SUBTERRANEAN MASQUERADE

Temporary Psychotic State is the debut EP from US progressive metal act Subterranean Masquerade. The two song EP was released in 2004 and has a playing time that says 17:21 minutes. I must admit that when I saw the name Subterranean Masquerade the first time I was instantly turned off. I thought to myself that it was a really foolish name and I imagined a bad Dream Theater clone. This is fortunately as far from the truth as possible and I´m really glad that I decided to give Subterranean Masquerade a chance after all because this is truly a unique and very eclectic band.

The music defies catagorization as there are both elements from acoustic folk and rock´n´roll to death growls and extreme metal and everything in between. What can be said about the music is that it is slow building and very interesting. There are lots of different parts in both songs and they never get boring or repetitive. The vocals from Paul Kuhr are really great. He adds a lot of emotion to the music. There is some really great violin playing in Temporary Psychotic State (A Recollection Of Where It All Began) which is the first song on the EP. Female vocals also appear in the second song called Observation Through Metamorphosis. The music is generally not very metal orientated but when the metal parts do appear they are pretty heavy with growling vocals. It´s actually pretty confusing music but also really unique and exciting.

The musicianship is excellent and I especially enjoy the great vocals from Paul Kuhr and the intriguing acoustic guitar riffs.

The production is excellent in the parts with acoustic guitar but not as good in the heavy parts. Those parts are a bit thin sounding and lacks bottom IMO.

I can only say that this is one of those very rare times where I have actually found a truly progressive and unique band. I honestly can´t tell you who have inspired Subterranean Masquerade because their sound is so different from anything else. A really exciting choice if you want to hear music which explore new ground. A deserved 4 star rating IMO. I´ll be looking forward to listening to their full length debut from 2005 called Suspended Animation Dreams to see if the eclectic style holds water for the duration of a whole album.

Eclectic music (well, also even a bit of extreme metal)

1. Opeth-like guitar passage, then smoothly jazzy Pekka Pohjola, vocal harmonies and different kind of instruments - so what we can expect for this album could be gentle retro prog and atmospheric (metal?).

2. Mild metal comes to picture with mild death metal vocals, and for example with modest violin the mildness maybe makes the song very harmonic and the moods can change freely.

3. Catchy weird heavy rock at the start(for example the beginning with only rhythmic and melodic singing like the briskness of "digging myself"), then heavier and more airy dresses, but the same concept of flowing. Reminds me of those common progressive rock oriented band in the clubs that wants to entertain everyone. Well, instrumental parts can be quite soft here, but the overall is a piece of art that has fairly enough different moods and for example the great piano and oriental feeling (including violin) at the end of the song makes it special and my favourite.

4. Kind of A Blur is like symphonic pop, instrumental movies fanfare music. Nice melodies and celebrating choir at the end. Says nothing to me.

5. A ridiculous heavy rock imitation right from the beginning, at least the sounds are rather awful, and somewhere it sounds.. gothic "death" rock, well I take Babylon Whores as representing the genre. But again, there's much more (basic things I've described earlier here) in this song. Piano reminds me even of Supertramp (and the symphonic pop in the bigger art concept). Song includes also some happy pop choirs in and the title "The Rock N' Roll Preacher" describes well the thing I see here. Though the song is not rock and roll. There's also some more ambient part with weird sounds, and right after that at seven minutes there's the real avant-gardism that I like much and actually haven't heard much like this: a bit funky soft sax still with simple drum rhythm and death metal vocals (reminding me of rap) in a layerly atmospheric symphonic pop form. And right in the middle, there comes a peculiar guitar solo, melody with very odd pitches and sounds reminding me of surf rock. THIS IS WHAT YOU HAVE TO HEAR.

6. The "symphonic pop" continues, but starts to sound folk metal, then it becomes to meander always without a warning: stronger epical melody, and the heaviness reaches its top when I hear the first double bass drumming. More traditional death metal stops or turns to violin and drum oriented and almost carnivalic. There's also more landscape painting, and all in between you can imagine of basic avant-garde metal band. This song is very good and when it's maybe the most diverse here this far, I think it's also the most harmonic.

