PROLOUD

Proloud is one of the unknown and yet undiscovered great progressive metal bands from Italy with sadly only one album rleased in 2002 named Rebuilding at Sublime label. From the start I will say that this album is a killer one, realy, one of the best prog metal albums I've ever heared and belive me I've heared hundreds of them in last almost 2 decades since my musical journey begun. I realy like this kind of prog metal, isamong hte best I can hear from this subgenre, with catchy melodic parts but combined very efficient with more metalic ones, the result is excellent all the way. From the first tune, ok the second one Fickle , the first being a short intro, the piece realy overwhelmed me with nice balance between melody and roughness and damn catchy chorus and fine musicianship, great great tune, maybe the voice of Giancarlo Mattei reminds me of Geddy Lee, but in the end not a bad thing. Musicaly speaking , there are a lots of instrumental passages, even an instrumental piece named Gethsemane very much in vein of Dream Theater or Empty Tremor, but well played with intricate moments and mood changes, also pieces are extremly well constructed with rythm changes, very strong are the guitar passages who are melted great with keyboards and drums. Another winner fror me is the piece Leave It To Nature, simply great great tune it contains all the ingredients a progressive metal pieces must have, great songwritting, excellent vocal parts, I realy like the voice of this Mattei very warm and with a great range, instrumentaly speaking it cointains beside prog metal passages some jazzy momemnts, the rsult is fantastic. Third best is the longest track from here almost 10 min named To Be On Fire a gem of a piece , this must sound progressive metal to me, complex, melodic in same time, keybords and guitars all over, great voice, what else this is a true great album.In the end , I will give easy 4 stars, maybe the album as a whole is not highly innovative , but contains some of the most pure and solid prog metal I've ever heared in years. Now about the packaging of the CD, fantastic, from the great almost black front cover art to the extended booklet, there are even post cards with drawings for each song of the album, realy awesome work, visualy. So, 4 stars a fantastic prog metal album that for sure needs a far better view. I was very impressed. Similar with Empty Tremor, Madsword and Dream Theater (Images and words era). Recommended for sure for any prog metal listner and not only , they will find some spectacular moments here.