99 releases in the first 3 weeks of August 2024: 14 Highlights!

I have been watching Canada’s progressive metal artist The Aphelion for 7 years, analyzing all of the aspects of their live performances, the songwriting, and their drive to deliver amazing music. With every year of much noticeable improvements, every new song heard at each show attended, I knew they had something big cooking. And boy, was I right. The long-awaited sophomore album “Nascence” delivers everything that this band had been striving for, and it is glorious as it is wild. Vocalist/bassist Evan Haydon-Selkirk floored me since day 1 with their insane vocal ability, and on record is still mind-blowing. That chorus on ‘Fragility’ alone should convince you of their capabilities. From emotional rock ballads to aggressive death metal throttle, they cover lots of ground. If you’re remotely into bands like Pain of Salvation, Leprous, Faith No More, or Fair to Midland, you’re in for a treat! Colin

The second massive concept album of the month that is part of a multiple releases spanning story after The Aphelion’s “Nascence” is “Misery Prelude: The Prince Eternal” from Texan prog metal trio Framing Skeletons. It’s their fourth full length album since their debut “The Blueprint Exchange” hit the underground scene in 2019 like one of those infamous snare drum hits by drummer and mastermind Bryan Holub. While their 2020/21 double strike “Osmium”/”Luminescence” showed the two sides of Framing Skeletons rather separated, the 75 minute “Misery Prelude” tells the story of, you guessed it, “The Prince Eternal”, a sort of prequel to 2023’s 20-minute 1-song EP “The Rightful Heir to Acrelot” and shows the three Houstonians at their most diverse musically. Influences from any extreme metal genre imaginable, including seemingly opposite ones like thrash and djent, go hand in hand with powerful, epic hooks and grooves and despite a seemingly constant oscillation between styles and different parts, the flow of the entire journey is simply impeccable. Front and center Jeremy Burke’s blistering shredding (be it heavy af grooves or flamenco-feel acoustic stuff) and his compelling, powerful and mighty vocals, excelling in both clean and extreme departments. Framing Skeletons is an underground gem and it’s high time for some well-deserved wider recognition. Dario

Perhaps my favorite promo email discovery in a long time and such a wonderful surprise: the beginning of August saw the release of “Bifurcate”, the stunning debut album by New Jersey based duo/band The War Yaks. Now, the only place I had come across “Bifurcations” before was one of my favorite songs on Schizofrantik’s “Oddities”. So I naturally associate it with a certain avant-garde feel in the music. Now what The War Yaks have accomplished with “Bifurcate” certainly does have a slight avant-garde touch through sophisticated and adventurous harmonies, while always keeping a certain accessible appeal, masterfully balanced to great effect. In addition to the exquisite instrumental work, including but not limited to the performance of saxophonist and co-writer Anthony Warga, the not-so secret weapon of The War Yaks lies elsewhere. Vocalist Nat Rusciani’s timbre is nothing short of breathtaking. Granted, a lot of people might find it a bit too much, but I for one celebrate every little extra vibrato, expression, pathos and gravitas. The motto preceding their EPK, “Like jazz, but worse”, seems oddly fitting and then some. An album full of contrasts, yet the immaculate whole becomes so much more than the sum of its parts. As long as no Yaks actually have to go to war for it: please give me more of it! Dario

Ritual from Sweden is back! After a long hiatus (17 years!), the swedes built again a delightful, albeit a tad dark story with their magical intricate progressive rock, “The Story of Mr. Bogd, pt. 1”, a concept album about the mysterious journey of Mr. Bogd, leaving a life of riches to find strange characters and creatures.

Ritual is once again giving us the gift of their wonderful music, incredible musicianship and timeless multi-instrumental complex compositions that only make me wonder how 4 musicians do all that? Production-wise it is near perfect, as we’re used to from the quartet, you can really hear and marvel at all the layers and different instruments, which helps immerse yourself into the interesting story.

It is always a joy to listen to a Ritual album from start to end, with the wide range of emotions, passages, changes of pace and funny or sad moments, all speaking to me through their music and Patrick Lundström’s amazing story telling and unique voice, sadly in “The Story of Mr. Bogd, pt 1”, the story is cut short leaving us in a sudden cliffhanger eagerly waiting for what I suspect is going to be an even more magical part 2. Van

From sunny California comes a weighty serving of brutal, yet atmospheric, proggy and psychedelic death metal. “Senescence” is the title of the debut full length from Santa Rosa based trio Vile Rites. As the beautifully painted cover artwork, tangly band logo and ornate album title lettering suggests, there’s a natural touch felt across the board, be it the crunchy and heavy, yet vibrant and authentic production far away from any digitized computer sounds, to the lyrical themes inspired by nature itself. “Drawing inspiration from events in nature, Vile Rites creates a visceral and kaleidoscopic experience that feels like wandering alone in the forest at night.” says the press text and I couldn’t agree more. “From cavernous darkness to soaring ethereal ecstasy”, what more do I want when diving into an exciting, exhilarating progressive psychedelic death metal journey? Dario

What more do I want when diving into an exciting, exhilarating progressive psychedelic death metal journey? Maybe “the story of the formation of our solar system and the cosmic events that led to the development of life on Earth.”? Well, “Violent Cosmic Fortune”, the sophomore effort by New York based trio The Mantle doesn’t do it beneath that. An antithesis to Exist’s “Hijacking the Zeitgeist” of sorts, in subject matter only though. Soundwise, The Mantle’s brand of progressive death metal is as cosmic as the album title suggests, as crushing but also as luminescent, explosive and wondrous as the origins of life itself. Utterly compelling in the depiction of the vastness of these events, “Violent Cosmic Fortune” is an event no fan of the genre can ignore this year. Dario

