PERIPHERY

In terms of metalcore music that is combined with prog metal, my favorite has got to be Between The Buried and Me, but a close second goes to Periphery.

I knew of Periphery since I first started to get into more progressive metalcore music, though I haven't heard them until getting attached to similar groups like Protest The Hero, The Human Abstract, and Animals As Leaders. While they aren't the forefathers of djent, that title could go to Meshuggah or Fredrick Thordendal's 'Sol Niger Within', Periphery definitely modernized it in my opinion, combining genres like industrial metal, post-hardcore, thrash, and even brostep into the mix, creating a highly intoxicating soup of melodic metalcore riffs and complex solos that intensify and glorifies the atmosphere all around me. While others may disagree, I'd say they are one of those bands without a single bad album. In fact, I'd double down and say their discography could even rival some of the best prog out there, with the only album I thought wasn't as good as it could've been probably being their first, but only due to a more production and mixing side of things. I digress, but with a small but very lovely discography like Periphery, and the fact they'll be releasing their seventh album soon this year, I thought it'd be a perfect time to inspect my all time favorite from the band, and recently (from the time I am writing this) my favorite album of 2019, Periphery IV: Hail Stan.

What else can I say about this gem of an album? Well, for starters, I absolutely love the tracks on here. Each one, from the big winding epic of Reptile, to the bombastic CVRCH BVRNER, to the ethereally magnificent Satellites, each track on here just hypes me up in such a way that as the first minute of Reptile swells up, I am just instantly on board with this Periphery train of metal goodness. I think this album is where the band truly embrace their more modern ideologies within their djent music, as this contains a lot more electronic elements than ever before, taking a slight backseat on just their intense metalcore for more melodic structures, with classical hymns, ambient passages in a few moments, and even slight bits of brostep, all of which delivered like a fine wine in a fancy restaurant, though that same restaurant has a mosh pit in the middle. It is all a glorious fusion of different genres that makes Periphery even more adventurous sounding then they already are.

If we are talking about tracks, I'd say my all time favorite here is Crush. Such an enthralling piece of music that truly showcases all of the album's main facets in a glorious way, showcasing heavy metal riffs with electronic beat music and a really cool little classical outro. It all just comes so well together that I am surprised that this album, or this band for that matter, isn't on the same scale to many prog metal legends like Mastodon or Pain of Salvation to many people. While it isn't a long epic, nor is it an immensely intense track, I still think the band struck the most amount of lightning in a bottle for this song, and this album as a whole.

I think while the instrumentation is a fine wine, Spencer Sotelo's vocals are like a chef's kiss on the whole thing. Without them, it'd be a great instrumental album, but Spencer adds a certain spice to this soup that he increases to a progressive metal classic in my eyes. His entire presence in every song just works so well in every aspect, and he just gives it his all that, no matter what, I never felt he had any weak spots. Ever since the first album, his voice has aged even better with each release, and here he just melts into my veins that whenever I give this album a spin I will instantly get enthralled into it. Periphery as a whole is like a wine, they just get better with age.

This is an instant prog metal legend for me. It is an album that contains both complex riffs that break me up into bits, but also powerfully beautiful movements that I cannot help but feel a certain love in all my heart. I 100% recommend listening to this as this is essential in my eyes. It's an album that sets a new bar to reach for any and all prog metal groups. Just incredible.

Ouch. I mean like seriously, OUCH!!! First off I wanna make something clear: I do enjoy some Periphery albums. It's not like I went full hater on them, I really enjoy "Periphery: Hail Stan" and "Periphery: Select Difficulty", I think they're solid four-star albums. But of course almost all bands have lows and highs. This is easily the worst Periphery album and by far the only one I'm not capable of enjoying.

First thing is that Spencer screams like an emo-wave teen in this album, it just sounds ridiculous and calling it juvenile feels like an insult to every already-bad juvenile band. Thank god he stopped doing those high-pitched screams in the following albums (not counting Omega). Second thing is how chuggy and terribly mixed the guitars sound. I get it's Djent but damn there were moments in the album where I thought a laser cannon was firing right at my side. They make bass inaudible and combined with Spencer's screeching, you will probably end without ears after doing a full listen. Drums were the only thing that weren't awful. Bass was inaudible as I said before... Musicality was definitely there but I'm almost completely convinced the problem was in the mixing: It's simply bad. And bad mixing can completely ruin a decent, solid album, who knows if maybe this is what happened to Alpha...

I just don't enjoy this album and this is probably the only Periphery album that deserves a 1-Star rating.

