THE TOWERS OF AVARICE

Like a great swathe of progressive metal bands, Zero Hour are somewhat influenced by Dream Theater, though their debut album is apparently where you will hear that the most. This followup to that is notably more aggressive and dark than Dream Theater; imagine if Megadeth at their most technically complex (say, on Rust In Peace) ended up incorporating just a bit more prog into their approach, and you'll end up with something not a million miles away from this, especially when it comes to Erik Rosvold's lead vocals.

The band seem to particularly like their staccato playing, and the absence of a dedicated keyboardist certainly helps to set their sound apart from Dream Theater - though there are keyboards on the album here and there, with no one member using them as their primary influence they are used for occasional extra texture, and the instrumentation is largely kept to a stripped-down core of guitar, bass, and drums.

It's all quite sparse and dramatic, but overall the band seem to be ploughing a fairly narrow furrow here - if you really like their overall style, you'll absolutely love the album, but I suspect most people won't want a ton of Zero Hour albums in this vein because the similarities become compositions become all too evident a mere two songs in.