Progressive Metal Music

Participants of this thread may enjoy this slightly uncharitable analysis of Sleep Token et al.

The channel has obnoxious video editing, but I've listened to quite a few episodes while doing stationary cardio with the ipad flipped backwards, which renders it a tolerable podcast.

(To be fair, I listen to Sleep Token every now and then. It just has too many sodium nitrates and mixed tocopherols to be on the menu regularly for my taste).

I’ve been getting the not a band called Orbit Culture lately. At first I didn’t really like it, but I’m a drummer and their drummer is really good. Someone who knows when to play hard and more importantly when not to. I don’t keep up with all the sub cultures of metal so I don’t know what you’d call them. Their newer stuff album Death above Life is good, but the older Album Nija has some serious Slaughter to Prevail foot speed going on.

Older faster stuff.

https://open.spotify.com/track/3l0aIfCxDyVzr6b2TMkVGE?si=uNJbuBWlQfWTAqfErRnCRw

Newer more melodic stuff.

https://open.spotify.com/track/1G0DY4wXNzUOlj15GncBON?si=QLHn2mCpRw6ZtGKy7wX19g

Salamanizer Ski wrote:

I’ve been getting the not a band called Orbit Culture lately. At first I didn’t really like it, but I’m a drummer and their drummer is really good. Someone who knows when to play hard and more importantly when not to. I don’t keep up with all the sub cultures of metal so I don’t know what you’d call them. Their newer stuff album Death above Life is good, but the older Album Nija has some serious Slaughter to Prevail foot speed going on.

love'em!

Totally, I started Nija today to get an idea of their sound and ended up thru-listening the entire record. They reminded me of Rivers of Nihil from the Owls days. "Open Eye" was probably my favorite cut.

Salamanzer, I also appreciated the subtlety within the sonic slaymation. Thanks for the rec!

This thread yielded some great listening experiences. I think I've redpointed at least one track from everyone who has contributed..

F r i t z wrote:

Participants of this thread may enjoy this slightly uncharitable analysis of Sleep Token et al.

The channel has obnoxious video editing, but I've listened to quite a few episodes while doing stationary cardio with the ipad flipped backwards, which renders it a tolerable podcast.

(To be fair, I listen to Sleep Token every now and then. It just has too many sodium nitrates and mixed tocopherols to be on the menu regularly for my taste).

Mentally preparing myself to throw this on in the background while I work, I tried to watch it last week and I had to put my head down for a minute cause of the editing and narration style lmao 

Gotta recommend Unloved by Frontierer, I've been bumping it heavily the past week or so. Almost all bangers! I wish Chad Kapper did clean vocals, I can't find any evidence that he ever has but he'd be one of my favorite vocalists if he had that versatility. 

adding one to the thread:

Cloudkicker

Side project of a professional pilot.

Every title is pulled from a black box recording, some the final words before a fatal crash.

A bit morbid in some ways, but beautiful and powerful stuff all the same:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Djent/comments/qu75xn/cloudkicker_beacons_the_spooky_transcripts_behind/ 

We're going in, We're going down - maybe the most intense composition on the album.

Amy, I love you - Co-pilot survived but man what a thing to say right before crashing.

Brent Kelly wrote:

adding one to the thread:

Cloudkicker

Side project of a professional pilot.

Every title is pulled from a black box recording, some the final words before a fatal crash.

A bit morbid in some ways, but beautiful and powerful stuff all the same:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Djent/comments/qu75xn/cloudkicker_beacons_the_spooky_transcripts_behind/ 

We're going in, We're going down - maybe the most intense composition on the album.

Amy, I love you - Co-pilot survived but man what a thing to say right before crashing.

Fucking Solid!  immediate new fan.

if you know they are possibly going to be the last words you speak make them good

B B wrote:

For the ones who like opeth, check out Steven Wilson. Good song to start with would be “the holy drinker” 

Kinda like opeth but… jazzy? 

I'm a year and a half late, but FYI that Steven Wilson and Mikael Akerfeldt did a collaboration album under the name Storm Corrosion. It's more doom folk(?) than metal but it really hits on a windy fall day. 

+1 to Beacons, it's such a solid album

I'll plug Russian Circles, they're post metal and not technically prog, but Mike does a lot of tapping and almost exclusively uses alternate tunings. Their song Death Rides a Horse is a good intro. They're also putting a new album out next month!