Periphery II: This Time It's Personal is not just an album, it's a force of nature. Unlike Periphery I or founding guitarist Misha "Bulb" Mansour's previous solo work which "merely" explored the possibilities afforded by modern "bedroom" production and djent style riffing, Periphery II actually combines the powers of all six of the group's visionary and boundary pushing musicians in an effort to redefine what progressive metal was going to be in the 2010's.

The riffs on this record display brain melting technicality and heaviness. Yet drummer Matt Halpern ensures that the polyrhythmic madness is always firmly grounded in infectious body shaking grooves. Spencer Sotelo's blend of Randy Blythe style growls and early 2000's screamo is a staggering display of vocal dexterity and virtuosity. And Jake Bowen's electronic interludes help piece the disparate parts of the record into a coherent whole. No wonder Loudwire placed this record on their top 25 progressive metal albums of all-time list.

And yet despite the groups undeniable impact and power, Periphery receives more than its fair share of hate from the metal and prog gatekeepers. The inbreds over at Encyclopaedia Metallum: The Metal Archives refuse to list Periphery while reviewers on the Prog Archives have actually gone on to insult the intelligence of Periphery fans. But when it comes to art and politics, you'll always have your reactionary fearful fascists calling out the heresies of pioneers. Thankfully, those people tend to be on the wrong side of history.

Periphery on their second album continued with their heavy, progressive metalcore, or "djent" as some people call it. Call it what you will, it is a decent album. I honestly like to listen to Periphery for their metalcore side instead of their progressive metalcore side but that means I just like the band in a different way than most people do. Think about it. If you're familiar with metalcore from the 2000's you will know that clean singing and growls are common, as are grooves, drop-tuned riffs, and plenty of breakdowns. That's pretty much what you get with Periphery. They also like their weird time signatures and complicated music too. Like a lot of people on this website, myself included.

Listen to Periphery if you like the newer "djent" bands like Animals as Leaders or TesseracT or anything like that. These guys sound nothing like Meshuggah. If you want to get into Periphery, start with Periphery 3. It's way better. This one is still good though.

Now this is an album I love to jam out too. Periphery III: Select Difficulty is my favorite album by Periphery. It's heavy, has breakdowns, great bass provided by Adam "Nolly" Getgood, just a lot of great jams. Progressive metalcore bands are pretty common nowadays, and we can blame that all on Periphery, same goes for the "djent" movement that brought a lot of new bands that sounded like Periphery and nothing like Meshuggah. Strange.

The music, for people who never heard the bands music, sounds like teenage Meshuggah. If you never heard Meshuggah's music, imagine low riffs with lot's of china cymbal. The progressive metal is definitely there. The song Prayer Position is pretty much Periphery in a nutshell. Longer songs (7 minutes-ish) like Lune and Marigold show the band members technical ability. They also confirm that the band plays progressive metal well, with ease.

Getting into Periphery? Or progressive metalcore? Or anything alike? This is your album to start with! I really like this album. I would put Select Difficulty with We are the Romans by Botch and One of us is the Killer by The Dillinger Escape plan on the podium that's labeled "best progressive metalcore albums" in a heartbeat. Great stuff, really!

For the life of me I cannot understand the lack of love this band gets on the archives. Everything from the supposedly "emo" vocals to Periphery's "dumb" fans (yes, one reviewer on another album accused Periphery fans of not being the most intelligent bunch) are used as excuses for justifying the hate or underwhelming appreciation of their work.

I can only hope that open-minded listeners can leave these preconceived notions aside and give this record and honest spin. Ear destroying riffs, passionate melodies, and excellent electronic interludes and passages are, through truly progressive ambition, weaved together to produces Periphery's best record since 'Periphery II.'

Perhaps most encouraging of all is how Periphery have managed to reign in their excesses. The songs feel tighter with less sprawl. The run time still characteristically spills over the 60-minute mark, but thanks to very varied song writing, you would hardly know it while listening.

My personal rating for this record was 4.5 out of 5. I found 'Follow Your Ghost' to be unnecessary and 'Crush' squandered some of its potential. But these are minor flow on an otherwise superb record.

Periphery is a Progressive Metal band from Maryland (US) founded in 2005, however they didn't released their first full length album until 2010. Since then, they have released 6 albums, with their 6th titled "Periphery IV: Hail Stan". Founded by Misha Manssor (guitars), the current lineup also includes Spencer Sotelo on vocals, Jake Bowen on guitars, Adam "Nolly" Getgood on bass, Matt Halpern on drums, and Mark Holcomb also on guitar. This is their first album to be released on their own label, and the band plays music that sounds like they set out knowing they had no restraints on the heaviness they wanted to play all along. They have no fear of getting very extreme, but they don't mind softening things up from time to time.

