Formed in Australia all the way back in 1993, Teramaze have a long history although you wouldn’t necessarily know it from the press release that accompanies new album (and the band’s first for Mascot offshoot Music Theories Recordings) ‘Her Halo’. The band’s fifth effort, ‘Her halo’ is a powerful and well-polished effort that sees the band drawing the appropriate balance between song-writing and technicality with the result that the eight-track, fifty-five-minute album passes in the merest blink of an eye. Throughout the album moments arise where you can marvel at the band’s instrumental prowess, but unlike, say, Dream Theater, who occasionally seem to revel in their instrumental excess a little too much, Teramaze take a much more nuanced approach, offering up a beautifully honed and emotive album in the process.
The album opens with a thirteen-minute masterclass in progressive metal, ‘An ordinary dream’. Opening with acoustic guitar and the rich tones of a grand piano, the track does not hesitate long before going on the attack with blistering guitar work to the fore before the band pare it back for the melodic verse. Taking their cues from the likes of Spock’s Beard, Neal Morse, early Dream theatre and throwing in a pinch of Queensryche-esque grandstanding for good measure, Teramaze offer up melodies to die for and the crystal clear production job helps to keep that in the foreground no matter how heavy the underpinning riffs become. Heavy and yet poignant, ‘an ordinary dream’ is a quite remarkable opening track that has the power to excite the senses and break the heart in equal measure, and it is clearly the work of a band who have spent a good deal of time honing their sound to the point of perfection. Prog fans will be in heaven as the Gilmour-esque solo winds across the song’s heart whilst metal fans will be unable to resist the churning riffs that follow it. Rather than continue in the same vein, the band take a flaming brand to prog metal with the crushing might of ‘to love, a tyrant’. Mixing melody with power, teramaze juxtapose steel-plated riffs with close harmony vocals and a percussive assault that shakes the very foundations of your home. Delivered with controlled ferocity, the band demonstrate a clever mix of instrumental mastery and carefully balanced accessibility meaning that this is a track you can both bang your head to and yet sit back and admire the technicality if you so wish. The title track demonstrates the band’s ability to draw on the full-blooded power of metal and the addictive melodic nature of pop to deliver a piece that recalls latter-day Spock’s beard with its multi-tracked vocals and adventurous riffs whereas ‘out of subconscious’ pulls a similar trick, with both tracks recalling Dream Theater at their most bombastically accessible.
Pure driving pop-rock, ‘For the innocent’ is a potential single in the making with its rich vocal work and more laid back vibe. That’s not to say the riffs don’t kick in with admirable power on the chorus, the band don’t forgo their power, but rather that the track as a whole offers a greater depth of light and shade with the heady harmonies actually recalling the recent Trivium album with its elastic riffing and soaring harmonies. Opening with a horror movie sample, the instrumental ‘Trapeze’ brings has a Joe Satriani feel to it with some suitably impressive riffing, some stunning solo work and even a jazzy interlude. In stark contrast ‘Broken’ is a sappy, acoustic-led ballad which treads far too heavily into radio-friendly territory for these tastes, (think ‘the answer lies within’), but for those who like the BIG ballad, I can see this working well. The album ends with ‘Delusions of grandeur’, a track that sees the band range across the breadth of their influences in ten impressive minutes. With the synth orchestration once again doing much to recall Dream theater, the band maintain a lighter touch that sees the emphasis remain with the song, and, despite the length of the album, Teramaze do successfully leave the listener wanting more.
Overall Teramaze are a band who do much to impress. Drawing upon a wide variety of influences, the band are very much at the melodic edge of prog metal, neither afraid to unleash an earth-shattering riff nor a sky-scraping chorus. Very well polished, the band have clearly been honing their sound over the years and there is no question that fans of highly technical, yet melodically memorable progressive metal will find this to be a most impressive addition to their collection. Nonetheless, the band do veer perilously close to Dream theater at times (particularly in the latter stages of the album, and for those who prefer their music to pack a punch, ‘broken’ is a step too far into ballad territory. Overall ‘Her Halo’ is a very impressive album that will have prog-metal fans in ecstasy, but there are occasions when you wish the band would cut loose from the syrupy synth and give vent to the heavier riffs that pepper the first half of the album a little more.
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