Athena XIX - prog metal featuring Fabio Lione (Rhapsody of Fire, Angra, Labÿrinth, Vision Divine)

Athena XIX

Everflow Part 1: Frames of Humanity

Reigning Phoenix Music

6 December 2024

Fabio Lione, who for two decades fronted Italian symphonic power metal band Rhapsody, began his metal music career with this band in 1991 and left in 1993. In 2024 the new album, I would say, is traditional prog, with groove and experimental elements, an interplay between musicianship with contemporary songwriting and uses of technology. The album begins with "Frames of Humanity," which sounds catchy, but the techno-dance music at the start of the second song, "Legacy of the World" seems like a different genre altogether: a hybrid of prog, groove, robot metal and techno while still melodic. The third song, “The Day We Obscured the Sun,” confirms the hunch: there is quite a bit of groove, chunky songwriting. Or, take song number six as an example: "The Calm before the Storm" almost seems like it will launch into an industrial groove; it’s a semi-industrial rhythm topped with melodic singing. This song could have easily been turned into something much weirder, but the band is careful to keep things within reason.

Of course, there is melody here with Fabio on vocals. The vocals remain melodic throughout. There is a ton of experience within this band. They could have made a normal prog album and it would have been just fine. Instead, they have taken some chances trying out some elements from outside of metal, and in the process have made something less typical, a bit more difficult, but still melodic, for audiences that look for albums that are a bit more adventurous. Will one listen be enough for the songs to be understood? No, but prog audiences sometimes like a bit of challenge anyway. Ok, well, here’s a challenge.

ATHENA XIX - Frames of Humanity (Official Music Video)

https://www.facebook.com/Athena.Band.Italy/

Marrowomb - new extreme metal from Chicago primed for 2025

Although the full album Phisenomie does not come out until February 21st, 2025, Marrowomb is not waiting around, sitting on their rocking chairs on the front porch, holding on until the new year arrives before getting the ball rolling. They have one song ready right now for your examination and it is called "Vicarious Visage.” The track is a no-intro, headbanging rocket of energy. The speed and style of the drumming is black metal, while the heaviness and growling point to death metal for 3:35 seconds, when a slow heaviness shows up to create some major midtempo rhythms that could make a crowd move in unison, shaking the security barrier or the walls. Marrowomb is extreme metal from the Chicago area, mostly informed by black and death, by multi-instrumentalist Frank Lato, who, according to Metal Archives, has worked with Polyptych, Endmember and Headshrinker. Frank does guitars, bass, vocals, synths/programming, enlisting Kevin Paradis on drums.

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61558761150437

Impellitteri - for fans of shred guitar

Long-running shred artist Impellitteri (U.S.) put out a new album on November 8th, 2024. The name of the album is War Machine and it features the combination of heavy metal and guitar wizardry for fans of the traditional and classic styles. The discography and history goes all the way back to the 1980s, and then continued actively through 1990s and into the new century. Especially for fans of serious guitar in the style of traditional/classic heavy metal, the new Impellitteri album is a good place to start. Here are some videos from the new album. Hear for yourself and see if you enjoy the shredding!

Impellitteri - "Out Of My Mind (Heavy Metal)" - Official Music Video

Impellitteri - "Power Grab" - Official Video

Impellitteri - "Wrath Child" - Official Video

Impellitteri - "Hell On Earth" - Official Video

Tungsten (melodic metal from Sweden) - official music videos

Check out these videos from Swedish melodic band Tungsten. In 2024 their fourth album The Grand Inferno came out on November 8th. These videos are generally accurate as representations of their feel-good style of music. The band features former HammerFall drummer Anders Johansson and his two sons Karl and Nick, with Michael Andersson on vocals. Andersson was the singer for prog power band Cloudscape (1992-2017). Tungsten is not a prog band, but the singing style fits the music of Tungsten, which is based on heavy metal, classic rock and power metal, and just generally melodic metal.

TUNGSTEN - Blood Of The Kings (Official Music Video)

TUNGSTEN - Vantablack (Official Music Video)

TUNGSTEN - Walborg (Official Music Video)

https://www.facebook.com/tungstenband/

Liminal Shroud - a call going out to a particular audience

Liminal Shroud

Visions of Collapse

Willowtip Records

5 July 2024

Expect a challenging listen in the genre of progressive extreme metal, mostly within the parameters of black metal. I'm not going to lie to you, this is an album (five songs in 44 minutes) that takes time. I have heard it enough times that most recordings start to make fuller sense, but not this one. Yet, this is on purpose by the band. Four of the songs range from nine to eleven minutes. Especially if you enjoy black and prog metal, the songwriting may really appeal to you if you are looking for music that requires extra focus to be understood. Thoughtful audiences that are looking for music based on skill and vision, and not instant gratification, are the ideal listeners. The band wrote this music for themselves, but they also wrote it for you, and they are looking for you, the thoughtful audience. It is not experimental music. It is black metal, but the type that emphasizes the music itself, without the commercial or attention-getting clichés. Astronomy and existentialism are probably the most important concerns in the lyrics, which are largely impersonal or devoid of egocentric declarations. While some may interpret the lyrics are depressing and the music as too complex, uncommercial, aloof or unmemorable, with this third album the band is completely aware of those criticisms, but they do not care because this is not music for the masses, anyway. It is not ear-friendly music, but that does not mean that it is not skilled or crafted with attention to detail. Quite the contrary.