The first track is the longest on the album at over 16 minutes on the truly epic "Reptile" and features Mikee Goodman (one of the vocalists for the British metal band "SikTh"). With a heavy symphonic sound, this track starts to build intensity with thumping guitars and decent yet heavy vocals which fit the style of heaviness quite well. There are some yelling vocals throughout, but they take turns with clean and sometimes processed vocals. The music is hard and heavy and has the complexity required for the progressive metal genre. Right away, with the power and intensity of this track, you know the band means business this time around both in loudness and in production. Before you hit the 8 minute mark, the music calms and a deep, spoken vocal takes over, later followed with a more melodic line sung in a very emotional manner, the music builds and vocals intensify, but the music remains at a slow tempo, and then intensifies to an almost sludgy feel. This finally advances to a nice, heavy instrumental section that is supported by keyboards and a very cool guitar solo. Moods, tempos and meters change as the track continues, playing pretty much the full gamut of progressive metal through the track. The music has the progressive smarts of "Opeth" with the intensity of "The Mars Volta" while managing not to sound like either band.

As for loudness, all the stops are pulled out on "Blood Eagle". Starting off extremely loud and heavy, this sound continues with yelling vocals and full intensity, backing off only for one short section. Both the guitars and the drums play on unchecked by any restraint. This is complex progressive metal at its best, and interestingly enough, the yelling vocals don't even bother me. Maybe that is because of the complexity of the music. This crazy intensity continues without any let up on "CHVRCH BVRNER", but this one ends up with some crazy effects. "Garden in the Bones" does let up a bit more and allows for a more melodic vocal in some parts, but has several vocal styles throughout. In the middle, things soften a bit, but still remain unpredictable.

"It's Only Smiles" has an excellent, attention getting riff which introduces an emotional and melodic sound supported by synths, mellow verses and intense choruses. The guitar solo in the middle is beautiful even in its intensity. This is one of the more accessible tracks on the album, but don't worry because it still has a good level of progressive complexity and plenty of emotion. "Follow Your Ghost" returns to the loud and heavy sound with plenty of screaming and growling vocals, and remains quite relentless throughout. "Crush" is led more by electronics and keyboards with a more straightforward vocal and melody. This track definitely has a more pop-ish feel to it, but it still has some short bouts of complexity. It's a good place to put some variance in the overall album, but, with its heavy used of keys on this track, it almost feel like an entirely different band, however, it is a welcome change and still a great track venturing into "Nine Inch Nails" territory and even has an orchestral ending.

"Sentient Glow" is a cover song originally done by "Haunted Shores". It returns to the heavy sound again, very complex and many different vocal styles in a shorter 4 minute track, and even finds time for a soft section in the middle of it all before the wall of noise returns. The album ends with the 9+ minute track "Satellites". This one is surprisingly softer and has a very nice melodic feel to it. The music is still top notch and even features short harmonic, choral style vocals. But, you knew it had to happen eventually and just before the 5 minutes mark, it suddenly goes heavy and loud against a complex and solid background. After 7 minutes, the sound is more symphonic, and then suddenly very emotional and heavier again.

This is one great album. The vocalist is quite amazing with his ever changing styles, though I could have done with a bit less of the yelling, but at least it's dynamic and quite melodic at times. Overall, however, even with the variance in the styles from time to time, the sound can get extreme and relentless. There is a lot to hear in this album, and most of it is excellent with amazing musicianship, mostly heavy guitar, but with plenty of good surprises throughout. I must say that I really enjoy this album, but, at this time, am hesitant to give it 5 stars, though that could change with time and more listens. I do highly recommend this album though, mostly to those that love their progressive metal heavy and loud, but yet with a lot of variety. The yelling might get on some people's nerves, but the vocals also have dynamic in them and can change from one style to another rather quickly. Anyway, I have no problem calling this an excellent album and one of the best Prog Metal albums I have heard this year, and that is saying a lot.

Customers who bought (band name) also bought "Periphery". Cool. Let's check them out. Hmm. The vocals are out. Next!

A few months later. Periphery again? Okay, let's give them another shot. Nope. Not with those vocals.

Several months later. Periphery? Try. Fail.

And then the band appears on a list of top progressive metal bands. But I just can't get passed those vocals. And then "Periphery II: This Time It's Personal" is on LoudWire's list of 25 top prog metal albums, and I'm looking at the list and thinking, "I have 15 of those and five more are on standby in my Amazon cart. You know what? Let's just buy the damn album and give it a fair listen.

