Time to return to
and this time I’m glad to see that Ant has given me a progressive metal album to listen to. Whether I’ll like it is neither here nor there (I suspect I will) but at least it’s better than post-punk! Therefore we find at number
29 in his list
Artiste: Teramaze
Nationality: Australian
Album: Esoteric symbolism
Year: 2014
Label: Nightmare Records
Genre: Progressive Metal
Tracks:
All seeing eye
Lines of symmetry
Transhumanist
Bodies of betrayal
Parallels/Dual reality
Spawn
Punishment by design
Dust of martyrs
The divulgence act
Esoteric symbolism
Order out of chaos
Darkest symphony
In vitro
Chronological position: Fourth album
Familiarity: Zero
Interesting factoid: Teramaze began life as a thrash metal band called Terrormaze, but apparently after finding God (must not have hidden well enough!) they changed both their musical style and their name.
Initial impression: Black mass?
Best track(s): I’m not interested enough to choose either
Worst track(s):
Comments: It’s a pretty, er, esoteric opening, with dark stormy sounds and then what sounds like a choir chanting before the guitars punch through, allied to fine keys and I can hear the progressive now. Seems the opener is an instrumental, so we don’t get to hear what the vocalist is like until “Line of symmetry” hits, and he certainly seems to know what he’s about, with a lot of power and yearning passion in his voice. Some very expressive guitar too. Get a sort of a feeling of Threshold from this, while “Transhumanist” is faster and harder, and reminds me more of the late lamented Balance of Power. Some really smooth and beautiful guitar work in “Bodies of betrayal”, but so far I’m not hearing what Ant is apparently hearing. It’s good, there’s no doubt about that, but I don’t so far anyway see it as anything more than that.
I kind of feel the songs are struggling to find a hook they can use, and the previous track came close but fell short. They’re all good songs, in general, just nothing terribly memorable, or nothing at least that’s sticking in my mind or jumping out at me. Also, I feel the keyboards are not getting enough airtime here, with the guitars just bludgeoning them into almost submission. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but if you have a keyboard player in your band then I’d expect to hear him. There’s something of a change of pace for “Spawn”, but it’s still nothing I’d call remarkable. In fact, we’re now onto the tenth of thirteen tracks (it’s actually the title) and I can’t remember the ones that went before. Now I’m just bored, waiting for the end.
Okay, it kind of got better in the last few tracks but at this stage my interest is gone and I just could not be bothered.
Overall impression: Big disappointment, very flat and generic. Don’t get it.
Hum Factor: 3
Surprise Factor: -8
Intention: Wouldn’t be too bothered listening to more of their music to be honest.