7. First almost approaching to math metal, then slower atmospheric metal with female, choir (nice a bit odd harmonies!) and male vocals. At this point, at the latest, the band shows to be eclectic, and that's what makes it special. This is a long song and for example the choir comes again with nice and weird harmonic melodies and the thing is growing big, violin in the final. In the end, there's also quite fast space rock combined to melodic heavy metal, or that's the partition I get, thought the total is maybe more music like eg Amorphis (well, there's much more, and unfortunately these rhythms and melodies (here and before) are very usual even for the kinds of Opeth)

8. As a pop, this is great. Female singer a bit like Dido, very gentle and with soul, and this is very atmospheric piece, and this is progressive rock, mostly instrumental. Conclusion for the album. I like the last moments where I hear something like people counting by shouting.

I would like to give this album even four stars and I was just giving two when I realized it would be bad thing for "Six Strings to Cover Fear" and other great things here, or actually, the concept and, well, strangeness of for example pop things. Weird, haha.

Conclusion for the start: this is very nice music and I think you like it!

If this is the aggressive mood of Subterranean Masquerade, I thought I would skip their album Suspended Animation Dreams, because this is quite mellow. Maybe the other album has focused better on that side and it has got better ratings, too. But I got the other album. It's more divided (and more diverse) into mellow concept album symphonic pop and some kind of heavy metal, whereas this EP is more flowing, dark and psychedelic.

My disappointment doesn't mean that this EP is bad. It's quite atmospheric, air metal as I call it, with some violin and maybe even avant-gardistic elements (well, avant-garde isn't just odd instruments), maybe more like little bit odd landscapes and mild fusion of many styles (it isn't so apparent). The music is also slow and "beautiful", though flowing (having also faster rhythms beating up the folky swing - actually the main melodies are slower and the style showing them is quite much post-rock). Violin suits fine here, it's not tricking and it has very nice warm country sound and with some things makes this EP almost folk metal. There's also similarities with for example maudlin of the Well (that I think is more inventive..). 1. Temporary Psychotic State (A recollection of where it all began): Circus/Carnival/Amusement park theme is usual in avant-garde metal but in this, it's more just in the intro. The first thing I think about the music when it actually starts is Opeth. There's psychedelic melancholic feeling and the vocals are sounding quite good and warm. The song is growing to the end, for example getting more heavy and the vocals turn to death growl on doom metal. There's also some mellotron (sounding) choir ans electronic space elements. And I have to mention Finnish band Soundsleep's song Amity Between Life And Death, as it came into my mind listening this.

2. Observation Through Metamorphosis: I prefer this song, because it has more diversity. It goes few more times on quite waters, and coming back more "aggressive" in shorter notice, so it's basically much like the first song - maybe just more scary. It has also woman singing on the background, almost going Iranian psychedelic weeping.

After all, this is "common" atmospheric progressive metal, and I think many loves this. I was intending to give three stars, and some might give more, but because this EP isn't giving me much and because I know there's much music that I like more than this and that I must give three stars, I give only two, as an objective reviewer. There's tiny things that matters; if there was more songs and if they were more progressive, I'd gladly give for example four stars. Yeah, stars stars stars, blah blah.

Wow.

I discovered SubMasq some time ago, yet it wasn't until recently that I had aquired their album. To say the least, I was more than pleasantly suprised with this little musical abomination of sorts. Though I am already a huge fan of many bands that could concievably fall into the same category as this band (Mr. Bungle, Estradasphere, Kay Dot/maudlin of the Well), I find a distinct voice and style present in this CD, as well as the band as a whole, considering the plethora of Bungle-esque bands that seem to plague the whole scene, and the paradoxically unambitiious bands that plague this "unique" genre.

From the slightly eerie opening, to the brilliant outro song "X", this album really does it's job, wonderfully, of keeping the listener intrigued, and possibly slightly confused. Though there are a myriad of seemingly unrelated genres here, they seem to mesh together wonderfully. In reality, the only reason this band might be called "metal", or in this case "Prog Metal" is the interladen metal riffs, and the growled vocals. Though it obviously has it's influences from heavy metal, Opeth being a large influence, from what I can garner, it also has a vast pallette of musical influences that it draw's from. Song's like 'No Place Like Home' having a Middle Eastern World Music flare, to the strangely upbeat and interesting Rock and Roll Preacher, throwing in some nice Jazz implements near the end of the song. Even it's mainly metal oriented songs are laden with other influences, and strings are abundant throughout the whole album. (I must add, on somewhat of a side note, that the Harmonica solo at the beginnimg of NPLH is brilliant)

As an overall concept, the lyrics are difficult to decipher, and the story is odd and confusing, yet, it adds to the mystery and oddity of the whole concept. Though decipherable, the strange lyrics are one part of the whole mystery of the concept, as confusing as Tomer intended it to be. It took me several listens to fully grasp the lyrical content of the album. At first, I thought the lyrics (those that I could decipher, mind you) were somewhat juvenile or un refined, but after several listens, I found them to be quite intelligent.

