KALISIA

'Sci-fi metal' might be the best way to describe this labour of love from French band Kalisia. Over six long years, 'Cybion' was very slowly recorded, although when it was released in 2009, it became clear that the effort had paid off. For a band that has been around since the mid-nineties, Kalisia certainly have not been anywhere near consistently productive as a group, but this one gem of metal makes me wish they were. This is a suite of epic progressive metal that pulls out all of the tricks and assaults the listener with one of the proggiest dishes metal has served in recent years.

Although the elements of 'Cybion' that Kalisia pulls out are covered in the cliche of prog metal, it is all fueled up in such a way that it feels like the prog metal album, the one that virtually defines where the genre is at nowadays, and hopefully where it's going. 'Cybion' opens in the most 'grand' of ways, that being a symphonic overture. Immediately, a listener is pulled into the mindset that everything that Kalisia throws at them will be larger-than-life, and for the most part, this happens to be true. The entire hour-plus runs as one sprawling epic of sorts, and once it leaves the launch pad and bursts into galloping metal, it rarely comes back up for air.

There is a very modern progressive death metal sound to Kalisia, with synths and guitars being used in almost equal capacity. The growled vocals of Brett Caldas-Lima are contrasted by multiple singers in the tradition of a metal opera. Speaking of metal operas, Ayreon is a very notable influence in the music of this band, and- wouldn't you know it- Arjen Lucassen has a cameo here, along with Angela Gossow (of Archenemy) and Paul Masvidal (of Cynic), to name just a few. The point being, whoever is pulling the strings behind Kalisia has done everything conceivable in order to provide an over-the-top experience.

A slight issue I may have with 'Cybion' is precisely the fact that it stays bombastic and 'epic', and never really comes down to give the listener a break. That may seem like a silly criticism to some, but taking into account the fact that this album is an hour and fifteen minutes long, 'Cybion' can be alot to take in all at once. There is everything here from symphonic orchestrations to death metal and jazz, but it all knells under a banner of sci-fi oriented prog metal, much in the tradition of Ayreon. Kalisia have churned out a masterpiece here, and I believe the long work and meticulous efforts they put into it show in the end result. Incredible stuff.

Bill has apologized to us four times since.

Instrumentally, the band is flawless, I hold no grudge against it. They're almost good enough to disregard all else with the album; but not so.

The vocals are where most problems come in. There are perhaps four singers and all of them sing for each character. Keiji is sung by three different singers and the same goes for most other characters. The growls are simply sung to be sung and not making an emotional point as they should. YOU DO NOT SING "MY HEART IS SMILING, I'M IN LOVE" IN A DEATH GROWL!

The lyrics are also a problem. They tell of an discussion between man and Alien intelligently and then use the words "but then". Their new language is interesting at times but rather pointless and many times you won't realize the lyrics have been sung until halfway through an entire stanza.

As for progressive: all different time signatures are in the introduction sound like the CD started skipping and you couldn't get a full measure. "11/16? It's an unfinished 4/4 time signature." The rest of the album is basic 4/4 with occasional orchestration or a saxophone solo. However, that's when the album's music is good and after Part One, the music is always good.

The second album, I heard not much of but my friends were obsessed with it. That makes it worth it enough in my book.

Breakdown: Amazing Instrumentation; Mediocre Lyrics; Okay singing; Ten Years of work was wasted. Tommy was made in ten months, The Wall in eleven. Both albums are dozen times better than this prog opera. We overpaid by about $20 (subject to change).

This album combines few very interesting things that wouldn't be so "tasty" if they would stand alone. Death metal vocals (I hate them, yet I love them in this combination, without them it would be very different and I dare to say, worse), heavier guitars (from time to time, you know), melodic (almost power metal-like) music in mixed with great atmosphere and also some kind of story. You don't have to read it at all, you can just feel it. It's hard for me to define how good this music is for me. So am I convinced of its advantages. One politician in our country used to say "socialism with human face". Even I don't like him, I'll alternate this into: "Death metal without death metal, but with human face." - Now that's not so bad deal, is it ?

We shall see. But I know I'm going to like it a lot. But who knows, many better albums fell later of 1-2 stars, as time went by. This is life. But not in all cases. It's like 33% of times I'll drop rating later. Or raise it (what's undoable in this case)

Really beautiful set of cover pictures. Hell, this is pure musical ecstasy, using all these tricks that makes prog metal good, also with occasional going up with woman tender vocals, acoustic guitar that can be heard through roaring of electric ones (spectacular) and also the best (I'm sure it's best, trust me) use of electronically modified voice I recently heard).

EDIT: 4(-), not so appealing this time. Probably, you have to be "in mood" to enjoy this, as it's not as good as it should have been after repeated listens.

20 tracks tell a story from stars and their interactions, an good science fiction or space version of the lord of the rings...you make say. Its musical structure looks more like opera screenplay with variety of ways in storytelling. Singers growl, chant, speak and sometime melodically sing. These serve as the dialog between characters in the story. The music, however, plays it part as a background score of a movie. It comes in variety of style but mainly metal riffing with atmospheric keyboard background. Therefore, the musics sound so big and serious like Norwegian black metal band. I personally feel like I am watching a cult movie made by Jerry Bruckheimer.

In term of musicianship? They are extremely talented. In writing, composition and production? There is no single thing to complain. This kind of music is usually so complexed and hard to get into...that is what we love about prog, right? Anyway, their musics are more heavy devy wall-of-sound type than others. Therefore, as a reviewer I have to say that, as I am not very familiar with is kind of music, I feel a bit fatigue after a listening session. Moreover, there are some point that I get bored by it length and its somewhat repetitious riff. But, I must say, that's not their fault, it's just a matter of my preference. So...if you like this category of Prog, I'll undoubtedly like Cybion. For me...3.5 stars.