When it came to promoting their full length debut ‘White Noise’, Finnish prog metal band were taking no chances. The first digital single appeared almost a full year before the album itself, and they subsequently drip fed their potential fans different tracks over the following months. This was no hit and run PR campaign. What’s more, in an effort to attract a variety of ears, they ensured those early digital singles covered a lot of musical ground. It was a campaign that worked. For those who didn’t enjoy the melodic metal of ‘Drown’ – an In Flames meets progressive metal workout – there would be the epic ‘Inverted’, a tune where the band abandoned their metal stance and embarked upon a very unfashionable 70s sound. Hey, if that were good enough for Opeth, going massively retro could work for others, and in the case of this massively uncommercial single, it proved a master stroke for Darkness. If anything, it was that unexpected shift which genuinely stoked up the excitement for the album itself.
Tag Archives: prog
LALU – The Fish Who Wanted To Be King
Previously the keyboard player with Shadrane and Hubi Maisel, Vivien Lalu formed his eponymously named band in 2004. The idea was that the band would approach prog in a very unrestrained way, and also add contemporary elements to keep things interesting. Considering a lot of prog metal in the mid noughties seemed to consist of stuck-in-a-rut Dream Theater-isms – especially from DT themselves – and so much prog relied upon obvious influences, Lalu’s desire for a bigger and more interesting musical canvas wasn’t unwarranted. Of course, there were a few freewheeling, pioneering spirits then – not least of all Devin Townsend, always marching to his own drum – but prog metal definitely needed new blood at that time.
ROGER WATERS – The Dark Side Of The Moon Redux
Since Pink Floyd’s uneasy reunion at Live 8, Roger Waters has spent far too much time rubbing people up the wrong way. He isn’t shy in spouting angry political opinions via a webcam for the whole internet’s benefit, or offering other pointed opinions, even if they weren’t asked for. Following the release of the rather dull ‘Is This The Life We Really Want?’ – an album where the best arrangements seemed indistinguishable from lazy rehashes from a Waters past – his live shows became increasingly like political rallies with some songs thrown in. He’s spoken publicly many times about the war in Ukraine, siding with the Russians. He’s attacked British politicians, even stooping as low as to use disability hate speech against one MP. He was always a curmudgeon but, in 2023, the 80 year old ex-Pink Floyd bassist finally reached the point of being intolerable.
THE REAL GONE SINGLES BAR #20
Welcome back to the Real Gone Singles Bar, the place where we explore some of the individual mp3s that have landed in our inbox over the previous few weeks. For this twentieth selection, we bring you some light electronica with a souful feel, some sprawling prog rock, a brilliant cover tune, and more besides. As always, we make no apologies for the broad range of styles featured, and we hope you find something to enjoy.
*
VINCENT CARR’S SUMIC – Jupiter Wrens: Fantasias
It’s likely that you’ve never heard of Vincent Carr, but the multi-instrumentalist began releasing very interesting, largely instrumental work under the SUMIC name in 2014. Although easily labelled as “prog” due to its indulgent approach and complexity, the one-man project takes in a broad range of sounds and influences. On the very pastoral “Rekindled” (2016), the musical pieces drew heavily from folk and even hinted at influence from Freddie Phillips. On 2019’s more complex ‘New Paeans’, Carr wasn’t shy in sharing a love for Mike Oldfield, Steve Hillage and Gong, and the more recent ‘Strolling Early Morning’ did a fine job of blending all of those influences on a record that managed to be a little more accessible, yet no more commercial.