UNION

It took me a few listens to get into this, and I think I know why - it opens with its two weakest songs. The title track in particular isn't a great introduction, and I'd even go as far as to call it annoying, but as you spend time with the record the rest of it opens up and proves itself to be quite creative and enjoyable. I'd even go as far as saying it's the best thing to come out of "djent" since that genre's timely demise in around 2015.

And the reasons for that is that the djenting is quite superficial - the band don't rely on the chugs or the genre cliches to write their songs, and these songs could all work perfectly well with any other style of production around them. The star here is undeniably Andy Robison, both for his vocal performance and his excellent keyboard work. The melodies here, particularly in "Starseeker" and the closing epic "Coalescence" are nothing short of fantastic, sounding more like Radiohead than Periphery. He consistently finds ways to find hooks in small twists and turns that keep the songs in the latter half of the album completely engaging, and the melodic synth lines add to it with some influence from post-rock and ambient music coming through. As someone who was never really a fan of the djent sound, this is an album that you can quite easily ignore it and focus on the songwriting and melodies.

7.1 (4th listen)

Part of my listening diary from my facebook music blog - www.facebook.com/TheExoskeletalJunction

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