https://www.facebook.com/liminalshroudofficial

Misanthropy - things are about to get ugly

Misanthropy

The Ever-Crushing Weight of Stagnance

Transcending Obscurity Records

13 December 2024

This particular Misanthropy from the Chicago area (as opposed to a handful of other U.S. bands with the same name, according to Metal Archives) has come a long way. If one listens to their debut album from 2015, it does not sound like the same band, when they were something like a thrash growl punk band obsessed with sharks and nachos. Here are some ideas for listening to the new music of their third album. First, don't let the cacophony distract you, which is difficult to do. This is technical, dissonant, brutal death metal. It's noisy, chaotic, ear-splitting horrific sounds from beginning to end. Second, try to hear the music beyond the noise of farm animal jazz from Mars.

If you are able to make it past the noise, then the fog will lift, and you will hear music hiding behind the hideous barrage. It's jolting, horrid music for sickos. It is unmelodic, self-indulgent, brutal tech-prog metal. It is a fun, engaging listen if you like challenging crossword puzzle extreme metal with many fun details behind the wall of brutality. The first song features warped Frankenstein funky jazz metal chops in a cloud of growling and blasting. The second track throws down some dissonant grooves, while the third track hits on some all-out blasting bursts of speed with some downtuned thrashy riffs to get a mosh pit going. The fourth song busts out some slamming riffs with some sideways math and pinch harmonics (?!). The fifth song explores something like dissonant doom math groove (what.exactly?). The sixth song has some subtle monk-like chanting with high shrieking with guitar work for which I needed to open my algebra book to look up some of these equations. Before I know it, I am on the last song, for a total of 44 minutes of string bending capriciousness. On the seventh song, one guitar is effectively attacking the other, and the two guitars are orchestrating a collision of notes spiraling into each other. Just like that, the puzzle ends. Did the album even make sense? Not at all, but sit up, chin up, shoulders back, pay closer attention. Run it back. This time, try to focus harder. The headache that the album has caused shall be cured with repeated listens. Keep going. This yellow brick road is pretty wobbly, but the dizziness can be fun.

Among These Ashes - The Undertow (Official Music Video)

Among These Ashes is a band from Michigan, United States. Their sound is mostly is a groove-based, thicker brand of heavy metal with melodic singing and lots of melodic guitar, too. They may be as heavy as thrash, but do not limit themselves to that style. They have melodic guitars like traditional heavy metal, but use the chunky grooves a lot more. Their second album is called Embers of Elysium and it was released on December 6th, 2024. On drums they have Kyle Wagner [Boreworm, Carnis Immortalis, Nethergate, Pyrrhic, ex-Fortress, Immaterium, Stank, Introvert (PA) (live)]. On guitars they have Richard Clark (Abboud, Clark Country Drifters) and Dylan Hamann (Variform). Their bassist is Kane Bochatyn (ex-At Death's Behest, ex-Salvation's End). Jean-Pierre Abboud [Syrinx, Traveler, ex-Borrowed Time, ex-Funeral Circle, ex-Shadow Self, Abboud, Torn From Stone, ex-Finality, ex-Gatekeeper, ex-Crimson Shadows (live)] takes care of the vocals.

Among These Ashes - The Undertow (Official Music Video)

https://amongtheseashes.bandcamp.com/album/embers-of-elysium

Violet Eternal - things are about to get pretty

Violet Eternal

Reload the Violet

Rockshots Records

3 May 2024

This power metal album features the voice of Italian singer Ivan Giannini [Artaban's Redemption, Derdian, Heavy Generation, Ivan Giannini, ex-DarCloud, ex-Elegacy, ex-Ivory, ex-Airforce (live)]. The instrumentation is the work of Jien Takahashi (Heaven's Tragedy, Majustice, Stormheart), a Japanese guitarist with whose work I am not familiar and whose entities have demos and/or a debut album, but no sophomore albums yet, which is also the case for this project here, Violet Eternal. The singing is traditional power metal high-note vocals throughout and has no growling or extreme screaming. It is meant to be beautiful singing, which also turns out to be the case for the guitar work: very melodic, catchy and lots of shredding. These elements, the singing and guitar playing, really shine together on here. Then, when considered with the good songwriting, it all makes for a beautiful and pleasant listening experience for fans of melodic music based on classic rock and heavy metal. Metal Archives shows that there are several guests contributing some keyboards, guitars, bass and drums on the recording. The drumming sounds programmed and it contributes nothing in particular to the enjoyment of the music, but I do not know the actual details of it, I’m just going by what it sounds like to the ears. On the other hand, the songwriting itself should be provide plenty of entertainment to fans of this genre.

VIOLET ETERNAL - Under the Violet Sun (OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO)

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61555241974232

Shadows Fall - In The Grey (Official Music Video)

U.S. metalcore band Shadows Fall (1995-2015, 2021-present) has a new video. Some people on their team (video producer? video director? the band?) decided that they would make a video in which you are unable to see much of what's going on in the video. What a strange choice: to make the video difficult to see and render it unwatchable. This is a good example of metal bands sabotaging themselves so that the music will have as little success as possible and make it unattractive to potential listeners and viewers. Here is another metal band working hard to make their music not fun.

Shadows Fall - In The Grey (Official Music Video)