Best of 2024: Cool Songs

Welcome to the first installment of The Elite Extremophile’s Best of 2024. Today we’re starting off with Cool Songs, to be followed by the Top EPs tomorrow and the Top Albums on Wednesday and Thursday.

Before we get to it, let me give my usual Best-Of disclaimers. This is a one-man operation, in regard to writing the reviews. My proofreaders Kelci and Dan are very helpful, but I’m sure there was plenty of great music I just simply couldn’t get around to. I’ve also got my own personal biases against certain styles and trends.

And as a reminder, these year-end lists cover music released between December 2023 and November 2024. I spend much of December compiling and editing these lists, so I don’t bother searching for new music released in December until the new year.

This segment is meant to show off great tracks that do not appear on my other year-end lists. If a release makes my best EPs or best albums list, it is disqualified from appearing in this particular segment.

Without further ado, let’s get to it!

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Odds & Ends: September 2, 2024

Band: Burnt Log | Album: Time Is a Heron Waiting for Prey | Genre: Progressive rock, Dream pop | Bandcamp

Burnt Log is a one-man project based out of Scotland. The songs skillfully combine intelligent, progressive song structures with floating, dreamy atmospheres. Melodies are smart but accessible, and there’s a vague sense of nostalgia to much of the music here. Touches of post-punk, new wave, and even post-rock crop up here and there. Some passages are perhaps a bit too dream-poppy for my taste, but this is still an overall solid and interesting release.

Score: 72/100

Band: FILESHAREMAIDEN | Album: Veuve | Genre: Progressive metal, Technical death metal | Bandcamp

The first full-length release from Quebecois death metallers File Share Maiden is a swirling, tangled thicket of finger-twisting riffs, guttural vocals, and even moments of surprising lightness. There are many exciting, fun passages that demonstrate both technical skills and songwriting smarts. However, this band also falls victim to the common excesses of other tech-death acts. Many songs are longer than they need to be, and a number of cuts border on purposelessness. That said, there’s still plenty of great material here.

Score: 70/100

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Odds & Ends: July 3, 2023

Band: Chafouin | Album: Trois, quatre | Genre: Math rock, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

I liked this band’s 2021 album Toufoulcan, so I was excited when I saw they had something new coming out. Where Toufoulcan had a sense of sonic continuity between the tracks, this release feels more like a collection of unrelated (or barely-related) songs. The music itself is good, and none of the songs overstay their welcome. When taken as a whole, though, Trois, quatre feels a bit unfocused.

Score: 74/100

Band: Numidia | Album: South of the Bridge | Genre: Hard rock, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This album was a huge disappointment. I loved this band’s Middle Eastern-tinged debut record, which expertly blended Near-Eastern flavors with prog and psych in very satisfying ways. Here though, the band has stripped away anything that makes them unique and put out a bland, bluesy hard-ish, vaguely-prog-adjacent record that often reminds me of ‘90s Pink Floyd (and not in a good way). The music isn’t bad, per se, especially if you’re looking for something evocative of certain 1970s blues rock acts, but it’s a major step down from their self-titled, in terms of both creativity and impact.

Score: 52/100

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Odds & Ends: March 6, 2023

Band: Ak’chamel, The Divinatory Monkey and the Sovereign Plumed Serpent | Album: A Mournful Kingdom of Sand | Genre: Psychedelic rock, Progressive folk | Bandcamp

Ak’chamel is back with a slightly altered name since I last covered this band. The music’s a bit different, too, and I like this album more for it. It’s less murky, and the instruments are more able to shine through. There’s still a hazy, incense-filled atmosphere to this record, but it’s easier to discern individual elements. Wiry guitar lines, hypnotic rhythms, and assorted non-European flavors swirl together. Some songs are relaxing, and others have a mood that portends doom.

Score: 77/100

Band: Atsuko Chiba | Album: Water, It Feels Like It’s Growing | Genre: Post-rock, Post-punk | Bandcamp

The latest release from this Quebecois act is a hazy, somewhat droney excursion. The music is often abstract and shifting, but the compositions are strong enough to give the songs identifiable and enjoyable structures. There are still plenty of driving, energetic riffs, but they’re often coupled with ethereal atmospheres to make for a haunting effect. There’s a sense of menace to a number of these songs, and everything gels into a cohesive whole.

Score: 84/100

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Odds & Ends: April 4, 2022

Band: Besna | Album:Zverstvá | Genre: Post-metal | Bandcamp

Besna hails from Slovakia, and they play a variety of melodic black metal and post-metal which artfully weaves together multiple musical ideas. Each of the six songs on this album sprawl without being overlong. The passages blend together seamlessly, and the emotional intensity makes these tracks that much more impactful. I’m also glad that this band sings in their native language, as I quite like the sound of Slovak (and Czech, since they sound so similar, aside from that terrible ř sound the Czechs have).

Score: 82/100

Artist: Tanshuman Das | Album: Progress Report | Genre: Progressive metal, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Tanshuman Das is a bassist and composer from India who writes music in the vein of ‘90s Dream Theater and similar acts. The music on Progress Report is epic, dramatic, and cinematic. The compositions are intelligently-assembled, and the playing is skillful. This album is a bit longer than it needs to be, but that’s a pretty common issue in this style of music. Overall, though, this is a fun, enjoyable release.

