TERRIA

Terria is the fifth solo album by Canadian musician Devin Townsend. As a progressive rock fan, I have taken chances on albums I have never heard of prior to investigating ProgArchives. In most cases they paid off in a big way, but some (not many) records leave me scratching my head wondering if I am listening to the same album that my fellow reviewers are. This particular album unfortunately masssively falls in the second category. Actually, I regret that I have not taken the reviews of Greenback and Gatot more seriously, it could save some good money for me... Devin Townsend's music is deeply rooted in grunge and industrial metal and that can be confirmed by listening, both styles are very much dominating his music. The secretary in the office, who asked me whether I was listening to some Foo Fighters was not that terribly wrong. What he is trying to do is to mix all this rather noisy music with some symphonic-alike sounds, but actually this sounds rather new agey or ambient, than really symphonic. The music is not very melodic, in fact most of the music I hear do not sound like having a melody. And the riffs are hardly the best I have ever heard. Devin Townsend' voice for most of the time is angry and agressive, often he really sounds like Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters. In the better and more quiet moments he sounds halfway between Dave Gilmour and James LaBrie. There are some relatively enjoyable tracks here, especially Deep Peace and The Fluke, but altogether I can clearly say that It is not I who cannot penetrate these relatively easily accessible tracks, it is the relatively accessible tracks that have a hard time penetrating the shell of my indifference. The only feeling what this album really brings to me is some mild annoyance, that I am wasting my time while I could listen to something that I truly enjoy. I have listened this alabum at least 10 times, so probaly my opinion is not going to change radically anymore. One more thing, on my copy released by InsideOut I can read: "File under Metal". So not "File under Progressive Metal" like in the case by other bands of this label. Well, as I understand the term "progreesive metal" I agree with the label, that this is not really progressive metal, but probably not a terrible example of ambient influenced, grunge and industrial based modern metal, and it has some enjoyable passages even if not too many, so a 2 stars is my rating.