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This rather brutal progressive metal music has something very primitive: the extremely guttural lead vocals will make you think the singer is a Neanderthal; at the same time, there are omnipresent robotic voices that give a slight futuristic touch to the music. The rhythmic guitar and the overall sound are rather gross, so do not expect a crystal clear razor sound coming from the omnipresent riffs. The melody is pretty hard to decode in most of the tracks. The drums are fast and elaborated, and the presence of fretless bass is appreciable mostly during the more mellow bits. It seems the tracks are more interesting when the rhythmic guitar riffs stop, leaving the room to miscellaneous distortion-free guitar notes, which clearly remind progressive bands Gordian Knot and King Crimson. Even the brutal rhythmic electric guitar has similitudes with the ones on the Gordian Knot's tracks, except the music is faster here. There are some good modern keyboards, but they are very rare. The unmelodic & inelegant throaty lead vocals lower the global rating of this record. One must keep in mind that these guys as VERY talented, as reveals "Textures", a rather jazzy instrumental track a la King Crimson of the 80's: the fretless bassist has really the Jeff Berlin's style, and the guitarists have nothing to envy from Adrian Belew & Robert Fripp!

Rating: 3.5 stars