Acracy

Acracy

Doorways to Destiny

April 5th, 2019

This past Saturday the crew from Chicago by the name of Acracy sent in a copy of their brand new 2019 album Doorways to Destiny which features the following songs.

1.Liberation (Control Denied) 6:29

2.Aging Desires (9:35)

3.Book of Faces (9:26)

4.On My Own (6:09)

5.A Love Least Expected (9:25)

6.Come with Me (11:05)

The album opens with “Liberation (Control Denied)”. This first song is anthemic in form. The song is also a good representation of the Acracy way of making music. The traditional metal singing, the traditional heavy metal/progressive guitar, and the clear, audible sound of the rhythm section as the glue that keeps the frame together. This first song is headbanging power prog and it’s memorable. Uptempo and rocking, it’s a great introduction to the album. An important part of the song here is the progressive side, too. In the middle segments the guitar kicks in with the catchy, melodic soloing. Lyrically, the song is a statement on those so-called good-intentioned people in your life that tell you, “Can I give you some advice? I think you’re wasting your time and money doing music.” This type of so-called wisdom metal musicians hear all the time (“Are you still doing music?”, with emphasis on the word still), as if the musician—who knows in the flesh what it is like to make art in a society that values not art but money—is not aware of how difficult it is to play a music that is largely disdained, frowned upon and ignored by the corporate music machinery.

The catchy chorus is also a confident declaration of purpose:

I will not be swayed and follow

the path you feel is right for me

failure, triumph, pleasure, or sorrow

I must discover my own journey

There it is. Acracy is going to give you songs with skills, and the lyrics are not going to be fooling around: "Intrusive and not wanted—your advice; I don’t want to hear from you," is the band’s response to the cynics.

“Aging Desires”

The nine of minutes of “Aging Desires” show fully the progressive nature of Acracy. The song has three main paces: midtempo, uptempo and back to midtempo. In some ways, it is a more memorable song due to the midtempo, ear-friendly style. The first couple of minutes present a proggy style. The chorus is another catchy one that stays around after the song ends. Then, at 2:35 the tempo gets faster and the drumming becomes more pronounced, and the song will continue in the same manner, but before that, the song throws you for a loop with an interesting transition that is better heard than described. It’s something that makes you sit up and take notice. You should hear it for yourself and decide what to call it! “Space rock conversation percussive with some studio imagination”?

After that, there’s another surprise: the solo that follows is a cool melodic tremolo picking part that is, basically, melodic black metal. Very nice segment, and now the double bass drumming and general tempo is in full swing. Here in this part the singer plants his flag and lets out a signature scream, before the song returns to the pace of the beginning. However, even though there are hooks and licks in this song so far, we still haven’t gotten a proper guitar solo, but we’re going to get it now (in addition to several more high screams!). When the solo shows up, it’s the right time and we get a cool bluesy solo that reworks some of the riffs and melodies that we have heard before in the song, before letting out a bit of shredding.

Alright, I will tell you more about the album later. Let me stop right here because I have to jet right now and these comments are turning into an essay. I have a date tonight! There is a piece of chocolate cake that keeps staring at me. It’s telling me, “Hi, there. How you doing?” and I don’t want to ignore such a friendly gesture. Talk to you later, friends, and may you find yourself the chocolate cake happiness as I have. We’ll come back to Acracy!

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