Dark Cinematic Djent? I’ll take it as a fitting genre description for UK fiv-piece Vanitas. And at the same time a perfect example that djent certainly belongs to the metal family. At this point, the Metal Archives’ stubbornness to exclude anything remotely djenty and deny their ‘metal-ness’ is just laughable. But back to the excellent music at hand, no matter how you want to classify it: the six tracks (plus intro) on “Chaos Theory”, the new EP from Vanitas, fly by with relentless ferocity, providing perfect balance between heaviness, speed, catchiness and cinematic grandeur. It drops a tad too late for this year’s summer festival circus, but if the Birmingham posse continues in this top form, they’ll be burning down the stages of the top summer festivals (at least in the UK) next year. Keep up that tremendous energy! Dario

Certainly hugely cinematic as well, albeit in a bit of a different fashion, is “Invenio”, the second EP from Australian composer/multi-instrumentalist Thomas Pearce aka Capermote, that we gladly premiered on release day. With names like Mike Malyan (ex-Monuments) on drums and James Norbert Ivanyi as a co-producer on board, not to mention the clear yet powerful mix and master by Adam Bentley (Arch Echo), you would expect nothing less than quality of course. But the three instrumental compositions that Pearce has put together are nothing short of exceptional, with the tumultuous, darkly cinematic ‘Zeela’ as an exhilarating centerpiece. Guess I’ll be keeping a close watch on that Capermote name so I won’t miss any more excellent stuff like this. Dario

From the most ethereal to the most destructive: i Häxa continues their EP series with the third part, unsurprisingly titled “Part Three”. The clash of organic beauty and destructive, technological industrial noise seemingly culminates in the aptly titled ‘Destroy Everything’, but is that really the end? “Part Four” will conclude the i Häxa cycle when the self-titled debut album will be out on November 1st. Only then will we know if and how the destruction can be overcome. Dario

What lies between Mars and Venus? Correct, our home planet, Earth. “Between Mars and Venus” is also the title of a new EP by one man project Echoes and Signals, diving once more into an emotional sea of dark prog rock sounds. I kind of discovered “Mercurial”, the 2021 full length, towards the end of the year Fedor Kivokurtsev’s timbre strikes me as slightly similar to the likes of Mick Moss (Antimatter) or Marko Saaresto (Poets of the Fall) which is absolutely fine by me because there’s far too few singers out there bringing that dark, fragile timbre if you ask me. A delicate darkness I can absolutely subscribe to. Dario

A band name that popped up quite frequently in my feed over the last few days was certainly Turning Virtue. Somehow familiar as in ‘heard somewhere before’, upon further inspection I realized I had never listened to their music before. “He Held The Sun Captive” is the name of their new album and they have a certain British sound about them despite being from Buffalo, New York. A certain air of a melancholy atmosphere permeates the four long tracks and it might be the most subtle and reserved performance by Baard Kolstad (Leprous) on guest drums. Part one of a two-part concept. Certainly something to watch out for if you like mellow, lush and atmospheric prog rock. Dario

Utopianisti is not the congregation of impossible pianists. It’s rather a musical outlet for Finnish multi-instrumentalist Markus Pajakkala’s rather eclectic fusion/avant-garde/(for the lack of a better word) world prog shenanigans in everchanging line-ups. “Reason in Motion”, the sixth album, was recorded live in studio with a nine-piece ensemble and dives deep into Afro influenced jazzrock with percussionists Ismaila Sané & Gilbert Kuppusami delivering the relentless madness on the left and right channel respectively. What else does this record have in abundance apart from percussion galore? Lots of brass? Bring it on! Dario

This one was recommended to me by a friend, and surprisingly not the same friend who worked with them on their debut album! Cime AKA Monty Cime is the project leader, composer, vocalist, and bassist for this avant-prog sophomore album titled “The Cime Interdisciplinary Music Ensemble”. This release is definitely an ambitious one, and well-written at that! Fusing art punk, jazz fusion, post-hardcore, and a less-familiar term, nueva canción latinoamericana (inspired by traditional Latin and Hispanic American Folk Music). Very little I can compare this to, but I do hear a bit of black midi, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Eunuchs and TDK. It’s not often you hear bands fuse prog and punk, which lots of folks would usually say is some form of heresy, but I think it’s brilliant and needs to be done more often! If you’re looking for a breath of fresh air with music, look no further than this grandiose piece of art. Colin

Just about a week or so after Czech atmospheric proggers IONS released their excellent sophomore record “Counterintuitive” last November and got a glowing highlight mini review here in our Releases of the Week series, they were announced for the upcoming, The Progspace-presented ProgPower Europe in The Netherlands. Back then, I wrote the following: “Exploring the depths of the human psyche lyrically like many bands before, Czech five-piece Ions is wrapping their tales in a modern prog metal sound that oozes atmosphere and emotions through every pore. With synth swathes and floating odd meter riffs reminiscent of bands like Ihlo, Leprous, Rendezvous Point, VOLA, Kingcrow, the more subtle and less heavy moments of vulnerable melodic sensibility could also be likened to The Pineapple Thief (or the other famous PT band if you will). “Counterintuitive” is the bands’ sophomore effort and it’s an absolutely excellent one at that. The only wish that’s left after I’ve listened to it in its 50 minute glory is that maybe they could go for a couple more of those harder metal parts that are just so satisfyingly hard hitting. And/or to listen to “Counterintuitive” again. And again. “ All these qualities might have also persuaded the legendary underground label Willowtip Records to pick them up and even give “Counterintuitive” a well deserved LP release. To celebrate this occasion, they’ve also released a wonderful in-studio playthrough of ‘Birds of Reminiscence’, with over 8 minutes the longest song on the album. Check it out and see you front row for their long expected performance on Oct. 06 at ProgPower Europe in Baarlo (NL)! Dario