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| Track by Track Review
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Terracide
The sounds of nature start this. Then some keyboard elements join. As it builds out from there it takes on a definite fusion sort of texture. As the song grows various bits of spoken word stuff comes over the top. It works out into some rather crunchy jamming that calls to mind Dream Theater quite a bit. I love the jam that is driven by some amazing bass work. This thing just keeps evolving and changing as it moves forward. This essentially segues into the next cut. |
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Volatilestial
With real vocals, there is a bit more of a mainstream rock sound to this piece. Mind you, it’s still distinctly progressive rock oriented and complex. It’s just more of an AOR thing in a lot of ways. Some of it doesn’t work all that well from my perspective, though. |
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Manifest Destiny
This powers in with a real metallic riff. It’s fast paced, hard edged and very cool. If the whole album were like this it would probably land under metal. Sure, it’s proggy metal, but metal for certain. |
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Oceanica Toxica
Coming out of the previous piece, this starts with a very melodic, mellower movement. It gets some metal built into it as it carries forward. The cut seems to blend something like Metallica with Dream Theater. The prog and metallic elements each take command at different times here. |
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Mammonific
Another that does a nice job of riding the line between metal and prog, this is more mainstream than some of the rest. The vocal arrangement is quite complex, though. The musical arrangement isn’t without its twists and turns, either. I particularly like the piano driven movement near the end. |
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Animaulic
Sounds of the ocean start this piece. The cut works toward more electronic stuff from there. A metal edge joins after a bit and the song continues to move onward. As the it evolves, it’s more of an AOR based prog rocker. Yes, there is some crunch here, but it’s more melodic prog than it is anything else. It does get into some spacier, pure prog territory late in the number, too. |
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Esoterica
I love the jamming on this. It has more of that spoken word stuff in the mix. There are some great moments of instrumental soloing, too. It’s a melodic prog composition with a lot of fusion in the mix. This instrumental is one of the classiest things here. |
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Crownet
I particularly like the multiple layers of vocals on this number. The cut has some cool melodic prog at its heart, but it also works into metallic territory at times. It’s a complex and ever changing piece of music, really. There are some particularly dramatic sections on this cut. |
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Obesite
With a great rather spacey prog arrangement, we get a break into jazzy jamming mid-track. |
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Ode to Joy
Here we get a technical metal turned prog rendition of this classical piece. |
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Cosmosera
There is a real soaring melodic prog vibe to the first parts of this. It works out to faster paced, more metallic territory later, though. It also has a break into something that could probably best be described as jazz metal. For my money, this is one of the most effective numbers here. |
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Vastificant
With a lot of jazz built into it, this jam is one of the best on the disc. It has a real space rock kind of vibe and at times makes me think of Red era King Crimson. It’s definitely a great way to end the set in style. Much like that King Crimson album, there is a space of silence at the end of this that seems like part of the song. |
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