Progressive Savage

My personal revelations in 2008

Since this is the last day of 2008, I thought about writing some kind of a “favorite releases of 2008″ post. Unfortunately, I didn’t came across any really groundbreaking albums this year. DT haven’t released anything except a live footage, and what’s groundbreaking about that? Long-awaited TSR is quite nice, but that’s all one can say about it, and frankly Ayreon’s 01011001 disappointed me. I never liked Marillion, so their recent album didn’t impress me at all. Neither did Pendragon.

On the other hand, I think Perihellium’s debut album is quite nice, and I heard that Opeth’s Watershed is pretty cool, too… though nothing can beat Blackwater Park.

Nonetheless, I thought about sharing with you my two recent revelations. Although these albums were released two years ago (2006), I got to know about them from my boss shortly before Christmas so I didn’t manage to include them in my letter to Santa.

Diablo Swing Orchestra - The Butcher’s Ballroom

Diablo Swing Orchestra is a Swedish–generally speaking– metal band. Some say it’s art metal, other call it symphonic metal, but I think the best fitting description would be simply experimental. The album is a mixture of metal and different musical styles, like Latin (it reminds me of a music performed by mariachi groups) in Poetic Pitbull Revolutions or boogie in opening track Balrog Boogie. Main vocal lines are sung with operatic-like female voice similarly to Taria Turunen’s from the early Nightwish (I’m not familiar with their recent doings). Pretty much experimental and quite interesting album.

Unexpect - In a Flesh Aquarium

Unexpect is even more experimental band, this time from Canada. To cite after their homepage, it’s a…

metal laboratory mixing elements of black, death, core, symphonic, progressive and melodic metal; classical, operatic, medieval, goth, electro, ambient, psychotic, noise and circus music with an occasional jazzy touch.

A mixture of clean, narrative and growling vocals along with constantly shifting metrum and beautifully exposed bass lines makes this release a first-class progressive savage album.

What about you? Have you had any revelations this passing year? Any personal discoveries?