SPHERES

Up to this point they were brilliant death metal band, but not on this album. Death metal was not enough for them. Not anymore. People call this jazz-fusion metal or other more or less fitting names. Jazz-fussion? Naah. I don't know, maybe it's Post metal? Space metal? The truth is it's simply different and unique. It comes from the era when metalheads were reaching out for another, unexpected inspirations and the genre was at it's peak of creativity. We had Cynic "Focus", Sepultura "Roots", Atheist "Elements", Pan-Thy-Monium "Khaooohs", Morgoth "Odium", Tiamat "Wildhoney" to paint you a picture. "Spheres" was as unique and brilliant as any of these grounbreaking records with clear tech-death metal roots still somewhat present but with much wider pallette of sounds. The guitars sound restrained and claustrophobic rather than crushingly heavy, far from typical death metal sound and revolutionary in it's own way. The synthesizers (guitar synths for that matter) unobserved before in the genre provide array of blops and bleeps and space soundscapes. Voice is closer to black metal shrieking (not quite though) than typical growl. It floats above all those quirky highly technical rhythms played on sterille, cold, deadly precise drums and riffs adorned with interplanetary soundscapes. To me it's a visionary work of genius and a five star album of progressive thinking metal. There is no other record like this.