LEVEL 2

'Level 2' - Last Chance To Reason (8/10)

Disregarding the fact that it seems like every other melodic metal band with keyboards out there today is calling themselves 'progressive', the modern face of prog metal has been passed down to bands like Animals As Leaders, Periphery, and more recently, Last Chance To Reason. Here is a band that has only released their first major-label effort this year, and already shows plenty of promise for the years to come. Merging the sounds of a few progressive metal legends, Last Chance To Reason forms a sound that almost exclusively draws its influences from within the prog metal umbrella, and seeks to create something of an ultimate experience of the genre. As one might expect from this formula, there is little truly new that the band offers, but they do rather incredible things with what they have.

Seeing Last Chance To Reason live opening for Obscura demonstrated to me that this was a band who amazed on every front when it came to musical virtuosity. Apart from having one of the best mixed sounds I have ever heard in the live setting, each member brought something exciting and technical to the table. Last Chance To Reason's frontman Bob Delaney even proudly exclaims at the beginning of their set that they are 'progressive metal'. Sure enough, both the live performance and recording of this band tend to indicate that Delaney was making no understatement. It must be some feat in itself, but Last Chance To Reason manages to touch on virtually every cliche and convention of prog metal, save for a twenty minute epic. While I might be inclined to hate a band like this, the way in which the band executes it is far too well done for me to dismiss.

Musically, the primary influence I am hearing is Cynic, particularly their new, more song- based incarnation. The music is melodic, yet viciously technical, with time signatures being tossed around like pizza crust. The biggest similarity to Cynic are actually Bob Delaney's vocals, which are often clean and sound filtered through that Paul Masvidal vocorder thing that makes Cynic somewhat controversial among metal fans. The clean vocals work very well with the instrumentation; they bring melody to the table, but rarely get intense enough to distract. There are also growls here, but they don't work so well. Maybe the biggest conflict I have with the music of this band are their lyrics and concept. The body of the band's work revolves around video games, and apparently coincides with a larger project where this music is set to a video game. While it does not impede the technical proficiency of these players, the lyrics come off as cheesy and often reverting to technobabble, as opposed to poetic metaphors, and the sort of lyrics I most appreciate.

'Level 2' is a pretty amazing album in many regards, and while the band's influences are very clear even from the first listen, Last Chance To Reason's bombastic approach makes them recognizable and impressive. The drawbacks are few, but noticeable enough. All the same, I have no trouble believing that Last Chance To Reason's 'Level 3' (or whatever they will call their next album) will be a real hit, even moreso than this one. LC2R are a band to look out for.

It's utterly amazing just how different this album is to 'Last Chance To Reason's" debut. I originally expected some sort of evolution from the raw, unpolished sound of 'Lvl ', but this has such a different sound to it in basically every way, with more technical instrumentation with some aspects of djent, along with a style similar to BTBAM. The vocals no longer sound so poor and messy, with much greater focus on clean vocals, keeping the screams and growls, but simply using them far less frequently, and with far more power behind them. I also like the increased use of synth, as it gives the album a slightly closer feel to what I'm assuming what was intended, considering this band bases its ideas on video games, making the slight electronic aspect fit quite well. However, I find how similar this album can sound to BTBAM's 'Parallax' albums at points to sometimes get in the way of my enjoyment, as the style is incredibly similar, albeit less quirky here.

I definitely find that the songs on this album with the clean vocal hooks throughout to be the better ones on the album, as some of them sound incredible, particularly on 'Programmed For Battle', where the pace picks up wonderfully while the synths in the background make it sound like some epic space adventure. I also find that while some tracks early on don't really do much for me, the album improves exponentially once 'Programmed For Battle' starts, as the album becomes somewhat less generic, along with balancing between technicality and catchiness well. There are some more interesting ideas, along with a much grander sound that's backed up by some more interesting moments, such as the bass solo in 'Portal' or the various moments where some breakcore influence can be heard.

Overall, there aren't really any massive flaws in this album other than the set of three weaker tracks after 'Upload Complete' and a sound that's perhaps a bit too derivative in parts. Other than these, the album definitely ticks a lot of boxes, being really technically impressive while also being enjoyable to listen to. It's compositionally interesting, with the synths and clean vocals giving the listener some extremely memorable moments, along with being enjoyably fast paced. The vocals are also pretty great, as was expected considering Michael Lessard is also the current vocalist for 'The Contortionist'. There's definitely some room for growth and developing more of an identity, but even with what they have at the moment, it's clear that the band has a lot of potential and will likely go on to make some really great music.

Best Tracks: Programmed For Battle, Portal, The Prototype, Apotheosis

Weakest Tracks: Coded To Fail, Temp Files, Taking Control

Verdict: If you're into bands such as Between the Buried and Me and Cynic, then you'll likely enjoy this album quite a lot, as the heavy, sometimes chaotic nature of it will definitely appeal to such fans. I do also find this to be more accessible than such bands, mostly due to the more melodic approach combined with vastly shorter length of albums, making this possibly a decent starting point for people who want to get into such bands.