Score: 75/100

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Odds & Ends: March 7, 2022

Artist: Stewart Clark | Album:Journeys | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Stewart Clark draws noticeably from the classic prog giants, most obviously Yes and Genesis. The music is rich and grand, and though the playing is hardly flashy, the songs are creatively and thoughtfully structured. The folk elements are especially nice. Some cuts do drag on a bit, but this is an overall enjoyable release.

Score: 77/100

Band: Cyril | Album: Amenti’s Coin – Secret Place Pt. II | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

If you’re looking for some well-made progressive rock in the vein of acts like Transatlantic or The Flower Kings, these guys aren’t a bad choice. It’s highly melodic with a lot of strong instrumental performances. The band does occasionally veer into overwrought balladry, and I can’t say there’s anything particularly novel being said here. Despite that, sometimes you just want some lush, classic-style prog.

Score: 71/100

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Odds & Ends – June 7, 2021

Band: Caligonaut | Album: Magnified as Giants | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This solo project from guitarist Ole Michael Bjørndal features members of Wobbler in supporting roles, most notably in backing vocals. The vocal arrangements, combined with the Mellotron-focused compositions, make this a very Wobbler-y album. This project is what I had hoped Dwellers of the Deep would have been. While no individual track rises to the same level as “Merry Macabre”, this is a far stronger overall release. The four songs sound well-planned and finely-honed. It’s hardly groundbreaking stuff, but it is consistent, enjoyable, and well-formed progressive rock in the classic Anglo-prog vein.

Score: 86/100

Band: Coevality | Album: Multiple Personalities | Genre: Progressive rock, Jazz fusion, Math rock | Bandcamp

All the individual songs on this record are strong in their own right. The musicianship is fun and flashy without being too indulgent, and the band draws from a nice tonal palette. However, when packaged into a full-length record, it just feels too long. After about 10 or 15 minutes I find myself losing interest. Perhaps someone more into jazz would enjoy this record more than I do.

Score: 67/100

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Top Prog EPs of 2020

Welcome to the first installment of my 2020 best-of lists, TheEliteExtremophile’s Top 5 Prog EPs of 2020. Expect the two-part Top 50 Prog Albums list next week.

Prog is a pretty long-winded genre, so the number of EPs I listened to was low, somewhere in the 12-15 range. However, there were some absolutely killer releases, and trimming this list down to 5 was tough.

As I stated last year, I’m sure there are some excellent releases not included. This site is my personal pet project, and I simply cannot listen to everything that gets released. I also have my personal biases against some rather popular trends in prog, which affected the composition of this list. But if you’ve got recommendations, do not hesitate to shoot them my way, either through this site, email, or my Facebook page.

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Odds & Ends – March 9, 2020

Band: Ak’chamel, The Giver Of Illness | Album: The Totemist | Genre: Krautrock, Psychedelic folk | Bandcamp

The Totemist is a swirl of ritualistic atmosphere and repetition. The murky aura augments the contrasts between the sharp notes of the acoustic instruments and the omnipresent, sinister drone. The compositions morph in naturalistic ways, and subtle touches of jazz are worked in amid the faux-shamanic folk, resulting in something quite creative.

Score: 75/100

Band: Cthulhu Rise | Album: Last | Genre: Progressive rock, Jazz-fusion | Bandcamp

This instrumental Ukrainian band reminds me a lot of Liquid Tension Experiment. The roots of the act’s sound clearly derive from Dream Theater-style melodic prog metal, but jazz plays a large role here too. The individual musicians flaunt their chops on the three songs here, but the soloing always comes off as purposeful. Each track is full of surprising twists and turns, with few ideas sticking around for more than about a minute at a time. Somehow, it avoids feeling disjointed.

Score: 84/100 Continue reading “Odds & Ends – March 9, 2020” →

Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019, Part 1: 50-26

Though this blog is only about a year old, I’ve been publishing music-oriented year-end lists on my personal Facebook since 2010. Those lists have usually covered all releases—albums and EPs—as well as music from genres outside the progosphere. Since starting this blog, I listened to more new music in 2019 than I had in any previous year, and it was even more skewed toward prog and prog-related output than in years past.

To save myself from having to write (and you from having to read) a 100-plus-entry list full of mediocre releases, I’ve instead opted to publish TheEliteExtremophile’s Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019. This post will cover entries 50-26. Part 2, covering the top 25, will be published on Monday.

I’m not publishing album scores here, and past album scores should not be read into too much. Reviews generally reflect something of a first impression, and after months of listening, albums’ standings rise and fall. This list also features some very good albums which I just never reviewed in full.

As a disclaimer, I’m sure there are some excellent albums not included. This is a one-man operation (in relation to reviewing, that is; my editors, Kelci and Dan, have been tremendously helpful), and I simply cannot listen to everything that gets released. I also have my personal biases against some rather popular trends in prog, which affected the composition of this list. But if you’ve got recommendations, do not hesitate to shoot them my way, either through this site, via email, or through my Facebook page. Continue reading “Top 50 Prog Albums of 2019, Part 1: 50-26” →