All in all, an incredible find for me, and something I will look forward to in the future.

9.25/10 Stars

Avant-garde Metal at its finest.

Incredible output by this very Non-prog metal band. I say that not because they aren't progressive, but because this band/album is so much more than a generic prog metal band. If you're biggest complaint is that there's no thought/emotion in prog metal, this is an album you must own. It's not only extremely out there in many regards, but the songwriting is gripping and poetic. Just take a quick glance over the instruments used here. I'd like to think of this band as the doom version of Kayo Dot, in order to give some kind of comparison.

Wolf Among Sheep has an amazing impromptu chorus in the middle with lush chords and a quirky spring like sound that will have you dazzled. Despite the craziness that ensues, its incredibly well formed to keep a sense of structure rather than random ramblings that many avant style bands might fall into. What's most important is that there's enough here to keep you guessing, and to keep you coming back to the album searching for more.

I can't think of too many other projects pulled off like this with what seems like such ease. One can hope to expect many more outputs by this band of the same quality, as they have outstanding potential. A real gem in the field.

This was perhaps the first prog metal I ever came into contact with and boy was I lucky to discover this gem. This album features an amalgamation of several different genres - seemlessly, it's got jazz, death metal, prog and space rock and not only that it takes some of the best parts from each.

The albums starts out with the very chilled introductory song, a very fitting preface. The second song wolf among sheep (or maybe the other way around) is my favourite song on the album and also simply one of my favourite songs, it starts with a very beautiful acoustic section with a nice warm organ, a very good chord progression and some excellent harmonised vocal work. Then the song is cast into a burning pit of sludge and death metal whilst still retaining the musical complexity of the previous section (it has piano in this part and by god it somehow works), and then the release and we are greeted with some great violin work. Fantastically written music, very melodically rich, very dark and very rewarding.

No place like home is another fantastic song, a jolly song with some great harmonica and other stuff (invokes images of wind in the willows for me) and then we're cast into the pit with the death metal again but it is again melodically rich and tempered with violin and then we are sent into our warm cosy spacey world again.

Awake is the epic on the album and it too is a great song - melancholy, amazing female vocals throughout with some great vocal soloing going on around the 9 minute mark. it also degenerates into an ethnic freakout after some symphonic goodness and we end on a metallic note.

X is a great finale, beautiful, spacey, awesome black chick singing, climatic solo to finish it all off - outstanding.

A very very interesting, rewarding and different album recommended to most prog fans, I was a huge fan of this even when I didn't like metal at all that's how diverse this album is.

Before listening to this album the first time one should certainly expect the unexpected since the music we get offered here is absolutely impossible to categorize. Though usually being filed under progressive metal only 15 % of its contents in fact can be considered metal. Truly there are quite a few death metal type of growls, but those ones are very well woven into a fine drapery of lounge jazz, ethnic tunes, progressive rock, pop and who knows else type of music. Actually I'm not aware of ever having heard a similar record than this one (though I dare claiming to have a broad knowledge) and the only band sounding that much eclectic that comes to my mind is DISCUS from Indonesia. But the big difference to them is that Subterranean Masquerade succeeded even better since their record is much easier accessible than theirs. It's really big fun to listen how these musicians manage to merge all those different genres together to form a truly unique piece of modern art. Very often styles are changing a couple of time within the same track without making it sound blatantly or unbearable for the ears. Instead the songs here sound highly enjoyable, at times almost harmless and unspectacular.