Periphery. Progressive metal. But clearly there's a djent approach. And there's a metalcore style too not unlike Between the Buried & Me or Protest the Hero. Then there's the vocals which immediately remind me of Sugar Cult or Jimmy Eat World. Emo. Powerful vocals for sure and with an edge and a harsh scream. But there's also that plaintive heartbreaking tone that just sounds so like that, like emo pop punk. I can take it in its own genre. But here on a metal album?

The funny thing is that everything I might have had to say against this album has ultimately come to mean little or nothing. The fact is simply that I enjoy listening to this album. Okay, so it's like Animals as Leaders without Tosin Abasi combined with Jimmy Eat World and Protest the Hero guiding the song writing and musical composition. And there's another element which was nagging at me for two nights until I could place it: the gruff, shouted vocals remind me of Slipknot. Come to think of it, what little I know of Slipknot's music, there's some similarity in places. Is the tuning to dropped B, perhaps?

Well, that's just the thing about this album. There's so much going on that it's easy to say, "This part reminds me of xxx in places, and xyz in other places." I mean, there're the djent parts, the clean and pretty echoing guitar parts, the electronic percussion parts accompanying the pretty guitars, the wild lead parts, and more emotive Jimmy Eat World-like parts, and more! I keep taking my phone out of my pocket while walking and checking what track I'm listening to and that's a very good sign. Listen to Spencer Sotelo just belt out the note at 3:52 in "Ragnarok" or the sudden change in the music in "Facepalm Mute" from aggressive and heavy to light, atmospheric and electronic. How about the violin and proggy keyboard sound that starts off "Have a Blast"? A list could easily be made because each track seems to be able to shift and move around in different directions.

Now, I understand that not everyone wants this kind of music in their ears and not everyone will be accepting of the vocals simply for their style. At times I am even tempted to think the music and vocals are actually not that interesting. But then soon something comes along to perk up my ears. And so, "In fact, f**k it, Nick," I'm going to go ahead and give this album four stars. I'm not likely to go and buy another Periphery album so soon but this one here has quickly won me over. Now I'm adding Protest the Hero and Animals as Leaders to my playlist for the next week.

I sometimes wonder if the band's singer wants us to hate him. Oh well. But, in spite of the continued suckitude (as that is the technical term) of the vocals, the omega juggernaut actually feels like a juggernaut at times. I'm finding some redeeming value here for once, with the whole chain of "The Bad Thing/Priestess/Graveless/The Hell Below" actually sounding alright. Since my ears don't hate me for saying that, it must be true. And certainly the band's actually brought out some proper and well enough done metal for once. Other than that, the complaints that can be leveled at "Alpha" carry over. Especially, yet again, those *bleepity-bleep* vocals, and I will still hold fast to the conclusion that the whole "Juggernaut" project is hardly prog or tech. It's like they saved the best for last, yet they didn't have enough of it. Especially with the lazy and particularly terrible "Reprise", the worst track here and almost as bad as "Alpha"'s title cut. In the end, what shows this album's redeeming value is that I am actually considering getting this at the local record shoppe, all the while stealing angry death glares at its companion. The vocals make this a 2.5, but here I can only round up.

Periphery... a byword in the prog metal world. Hardly respected, easily brushed off by Anthony Fantano, not even listed on the Encyclopedia Metallum. You're left wondering just what could possibly be wrong with them...

... at least until you listen to this cold mess. First thing you'll realise is that the singer sounds like a mix of all the worst parts of metalcore and third wave emo vocals. Just juvenile sounding. Then there's the music, which is pretty much inoffensive and innocuous enough. Not a good thing. At best, it sounds decent but will probably bore. At worst, it just sounds like a rehash of already done metal tricks that were done better the first time, or even the first hundred times. This "juggernaut"'s title track, "Alpha", commits the worst musical sin of the album by having a completely out of place opening. Words can't describe just how weirdly this short opening section doesn't fit with the rest of the song, and the rest of the album. And I was promised by even some of the detractors that there were at least some interesting tonal experimentations within. Not there, so maybe, if we're lucky, the earlier releases oft described as guilty pleasures - including by fellow reviewer Gallifrey - has those. In fact, I'd say this has little prog or tech in it, and even scarce metalcore/djent influence beyond the horrid vocals. I can't say that most of the music is outright bad at all, but it's further away from good. Certainly nothing that can be called redeeming without my ears turning on me and throttling me to death. I would recommend that this be avoided at all costs.