REVIEWS FROM MY VINYL COLLECTION

Tag: intronaut (Page 2 of 2)

INTRONAUT – Habitual Levitations (Instilling Words With Tones)

This is the fourth album from the amazing Intronaut – the most groove-tastic of all the Prog metal bands. The band have brought more melody to the table since the early days, and to me, are now the complete band. The songs are quite simple in structure, but it’s the layers that are added to fill out the sound, and the amazing rhythms, riffs and grooves that make them one of the most unique bands of the genre. They have their own sound and you know you are listening to Intronaut, which is great thing as they are able to stand out from the crowd.

Killing Birds is a monster opening track with all the trademark sound and tones. The Welding is just unbelievably awesome with its use of differing time signatures for nearly all of the instruments, plus the riff is so fat and huge, and the rhythm section is so tight. Steps is big, fat, and low with the riffage, and grooves hard – I love the harmony vocal. There is no widdly-flash-bastard soloing here, just superbly crafted pieces of modern metallic Prog goodness. A Sore Sight For Eyes is a beautiful piece with a perfect split of heavy and melody. Holy polyrhythms Batman!!! Milk Leg will have your brain scrambling for the abacus to keep time. Monster tune! The wonderfully named Harmonomicon is next, and is the most chill tune on the album. Back to monster riffage with Eventual, which does have a hint of Sabbath at the beginning. Blood From A Stone is all about the harmonies and melody. Close out track, The Way Down, is my favourite on the whole album. Lots of fat off time grooves and monster riffage to keep the toe tappin’ and the head a’ bangin’. The album that came after was perfect, and I love the way they keep growing and progressing as a band.

9.5/10 from The Grooveman.

INTRONAUT – The Direction Of Last Things

This is another one of those album where there are not enough superlatives in the dictionary to bestow on such greatness. It’s very hard to pigeonhole these guys as there is so much happening in the space of one song – never mind a whole album. I will call them tech-metallers with a hint of jazz and Prog. I think that covers most bases. With two killer guitarists, an amazing bass player, and an alien for a drummer – they will no doubt give extreme sounds of awesomeness.

Fast Worms is first up, and within the space of the first 8 bars I am in awe of their heaviness. So many twists and turns within the confines of one tune. Amazing! Digital Gerrymandering is next up, and it is another epic tune. It has lots of off time drum grooves and maximum riffage before the killer instrumental section just blows your mind – with maximum groove and riffs a plenty. The supreme groovy heaviness of The Pleasant Surprise follows, and is again another brain mash of a tune. Even when they take the pace down a notch with The Unlikely Event Of A Water Landing, the awesomeness does not let up. The monster Sol Ponticello crunches your brain with maximum effect – another great tune with lots of changes and big chuggas. The title track is next up and announces its arrival with supreme heaviness that grooves hard. The middle eight and breakdown really slows things down with the groove still intact before the heavy returns. Last track, City Hymnal is here oh so quick and is an epic ending to a truly great album.

I know death metal is fun when you are twelve, but when that wears thin you need something that is going to keep you enthralled and entertained for more than five minutes. This is another in the series of everyone should own one. It gets 10/10 from The Grooveman for just existing, another10/10 for the cover, and 10,000/10 for the musical content within the grooves.

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