Album: The Reservoir (2014)
Genre: Prog Metal (Prog Rock) / USA
On their debut release The Reservoir, Tungsten have melded all those bands together to create a such a stellar collection of melodic, heavy and progressive tunes that I am alternately massively impressed and massively jealous. Jealous of the creativity and strength these songs show. Album opener ‘Water Over Stone’ features a deceptively “prog” opening (all synths and Gilmour soloing) only to give way to a riff so bouncy, you’d be forgiven for thinking that you were listening to something from Coverdale-era Purple. And yet for the catchiness of the guitars there is a delicate stream of keyboards running though this track, an underlying melody and added sound dimension. What’s clear throughout this album, is that the influences the band have professed shine though BUT (and this is the important bit folks) without sounding like carbon copies of their idols. ‘Night Wanders By’ has a version riff that sounds like it belongs on a hard rock album from the 70s, but you’d be hard pushed to say which band it COULD have been released by. This is one of the many things that make this album so good. It has all the best bits of your favourite bands but filtered through 2014. Enough of the past though.... ‘El Dolor’ arrives in a crash of drums and frantic guitar chords. Utterly hummable and certainly radio-friendly but just when you think the band have gone all commercial on you - NEVER FEAR - the back half of the song takes on a different musical tack completely with an ominous guitar line and some excellent placement of the Hammond sound. It ends sounding like a completely different song! Standout tracks on the album are ‘Atmos (Masto) Storms’ and ‘The Reservoir’. The former is an exercise in musicianship without losing any emotion or musicality. Singer Titi Musick (I’m saying nothing.....) uses words for the first 2 mins of the track and then spends the next 5 mins simply using her voices for notes. It’s this wordless display of angst and emotion that helps lift this song above the others. The eccentrically proggy instrumental section towards the end of the song shows that Tungsten can get all “odd sounds and time signatures” when they want to. ‘The Reservoir’ is the longest track on the album and you can hear why the band chose to name the album after it. Beginning with a riff from guitarists Ben Grossberg and Jeff McCall that defines the word ‘heavy’ and featuring a breakdown section that sounds like Iron Maiden crossed with Genesis, this track is truly a prog epic. It ebbs and flows, it’s heavy and dark yet shot through with moments of light. It’s hard to believe this is Tungsten’s debut album, such is the breadth and depth of the songwriting displayed here. Metal enough for you to bang your head, melodic enough for you to sing along to and twisty enough to be prog enough for the prog (“No mellotron? No prog”) snobs. Goodness knows what their second album is going to be like as this will be a hard act to follow!
Review by "John Sturm" (http://echoesanddust.com).
RATING: 8.25 / 10 **GREAT**
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Genre: Prog Metal (Prog Rock) / USA
On their debut release The Reservoir, Tungsten have melded all those bands together to create a such a stellar collection of melodic, heavy and progressive tunes that I am alternately massively impressed and massively jealous. Jealous of the creativity and strength these songs show. Album opener ‘Water Over Stone’ features a deceptively “prog” opening (all synths and Gilmour soloing) only to give way to a riff so bouncy, you’d be forgiven for thinking that you were listening to something from Coverdale-era Purple. And yet for the catchiness of the guitars there is a delicate stream of keyboards running though this track, an underlying melody and added sound dimension. What’s clear throughout this album, is that the influences the band have professed shine though BUT (and this is the important bit folks) without sounding like carbon copies of their idols. ‘Night Wanders By’ has a version riff that sounds like it belongs on a hard rock album from the 70s, but you’d be hard pushed to say which band it COULD have been released by. This is one of the many things that make this album so good. It has all the best bits of your favourite bands but filtered through 2014. Enough of the past though.... ‘El Dolor’ arrives in a crash of drums and frantic guitar chords. Utterly hummable and certainly radio-friendly but just when you think the band have gone all commercial on you - NEVER FEAR - the back half of the song takes on a different musical tack completely with an ominous guitar line and some excellent placement of the Hammond sound. It ends sounding like a completely different song! Standout tracks on the album are ‘Atmos (Masto) Storms’ and ‘The Reservoir’. The former is an exercise in musicianship without losing any emotion or musicality. Singer Titi Musick (I’m saying nothing.....) uses words for the first 2 mins of the track and then spends the next 5 mins simply using her voices for notes. It’s this wordless display of angst and emotion that helps lift this song above the others. The eccentrically proggy instrumental section towards the end of the song shows that Tungsten can get all “odd sounds and time signatures” when they want to. ‘The Reservoir’ is the longest track on the album and you can hear why the band chose to name the album after it. Beginning with a riff from guitarists Ben Grossberg and Jeff McCall that defines the word ‘heavy’ and featuring a breakdown section that sounds like Iron Maiden crossed with Genesis, this track is truly a prog epic. It ebbs and flows, it’s heavy and dark yet shot through with moments of light. It’s hard to believe this is Tungsten’s debut album, such is the breadth and depth of the songwriting displayed here. Metal enough for you to bang your head, melodic enough for you to sing along to and twisty enough to be prog enough for the prog (“No mellotron? No prog”) snobs. Goodness knows what their second album is going to be like as this will be a hard act to follow!
Review by "John Sturm" (http://echoesanddust.com).
RATING: 8.25 / 10 **GREAT**
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