"For the rest of this session, you might ask yourself 'Am I going crazy?"... this announcement after the opening intro speaks for the whole album. "Wolf Among Sheep (Or Maybe The Other Way Around?)" for example starts with acoustic guitar and whispering vocals before developing into a mournful solo on electric guitar, then a few growls for a short while which are soon thwarted however by warm string arrangements. The electric guitar returns uniting with the acoustic one later on, then there are enjoyable clean vocals combined with strings and the track finishes with a faster paced guitar solo. "No Place Like Home" is a blend of folk and ethnic tunes on flute, oriental type of vocals and jazzy piano sounds. "Kind Of A Blur" offers dreamy piano and string sections next to rather pop-ish sounding choir singing but despite its obvious simplicity this song is nonetheless a great one. In "The Rock'n Roll Preacher" we get to hear heavy guitars, a piano playing lounge jazz, acoustic prog reminiscent of the 70's and growls partly combined with sax tunes. "Six Strings To Cover Fear" is the only track here in a common prog metal vein and though being the easiest accessible one far away from being a dropout, quite heavy and sinister, but very strong. "Awake", longest track with 14 min consists of an awesome mix of orchestral sound, pleasant female vocals, heavy frowning growls and jazzy sections. Last track "X" is then a welcome recovery from this roller coaster trip and a perfect closure for this excellent album.

Hope my description doesn't sound too much alienating for most readers. Just trust me, the music doesn't sound by far that messy like it might seam. Everything fits together somehow in a great miraculous way and after a couple of spins one has the impression to listen to the most normal music in the world. Certainly this record won't please everybody; metal heads will find little here to be satisfactory and those having problems with growling will find only parts of it enjoyable. Nevertheless it's an excellent and unique one IMO and I'd highly recommend it to anyone having an open mind and a broad musical taste.

A short EP, but what great music!

The first chapter of the trilogy of an individual named X. It begins in his room, number 63, where he tells us his story abut his madness, his desires and hallucinations. And the music that he plays fits this mood so perfectly, you feel as if you are with him in his mind. You can feel his agony, his tormented soul, his psychological scars caused by the woodpecker in his head.

This band is the brainchild of Tomer Pink who wrote here the lyrics along with Yishai Swaerts (An Israeli metal figure and previously vocalist for Israeli metal bands Nail Within and Moonskin). Pink surrounded himself with very good musicians in order to achieve the best possible result, which he has. Every note here is carefully thought of, planned and carried out in a very good manner.

The first song starts with a tune that sounds as a park show amusement theme. Then you hear an acoustic guitar greeting you in, and a slightly mad voice welcoming you. Then the music starts and the violin makes sure you understand you have entered into a hall of insanity. The vocals at first are clear and "normal" and in the second part of the song change to death growls which are Paul Kuhr's specialty (He is the vocalist of Chicago's doom band November's Doom). The music flows on perfectly; creating weird, disturbing soundscapes that along with the lyrics make you wonder where the hell it is that you have wondered into. At about 4:20 begins the part that leads to the climax of this song. The lyrics and the music together create an effect that surpasses anything each one alone could have achieved. And then Paul switches to death growls singing abut his Psychotic State of Mind. His voice/growls just points out how much disturbed X is, and in how much pain he is. The music itself is so beautiful, making you sympathize with X, feel sorry for his pain.

Then the second song, starting again acoustically with the violin's perpetual company to warn us, this insanity is not over yet. In here we hear Susan Naud's beautiful vocal performance that perhaps personifies X lost love and his memories of her. Then the music changes again its style to the last part which is a cry for help.

The music is somewhat eclectic in that, that there are many genres blended perfectly into one composition. You get rock, metal, some folkish tunes (which the violin creates) and other bits of other styles - the result is progressive music that keeps on evolving all the time, not resting in its place, searching for more ways of developing and original.

The music is beautiful, the musicianship very good, the emotions expressed are overwhelming. A brilliant piece of work.

Wonderful album mixes doom, death, prog and some jazz metal into one great energetic display. The more I listen to this album, the more I like it. Grows on the listener in leaps and bounds. Very unique album from the great End Records, check out this one and some of their other great bands. Paul Kuhr from November's Doom provides a nice mix of death/clean vocals.

Oh... what a Masterpiece. The first time I heard this I nearly fell off the chair... It was jus like if all of my fvourite bands had melt together to forom something absolutely new and never heard... Rock, funk, jazz, death metal, gospel choirs, dark, classical... Progressive in its purest conception. Here it is not important who is the fastes guitarist or the drummer playing 9 bassdrums and 17 snares. Here what really matters are the emotions. And they rule in the "SAD" universe. To name a song would probably be a crime beacause I'd then have to name also all of the others but the 14 minutes of Awake are something that goes beyond words, beyond any classification, only to take place in that marvellous universe called Art. But as I already said, the same thing could be told of "No place like home" or "Six strings to cover fear". Everything perfect, music as it should be, in my opinion. Obviously you could also not share my opinion. but then I'd think you've heard the wrong album.