V

Five - 5 - Fünf - Fem - Cinque - Whatever your language is - this is the number of hours I listened to this album for straight upon first receiving my promo. I can in no way hide that I am a humungous fanboy of the Western Australian wonder that is 'Voyager'; a band that dominates the live stage every bit as much as their spectacular albums of melodious, rich, and energetic music. I first had the pleasure of hearing about Voyager on their 'I am the reVolution' tour after friends made the short trek up to the central coast to a little dingy music venue in Wyong on the NSW Central Coast. I was blown away by the sheer triumphant force of the band as well as the great mixture of synthetised backdrops against groovy and boppy metallic guitars which form a syrup, if you will, of New Wave meets Pop twixt Metal. My love affair with this peculiar yet homogenous sound and great bunch of guys and girl has been waiting with bated breathed on this release. After placing their last album in one of my top records for 2011 in combination with it having some of the best production I have ever heard in metal and all genres alike - this release had Krusty the Clown sized shoes to fill to even match the last release, and to exceed it overall would be borderline impossible. It's not often that I get the inpiration to write such an in-depth and brutally honest review but I feel it would be daft of me to skim it but on the surface.

Hyperventilating - The trance fused synthetised fury of frontman Daniel Estrin immediately tell me to hold onto my arse for a proceeding riff, I could feel the promise of djenty sackrattling from the get go. Holy hell - this is killer. The secondary nature of the guitars that support Voyager's popular songwriting curve that they have sometimes been criticised of is completely dismissed right-off-the-bat. Fierce pumping grooves move you and I mean they really move you. Not for one second are force-fed this 1-note djentstick garb at all - this is fresh, 2014, harmonic and interesting riffage that elated me. The Milton Cleans enter and it's not doubt what the influences have been on the band since 'The Meaning of I' but it comes off as the opposite of contrived. It is a mutated Cyclops growing and extra arm to generate more of itself. It is Voyager^2. All the hooks, all of the guitars (especially the playful phrasing of Scott Kay's first guitar solo to Simone Dow's diminished flurries) , the newly found presence of some slap articulations by Alex Canion to thicken the barrage of groove, and the punchy beats of the Dood take everything successful on the title track of their previous release including its more contemporary guitar tuning to make the perfect opener to this album. Terrific!

Breaking Down - From the suggestions of an eponymous record title, to the insanely supported crowdfunding campaign, there was a great deal of mystique around this release for me and I couldn't wait to get my first taste of the album. As a funder of the record, I was rewarded with an early taste of this track and to my surprise, I was worried. I did not like this song on first listen, or second, or fifteenth. I thought it may become more entertaining after pondering how funny it may be to count how many times the song could say the words "breaking down". It wasn't and I lost track at over 100, I'm sure. This song is just derivative and lacking substance and I felt as though it was so conventional and simple that it almost felt like the band thought they'd see how little they could put into a song and still have the fans like it. I know this is definitely not the case but it made me feel like Voyager thought I was stupid. This may seem overtly harsh and it's not meant to come across that way, it's simply my reaction and this is coming from a guy who can enjoy Katy Perry, Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears. I am not allergic to well constructed and simple pop but this has just deserved a permanent skip from me when listening to the album and without it, I'd probably have given this album very close to a perfect 10 out of 10. Most certainly not a worthy addition to the album to my ears.

A Beautiful Mistake - Dirty, gritty, PHAT bass and drums open the track like a hammer on amphetamines, immediate transcendence as a Devyesque lydian riff takes us soaring to the heavens. Somehow this song blends this sonorous, otherworldly quality with its lush keyboard pads against a four-to-the-floor Tommy Lee beats for a perfectly progressive piece of metal. Bonus Devy points to the lovely female vocalist ?emyna Kuliukas at the end of the track which washes into blissful sirendom to lead us into what I call a "Danny Song".

Fortune Favours the Blind - From as early as I heard 'Without a Sigh', I adored these interlude pieces that Voyager throw in to keep the dynamic curve of their art refreshing. The synthscape, the tribal drumming and the beautiful vocals channel Simon LeBon at his creative highpoints in Arcadia. With thematic links this is the 'V' equivalent of the 'Feuer Meiner Zeit' - 'Fire of the Times' 1-2 sucker punch; however far more engaging.

You, the Shallow - Everything about this song from its bounce to it's great riffs, powerful vocals which are stretching Estrin to new extremes. The atmospherics builds before the solos, the half-time head nodders, the leads themselves - this is perfection territory and down to that little moment where the bass and guitars do a little unison lick under the solo where the kicks follow and where some of the guitar hits are high-passed heavily; it's these moments of fairydust that get me smiling. Well executed magic. The vocal melody at 1:56 is melancholic and shows a desperate malfeasance that I don't think I have heard from Daniel in the past even at emotional peaks like in 'The Pensive Disarray'.

