Odds & Ends: December 2, 2024

Band: Anciients | Album: Beyond the Reach of the Sun | Genre: Progressive metal | Bandcamp

“Anciients” is one of my least-favorite band names. Certain dumb misspellings can be fun (see: Kömmand, Toxik, Vektor), but just slapping another “i” in there seems stupid. That being said, the focus of this site isn’t on bands’ names, but rather on the music they put out. And if I weren’t able to look past names I dislike, I’d never be able to enjoy acts like Between the Buried and Me or And So I Watch You from Afar.

Anciients is one of those bands that is adored by the likes of r/progmetal, and which I enjoy but do not view quite so worshipfully. Think Caligula’s Horse, Devin Townsend, or recent Haken. Beyond the Reach of the Sun, though, resonates with me more than this band’s prior work. Melodic, Dream Theater-influenced prog metal coexists with heavier sludge-influenced passages, and it results in some exciting compositions. Some slower cuts can take a little long to get going (I’m especially looking at you, “Is It Your God”), but the payoff is usually worth it.

Score: 78/100

Band: delving | Album: All Paths Diverge | Genre: Post-rock, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Elder frontman Nicholas DiSalvo is back with his second album under the delving name. It continues in a vein similar to the first delving record, but I like this one more. Hirschbrunnen, released in 2021, is a passable but forgettable post-rock album. All Paths Diverge has more complex and purposeful compositions. I really like how thoroughly keyboards have been integrated, and the guitar tones are lovely. This very much feels like a non-metallic, dreamier version of Elder, and that twist on Elder’s sound works really well. Like any hour-long instrumental post-rock record, there’s some bloat, but this is a release where the vibes and atmospheres are more important than any specific riff.

Score: 79/100

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Album Review: Blood Incantation – Absolute Elsewhere

Band: Blood Incantation | Album: Absolute Elsewhere | Genre: Progressive death metal, Space rock | Year: 2024

From: Denver, USA | Label: Century Media

For fans of: Wills Dissolve, Cynic, Morbid Angel, Pink Floyd, Tangerine Dream

Bandcamp

Blood Incantation has been a bit all over the place on their last few releases. Now, that’s not necessarily a bad thing, mind you. 2019’s Hidden History of the Human Race is both brutal and intelligent. It features nasty, complex riffs alongside brief interludes of Floydian atmospherics. Their last two releases, though, have seen them go in a much more explicitly astral direction. 2022’s Timewave Zero was fully electronic and honestly not really my jam. If you’re more into Tangerine Dream than I am, it might be for you. Then last year, they released the EP Luminescent Bridge. One of the two songs on it was a fantastic synthesis of their usual death metal alongside more cosmic space rock and classic prog. The title track, though, is simply too ambient for my taste.

Their new LP, Absolute Elsewhere, sees the band expand upon the ideas put forth in “Obliquity of the Ecliptic”, off Luminescent Bridge. Death metal and intergalactic progressive rock both feature prominently, and the band strikes a great balance. (Though, like so many other metal bands that decide to incorporate non-metal elements into their music, they go on about “leaving the notion of genre behind” on their Bandcamp page. And I’m just not nuts about that sort of framing. Blood Incantation didn’t leave “genre” behind. They’re just playing two genres on this album, instead of one.)

Like their last EP and the ambient LP before it, this record consists of just two long compositions: “The Stargate” and “The Message”. Each of these pieces is split up into three parts, called “tablets.”

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Odds & Ends: July 15, 2024

Band: Абстрактор (Abstraktor) | Album: Мать (Mat’, Eng. Mother) | Genre: Progressive folk | Bandcamp

This Russian quartet plays a smart, artsy variety of folk rock. They blend their own Slavic roots with jazz, modern classical, indie rock, and other bits and pieces from around the globe. The instrumentation is often intricate and full of unexpected twists. They build lush and varied textures, and they’re able to blend strong pop sensibilities with a spirit of adventurousness and experimentation.

