This morning I woke up with a monster hangover and a sense of doom about me. Six hours later I was somehow in New York City hanging out with my adopted mother Rebecca from Subrosa. Yet, strangely enough, despite what you would think given my obsession with that band, this was not the focus of my day, instead I was destined to go forth and prog. It was early evening on a Saturday night, I prepared myself for a soiree of technical madness and guitar driven fun, prog metal for all kinds of fans.
The first band up was the Philly troupe Tungsten. This female fronted act delivered a tight and powerful sounding set. Despite one or two mild hiccups, they managed to impress me and prove that they have what it takes to be on the top of the prog game. The solos were well thought out and fit in nicely with the pieces. The depth of the compositions was impressive and I especially enjoyed the way the bass lines interlocked with the music. Meanwhile, the guitars used some interesting slightly jazzy chord ideas to keep things interesting. On top of it all, the bands charismatic frontwoman kept up powerful vocals that soared above the mix and kept everyone engaged.
Up next was Binary Code, they put on an exciting very djenty show that made me a little bit nostalgic for the heyday of Periphery and bands of their ilk. That being said, djent was not the sole focus of their sound and there were a lot of cool atmospheric and techdeath parts that helped keep things interesting. The clean vocals were at times a bit heavy handed, but as a whole, they worked nicely with the rest of the music. Big things seem to be happening for this band and I really enjoy the way that the pieces seemed to undulate, growing and then shrinking, falling and rising, pure prog metal madness to soothe the savage beast.
Finally it was time for Leprous. By this point I was riding high on a horse, I had just met someone from Metal Injection and gotten invited to an awesome party. When the band came on they utterly ripped. Sure, they where clearly pretty tired, but that didn't stop them. After a few initial difficulties things started to go really well and they got into an impressive groove. The way they chained songs together was exciting and proved the bands ability as not just musicians but performers. Perhaps the climax of the Leprous set was the second encore (Yes, they did well enough to get two encores) which saw the band bringing out some vicious unison headbanging while in the crowd a small mosh pit got started.
As we headed back to the apartment where we are meant to crash (The party didn't work out) Ben from Tungsten and I started to talk. As we sit here on these couches, I'm starting to get a sense of something greater behind this movement as a whole. These bands all brought something mature and refined to a genre that is traditionally views as immature and unrefined. Yet somehow, it works, allowing prog nerds like us to come up and headbang, slaves to the roaring power of music that touches the soul.
Find the bands on Facebook!
Tungsten: https://www.facebook.com/TungstenPhilly
Binary Code: https://www.facebook.com/binarycodemusic
Leprous: https://www.facebook.com/leprousband
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