review: Monsterworks (U.K.)

Monsterworks

Malignment

Eat Lead and Die Music

2 October 2020

There are so many reasons to like this U.K.-based prog band. They have an amazing work ethic, like a fan’s dream come true. Some 16 (sixteen!) studio albums and two EPs since 2000 (it looks like they began in 1996). The sound quality is good and there is nothing much to complain about. The musicianship and singing are good. The vocals are both extreme and traditional, with screamed and sung parts. The screaming is probably more annoying, kind of shrieking, while the lower growling sounds good, as does the melodic singing. Fans of prog should get on this case immediately, especially the true, die-hard super fanatics that cannot enough prog with a variety of vocals.

Unfortunately, this is too proggy and too meandering for listeners that want something more balanced between prog and some more accessible material (songs). The band has lots of skills, but they just do not write a normal song that fans can bang their heads to and rock out. From the perspective of non-prog fans, the band wastes their melodies. They have plenty of melodies that could be rearranged and retooled for songs, and they have riffs that could be reorganized for a song, but the band simply refuses to do that. That's too bad because this band works too hard and has been making albums at a dizzying rate for too long to remain stuck within the confines of "for zealot prog fans only."

They do not lack music skills. The sound quality of the recording is good. Everything is good. However, they do not have a single song on the album to attract non-prog fans. There is no sense of balance. Even a boring band like Dream Theater or another super boring band like Iron Maiden since 1995 (and especially since 2003 to be more precise) at times during their most insufferable works finds a way to write some more direct songs, showing their rocking side. Not Monsterworks. Frankly, what they need is a producer to save the band from themselves. A producer to say to them, "No! That's not a song, guys! Let's rewrite and rearrange these parts and let's add a chorus, for pete's sake!" How hard is it to add a chorus and use it a couple of times to make something sound like a song?! Monsterworks needs help. They are a potentially great band whose skills are being wasted because of the complete and total refusal to give us, the normal fans that want a few good songs on an album, even a hint of a song. We’re not saying write a big hit like “I Wanna Be Sedated” by the legendary The Ramones, but c’mon, now, throw us a bone here. Not all of us fans are attending music college nor reading books on music theory. Some of us are just trying to find something fun to listen to while we go to school or work, just trying to get through our day.

Malignment by Monsterworks