Score: 81/100

Band: Agusa | Album: Noir | Genre: Progressive rock, Space rock | Bandcamp

I liked this release a lot more than I expected to. Agusa is a band I like–each of their last two albums have made my year-end Top 50 lists, after all–but one of my gripes is that they can be a bit noodly and long-winded. This album is a soundtrack for a film, so I was particularly cautious. Would the scattershot nature of soundtracks hamstring this work? Instead, this is a delightfully varied yet purposeful and coherent release. Folk, jazz, and space rock elements are incorporated naturally, alongside Agusa’s usual prog stylings. This album is also more consistently lighthearted than much of their other work, which is a nice change of pace. The shorter runtimes for these tracks also behoove the band, as they’re able to put forward fun ideas and meditate on them for a bit without needing to build some huge suite. Things do sag and slow down a bit near the album’s end, but it’s far from a fatal flaw in this case.

Score: 76/100

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Album Review: Perilymph – Progressions Imaginaires

Band: Perilymph | Album: Progressions Imaginaires | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2024

From: Berlin, Germany | Label: Six Tonnes de Chair

For fans of: Patrick Moraz, Phideaux, early Pink Floyd

Bandcamp

Arriving three years after their last effort, Perilymph’s fourth album, Progressions Imaginaires, is this group’s newest output. I’ve covered this band a couple times in the past, and I’ve always enjoyed their work. They have always done a great job at contrasting spare, acoustic passages with big, warm retro synth tones.

Perilymph’s past work has often straddled the always-fuzzy line between psych and prog. That has a lot to do with the way that they evoke the instrumental tones of the late 1960s, when psych and prog were both in their infancies and it was all a big mushy blob of forward-thinking rock music. This album, though, sees the band pushing in a more clearly progressive direction. The tones and textures are as lush and psychedelic as ever, but the songwriting is more dynamic, mature, and inventive.

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Odds & Ends: April 1, 2024

Band: 55YT MQRT | Album: 55YT MQRT | Genre: Space rock, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This band’s name might look like a license plate number, but their sound isn’t nearly that ordinary. They play a vast, cosmic variety of heavy psych and prog, and the album art of an astronaut traveling through an ancient temple is weirdly fitting. The soundscapes are vast and huge, and everything has a massive amount of weight behind it. Even though this album is a bit on the long side, it works. This is the sort of music where stretching out benefits the band.

Score: 80/100

Band: AKU | Album: Solipsism | Genre: Jazz-fusion | Bandcamp

The six songs on Solipsism effortlessly blend jazz and progressive rock into a rich, organic melange. Each of the four members of the band puts on a great showing. Guitar is the lead instrument more often than not, but the keys are smartly deployed and add a great depth. The bass playing is punchy and energetic, and the drumming is skillful and varied.

Score: 78/100

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Album Review: Slift – Ilion

Band: Slift | Album: Ilion | Genre: Heavy psych, Space rock | Year: 2024

From: Toulouse, France | Label: Sub Pop

For fans of: Elder, Hawkwind, Ash Ra Tempel

Bandcamp

Slift is back after a four-year gap with their new album, Ilion. The band has stated that Ilion can be thought of as a direct sequel to Ummon, their 2020 release. There is a lot of sonic continuity between the two records. Both prominently feature bludgeoning doom metal riffs, crossed with krautrock-like repetition, and interstellar aesthetics. Much like Ummon, Ilion is a challenging listen. It’s a nearly-unrelenting onslaught of heavy riffs that cascade effortlessly from your speakers. I saw Slift when they came to Seattle last year, and if they come again, I’m going to go once more. They put on a great show, and I’m sure these cuts will be great additions to their live set.

In many ways, Ilion takes what Ummon did and cranks it up even further. Ummon saw Slift shift from spacey garage rock to a more metallic sound, and that progression has continued here. Not only are doom metal influences present, but post-metal, too. Ummon runs 72 minutes across 11 songs, but Ilion pumps that to 79 minutes across only eight songs (only two of which are under nine minutes, and none of which are below five).