Jeff Mac wrote:

I'm a year and a half late, but FYI that Steven Wilson and Mikael Akerfeldt did a collaboration album under the name Storm Corrosion. It's more doom folk(?) than metal but it really hits on a windy fall day. 

Steven Wilson produced a bunch of Opeth's albums, Blackwater Park, Damnation, Deliverance, which is why In Abstenia is so much heavier than Lightbulb Sun...

F r i t z wrote:

Participants of this thread may enjoy this slightly uncharitable analysis of Sleep Token et al.

When I first heard about Sleep Token someone had told me that it was a project by members of Slice The Cake after that band broke up. I was confused and very disappointed....

Some black/death stuff albums I've been spinning lately:

Serpent Column (for fans of Krallice, Ash Borer): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQGCbY0wsz8

Orbit Culture (for fans of Gojira, In Flames): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z5KP0qRS3M

Oranssi Pazuzu (for fans of Blut Aus Nord, Schammasch): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptWbrHlufCY

Steven Wilson jazzy? RLMFAO

If we go the darkness road...Still hands down to Behemoth. The conceptual long songs are real 666.

somehow reminds me of GodFlesh.

Working my way through this latest crop of recommendations, thanks to all. I've been revisiting the BTBAM discography after many years but am trying to give some space between records.

Re: Russian Circles ... I don't know if this is a character flaw of mine or what, but I have a hard time getting into any instrumental record that is not classical. I really do like Russian Circles' sound in every other way.

Anyways, here's a cut from an Opeth album that I often overlook.

Enjoyed that Charlatan song, Fritz! Thanks for sharing.

I remember listening to Russian Circles back in the day when the Pandora genre-match radio algorithm was new and I was obsessed with post-rock. I'll have to give them another listen.

Fritz, seems like you might not be an EITS fan, since they are instrumental but far from classical. It's fascinating that your personal psychology doesn't enjoy instrumental music unless it's classical. I was raised on my mom's classical appetite, and when I was introduced to Explosions in the Sky, I finally began to understand classical music as Music with a capital M, and the emotional depth of it, not just "pretty sounds for a few minutes".

This is one of their more uptempo songs. Curious to hear what you think about it, Fritz.

It's a reference to this scene from The Thin Red Line, and the song is in someways and adaptation of Samuel Barbers - Adagio/Journey to the Line, which underscores this scene:

The context is certainly pretty metal:

Is it progressive metal? No unless you take an incredibly broad definition of the term, but its amazing 

Brent Kelly wrote:

Curious to hear what you think about it, Fritz.

I appreciate the personalized recommendation with a subtle challenge embedded.

I like what I've heard of EITS from what you shared and some of their other work on Spotify, but I guess I find myself not always finding the right context for listening to it.

Since I'm not commuting for the summer, I find myself mostly listening to "my" music when I'm warming up in the Crimp Crib or doing housework. Both of those tasks require me to overcome significant inertia, so I tend to pick something high-velocity.

I almost never listen to music when projecting, though, so maybe this would be a good application for instrumental.

Love it! Thanks for explaining! To be clear, wasn't intending a challenge so much as invitation.

I was introduced to EITS as a teenager joyriding in the summer evenings with my high school buddies as we were coming of age in terms of musical exploration. For me it's been fitting for meditative scholastic study sessions and highway listening at sunset while road tripping.

Fully understand now, though, the/your mentality behind uptempo mega-energy prog metal.

Reminds me of Michael Burry using metal to clear his mind while swimming/drowning in numbers.

I loves me a good wall of sound.

Aaron Kolb wrote:

Is it progressive metal? No unless you take an incredibly broad definition of the term, but its amazing 

Has elements of prog, very set all along, but definitely post noise/post hxc. Composer major here. kinda hard not to go to analysis

Like it.

Reminded me of this Scandinavian  gem:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjuD3FlzeU8

Produced by Anders Frieden.

Ignacio Van Oosterwyjk wrote:

 Composer major here. kinda hard not to go to 

I know I don't speak for everyone but as an uneducated music enthusiast, I absolutely love it when educated musicians analytically describe what they are  hearing in the music. Hoping you can share more inaights.

I was listening to this today and wasn't sure whether to post it as its pretty out there, but I will anyway as it's one of the very best and most different metal albums to come out in the past couple years.

And if you don't like that, here's a classic that everyone should enjoy