the album art features a loving embrace of power and progressive metal’s tropes: amid a sci-fi landscape, the band’s logo is in a faux-Devanagari script, while the album title looks Tolkienian. (Had I not enjoyed this album, I probably would have decried this as lazy hackery; my feelings about an album’s artwork and the music itself often feed off of each other.) Continue reading “Album Review: Tanagra – Meridiem” →