Embrace the Limitless - Lofty and floaty, like strolling through and alien garden - this is Voyager's uniqueness here. With sweeping arpeggios that feature again to punctuate the fat guitar syncopations of the song's chorus, it's pretty much everything I love about Voyager in a song. The harmonic structures and rhythmic figures are so much more interesting than what the band has experimented with previously. This is a fine balance of everything that is nice in modern progressive music. The vocals are spectacular and Estrin pushing himself to his limits and showcasing a beautiful falsetto that hasn't been heard in the same function on past efforts. The octaved vocals in the outro tag serve only to exemplify the serenity that the band are able to achieve in their compositions further. One of my favourites on the album.

Orpheus - Once again, interesting keyboard playing and a very driving beat by Ashley Doodkorte, makes this probably one of the most progressive tracks and one of the only tracks that alludes to the neoclassicism of much of the band's first two albums. Delightful arppegiators pepper the song with momentum and sheen. Thankfully, Alex Canion's vocals are not mixed into the background like with the last record, which I always felt to be a crying shame. He has a terrific voice and is emotive to the core - one would only be brought to such a state of catharsis from his performance on cult-band Noctis where he shows many of the sides that he brings as a musician and vocalist; a truly inspiring Australian musician.

The Domination Game - This song channels Symphony X vibes for me with its busy, techy riffs and this is fused with an earworm chorus and some great compositional devices in the form of sweet drum hits before the choruses. From the pen of Grand Canion, we are given a tremendous breakdown at 2:40 and a flawless vocal departure and we are left pensively in disarray over spiritual eeriness. The solo is a subtle duet between Kay and Dow with the latter providing tasty lickage to conclude the section. This will be a live favourite, of that I'm sure.

Peacekeeper - This is really more of an alternative rock song with a bit of a harder edge and once again we are visited by Estrin's glorious, impassioned vocals. This is a pretty straight forward song and should have been duplicated to replace 'Breaking Down' (ok, I've said enough on that). The vocal adlibs that conclude this piece are also something I haven't heard from the band before - very touching.

It's a Wonder - I am reminded of what Norther or Children or Bodom would perhaps sound like if they were born inside a pyramid stone. The opening riff is exceedingly awesome, the rest of the song is strong but not a favourite of mine. The riff at 2:45 is some solid stuff though and there is a zaniness akin to bands such as Leprous.

The Morning Light - Normally I would not be such a fan of rerecordings appearing in the middle of an album as it ruins the flow of a new presentation, but I have been one of those pesky fans that has been enthralled by this song in its live state and always wanted it with the new Voyager production. This is the world's greatest and most likely unintentional homage to the Terminator theme. It is what you'd expect and hope it to be - a rad remake of a song that you love. "I break the ice and time stands stills" - this section of the song has almost been a lump of dairy curd to me though and no remake will change that for me. I really loved hearing this and I am happy the keyboards retained their dominance.

Summer Always Comes - Tearjerking... literally. This track had sombre tears running down my face on the first listen with that glorious wide piano sound, heart wrenching vocals, and a climactic build which makes me feel lost like I were the protagonist of the most important story told. Not a semblance of me was underwhelmed by this piece. Beautiful darkness through light. The segue on that suspended chord works a treat into Seasons of Age.

Seasons of Age - A brilliant finish to this record - with some of the most chordally adventurous sounds that band have put to tape. Brilliant guitar leads, monolithic end riffage and tribal drumming that will wow you not because of the technical prowess, but simply because of how the total package makes you feel. Somehow the month of October will always belong to Peter Steele now and the Transylvanian inflections employed by Estrin suggest that it does for him and the band too.

Production - The production on the album is crisp, powerful and punchy but there is always a risk when you go the whole hog and get Jens Bogren to produce one of your records. Everything should sound like a downgrade in comparison and expectedly this is. Whilst the only flaw of the 'Meaning of I' to me was that the mastering was a little too loud for headphone listening at full enjoyment, this albums remedies this slightly with most tracks sitting at DR6 and DR7 yet the overall sound is still not as refined with a bit of lost definition in the drum overheads, grainer and sometimes lazier gating on the guitars between syncopated sections (especially apparent on Hyperventilating). One thing I would like to hear from Voyager is a bit more of a saturated guitar sound to carry some of the leads a little further especially in the tapping sections. The hyper-produced vocals are a trademark of Voyager's sound and I love. The attention to detail with delays and effected layering is what I've come to expect - world class. There is a weird hype at 3-5kHz too which I would have brought down to smooth the albums sound and reduce fatigue for repeated listens.