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Best of 2023: Top 50 Prog Albums Part 1: 50-26

Welcome to the first half of The Elite Extremophile’s Top 50 Prog Albums of 2023. This article covers spots 50-26, and the top 25 will follow soon!

As a reminder: the label of “2023” is not entirely accurate. The music featured here covers December 2022 through November 2023. Trying to find new music in the month of December is a fool’s errand, as much of my time during that month is occupied with writing and editing this list.

As I always say, I’m sure there are some excellent albums not included on my list. This site 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. (*cough* djent *cough*)

2023 wound up being an excellent year for the type of music I enjoy. While it wasn’t necessarily difficult to whittle the list down to fifty entries, some of the albums that failed to make the cut for this year’s list probably could place as high as the low thirties in weaker years. (Such acts include Loma Baja, The Ocean, Legendry, and Lil Yachty.) I contemplated expanding the list, but this already takes up a ton of my time as it is. So, let’s get to it!

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Best of 2023: Top Prog EPs

Welcome to The Elite Extremophile’s Top Prog EPs of 2023. The two-part Top 50 Albums list will be posted in the coming days.

As I stated last year, due to the variable number of short releases I run across year-to-year, this list is not limited to a firm number. This year, there were eight EPs I felt worth highlighting.

And where last year had all releases clocking in at under 30 minutes, this year’s collection is a bit more vibes-based. Some EPs fall within last year’s parameters, but others are noticeably longer. I’ve always taken an “I’ll know it when I see it” approach to categorizing EPs and LPs.

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Best of 2023: Cool Songs

Welcome to the fifth annual installment of The Elite Extremophile’s Top Prog Releases. 2023 was an exceptional year for prog and prog-adjacent genres, and I was left with a glut of good music that wasn’t going to make my year-end lists. Even in less-stellar years, there are often records that I’m overall unimpressed with, which just so happen to have a great song or two on them. Thus, from a desire to not give such releases the short shrift, I’ve decided to highlight ten Cool Songs from this year.

This segment is meant to show off great tracks that otherwise do not appear on my 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: December 25, 2023

Band: Frankie and the Witch Fingers | Album: Data Doom | Genre: Progressive rock, Krautrock | Bandcamp

Frankie and the Witch Fingers remind me a lot of Osees. The music is fierce, energetic, and shot-through with punk influences. But the riffs are usually weird and angular, with uncommon meters. Despite a lot of the overt, aggressive tendencies of this band, the music remains relatively accessible. There are plenty of melodic hooks and catchy riffs and themes. “Syster System” is one hell of an earworm, and “Doom Boom” has a groovy, King Gizzard-esque feel to it.

Score: 80/100

Band: Gong | Album: Unending Ascending | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Once you get outside the very big names of progressive rock (Yes, Pink Floyd, Genesis, etc), Gong is one of the better-known second-echelon prog acts. I’m honestly not that familiar with their output beyond their Pot Head Pixie trilogy of the early 1970s. Looking over their Wikipedia article however, they have been incredibly prolific, with numerous projects labeled “So-and-so’s Gong” also being considered part of their oeuvre. Maybe I’ll eventually do a Gong Deep Dive, but seeing all the various Gong-adjacent projects makes that a daunting prospect. I’ve also discussed Yes being a ship of Theseus, but they ain’t got nothin’ on Gong. There’s a whole damn Wikipedia article on the topic. Just look at this graphic!

Moving onto the music of Unending Ascending, it’s pretty decent. It’s psychedelic in feel, with a lot of space rock elements. The playing and compositions are complex and thoughtful. There are some weaker moments, like the sleepy and overlong “Ship of Ishtar”, but most of the record manages to be engaging and entertaining. Despite none of the current members of Gong having been in the band prior to 2007, they do a great job of maintaining the spirit of the classic Gong sound.

Score: 77/100

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