ANNO DOMINI HIGH DEFINITION

Riverside was a band that I approached with some caution. I’ve often been unimpressed with progressive metal in the modern era. Not just unimpressed, but often so much as incredibly annoyed with them. Fortunately, it appears that progressive metal and rock have dodged the bullet when it comes to Poland’s Riverside. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that these guys are bringing something new and cool to the table while being able to maintain a familiarity and compositional approach that does what good progressive rock has done since the 1970s—that is, they write good, interesting music, but manage to make it interesting, memorable and fun to listen to at the same time.

Of course, the name Anno Domini High Definition definitely wasn’t helpful when it came to me being worried about this album. I looked at it immediately and thought “well, that’s kind of a stupid name,” which was followed by “oh, it stands for ADHD, how trite.” Not trite at all, actually. The band has managed to produce what I think is a much of a mature, engaging and excellent progressive metal record with its roots in bands as diverse as Porcupine Tree, Opeth, Dream Theater and Marillion. Sure, these bands overlap in certain areas, but they are also varied enough that when you think about the combined, you definitely have to spend a couple of minutes pieceing together how that would sound.