Overall - 'V' is in every way the eponymous self-defining album Voyager needed to make with a few flaws to my ears. I would say it's the band's most progressive release to date and probably the most well rounded but let down by 'Breaking Down' for me and a little bit by the impossibility of competing with Jens' production on the last record. The songwriting and performance as a whole is breathtaking and this will be sitting high on my albums of the year for 2014. I am Voyager and I give this a 9.25/10.

Australian band VOYAGER probably merits a description as a veteran act at this stage, with a history going back to 2000 and a grand total of five full length albums to their name starting with "Element V" in 2013 and with "V" from 2014 as their most recent production at the time of writing. This latter CD is released through IAV Records, which I guess is a label set up by the band themselves, and is distributed through Nightmare Records.

The music scene in Australia have always been one I've never heard that much about, for some reason or other, but the ones I have come across in the last few years in one way or another documents that this is a music scene that produce plenty of quality bands. Voyager can safely be placed inside that context with their very own take on progressive metal.

I'm really impressed with what Voyager have accomplished on this album. It's not like they have discovered any new variety of progressive metal, the elements they use and utilize are all familiar ones throughout. They obviously enjoy a specific subcategory of metal called djent, at least the greater majority of their compositions feature riff constructions that gives me instant associations to that style even if not all of them may follow the technical description of that style. I'll leave it to the technical oriented nerds to make the final call on that one. To my ears this sounds like djent or djent-oriented material however, although used in a more careful and dampened variety than many other bands exploring similar waters. Tasteful keyboards supplement and compliment quite nicely, both for the aforementioned parts as well as when the bands opts for a more traditional Dream Theater school arrangement with majestic riffs and keyboards and when they shift to more pf a power metal based expression with galloping riffs and bass. This latter aspect more of a rare guest at this particular party I might add. There's also a piano ballad present, given a nice but perhaps a tad too predictable orchestral inspired coating.

All of these are familiar elements, as stated, and that Voyager have a drummer willing and capable to add more sophisticated details to his rhythms and that vocalist Daniel Estrin has a mesmerizing, powerful and melodic delivery doesn't present anything new either, although both of them do elevate the total experience due to the sheer quality of their performances.

The unfamiliar aspect of this album, the creative trump card if you like, is in their approach. This is fairly sophisticated and often quirky progressive metal that is positive and fun. Joyful, vibrant and energetic progressive metal may sound like an oxymoron, but that is what Voyager create and explore brilliantly on "V". Music that will make you smile, sing along and lighten even the cloudiest day of your life. I can't pinpoint any particular aspect of their material as to just why this album and these compositions turns out that way, but they do so. That the songs generally are compelling, that the darker aspects are dampened in nature and that the use of keyboards and keytar covers many songs in a lighter toned coating is part of the answer I guess, the vibrant and positive lead vocals of aforementioned vocalist Estrin is another. just as important are the riff constructions, bouncy and playful by accident or design, alongside keyboards, synths and keytar that also adds many fine, playful details to the table of the kind that will bring a smile to your face.

Quite a few of the songs at hand are highly accessible too when seen in the context of mainstream appeal. Opening track Hyperventilate have been chosen as the first single, personally I think that the shorter Embrace the Limitless has a strong potential in that context too. Concluding track Seasons of Age might have been an even stronger candidate if the band had opted to continue exploring the themes in the first half of that song, and while the concluding half is a most satisfying run from a progressive metal fans point of view it isn't one that will have the broad appeal a single needs to have, at least as far as my opinion goes. Just about the only slight negatives I can mention is that on two occasions Voyager doesn't manage to create such a vibrant and positive atmosphere, and then the end result isn't quite as compelling. A subjective point of view of course, and for the curious this applies to the songs The Morning Light and Summer Always Comes Again.

If you enjoy melodic progressive metal and don't mind encountering plenty of djent and djent-oriented details, Voyager's latest album "V" should be fairly high on your list of productions to check out. And if you find the notion of a band creating fun, positive and vibrant music within that stated context intriguing, music you want to hum, sing and even dance along to, then chances are that this CD will end up in your top 5 albums list of 2014, and fairly high on your top list of albums from this decade as well I suspect.

Yet another spectacular album from Voyager. Vocals, guitars, bass, drums, production, songwriting, harmonies, arrangements...all near flawless.

It's nice too see bands like Leprous and Voyager churning out brilliant, melodic progressive metal masterpieces at this rate. Einar Solberg and Daniel Estrin provide world class vocals for their respective world class bands.

There are so many infectious tunes on this, and so far it's my album of the year.

This album is not perfect. Some of the 13 songs are merely excellent and not sublime.

Highlights include - The Morning Light | Orpheus | You, the Shallow | Embrace the Limitless | Breaking Down | Summer Always Comes Again | Seasons of Age | Peacekeeper... and all the others.

There are no weak tracks, but the chorus of track 1 is the only part of the album I really don't like, which is a shame because I absolutely love the verses of that first song.

The second half of the album, starting with track 7-Orpheus, might be the slightly stronger half.

Rating - 92 / 100

Voyager is one of those bands that seemed to just come out of nowhere and knock me off my feet with their 2011 album, The Meaning of I. I'm not sure that I've heard a more catchy prog metal album since (or a catchier album in any other metal genre, for that matter). The level of hooks that this Perth-Australia group provides is incredible, and just about every song on that album stood out. Furthermore, their blend of modern prog metal with 80′s electronic and synth pop elements made them a band that quite literally sounded only like themselves. Basically, Voyager's last output was so great as to create the risk of becoming a looming mountain that would potentially cast a shadow over all future output. Perhaps in light of all this, the band chose quite a bold naming scheme for the follow record: V. As should be obvious to the fans, the title itself becomes a sort of double representation, standing for both the band's name and this record's chronological place in their catalog. It is precisely this combination of meanings that speaks to the special place of this release, a sort of statement that this album is all about Voyager, that they've realized themselves as a band and that this album is here to show it. Assuming this is true, it is a bold move indeed.

V certainly starts it off right with "Breaking Down" and "Hyperventilating," some of the most addictive tracks on the album. Right from the start "Breaking Down" is basically a buffet of hooks, while "Hyperventilating" capitalizes on its oscillation between powerful, pounding riffs, serene melodies, and fantastic use of electronics. Simone really channels her inner Steve Vai on this one as well, something that brought a seriously big grin to my face. These two tracks immediately show a band that continues the tradition of extremely focused composition and simultaneously sees them going the extra mile in the studio in terms of production qualities, perhaps even being over-produced for an extreme level of punchy- ness that brings to mind the type of production commonly seen in recent 'djenty' bands.

Unfortunately, after these first couple of tracks the fear started to sink in. I felt the album starting becoming 'less interesting.' The followup, "A Beautiful Mistake," while not quite being on the level of the preceding tracks, had some really rockin' drum/guitar riffs and a great female guest-vocal, but at some level, it became noticeable despite the fact that all of the right hooks were here there was something that just wasn't grabbing my attention as I'd hoped (a trend which continued on "You the Shadow" ). "Embrace the Limitless" is perhaps the song that revealed to me what was really going on here and helped some of the middle of the album grow on me. There's just a few of these songs that had sections that didn't do it for me and I would kind of get lost or drift off because of it (this being the case particularly on "Embrace the Limitless," a song whose chorus doesn't appeal to me but is otherwise an amazing track). At the moment in which I realized that pretty much most of these tracks had some elements I loved, they finally started growing on me.

Luckily, the few middle tracks that weren't to my liking didn't equate to a bad album; on the contrary, Voyager's latest offering was seriously delicious. Picking up at the 9th track, "Peacekeeper" delivers something very special with its melancholy atmosphere, huge keyboard textures, and some vocal moments from Danny that really shine. "The Morning Light" throws down a big ambient intro breathing echoing percussion in the distance under soaring synth leads and some wide keyboard textures that do a fantastic job at prepping us for a seriously headbanging mid-tempo groove. The repeating vocal motif and variations, both lyrically and melodically do just the right trick in building tension as subtle chord changes and loads of emotion carry this piece home, making it one of the strongest recordings on the album (despite the fact that it is a re-recording of an older track). Finally, the brief pop ballad "Summer Always Comes Again" breaks up the metal moods and really delivers the goods on an uplifting tune before taking us to the closer, "Seasons of Age" where heavy drums and bass allow lots of room for a distinctively modern approach to keys and guitars to come through. An excellent chorus that is fun and poppy in the way that Voyager does best, along with some surprising, but well executed sludgy riffing, make for a strong ending to V.

All in all, V proves to be a strong testament to the hard work, diligence, and all around creative prowess of Voyager. This thoughtfully composed, well performed, and thoroughly produced collection of tunes has grown on me more and more with each repeated listen, showing that despite the reputation of The Meaning of I that it had to live up to, V is a downright worthy album in its own right.

Just a perfect album of prog metal emotional beautiful am just hock every song just wake something and interest me with different pictures and colors of sound This is the best prog metal of the years for me fast to furious it just stay melodic and wow On my first listening I really like but after time certain music well This is not the case give me more please just love this ( looking for music [email protected] ) what I simply love about this album you can not expect what next 13 extremely good songs I been on prog music for 45 years and prog still surprise me because album like this Just amazing