Author Archives: Odyssey

About Odyssey

I have had a life-long love of music, but from the first time I heard Kiss and Black Sabbath with my landlord's son in Nicholasville, KY in the mid 70's, I have been hooked on Hard Rock and Metal. While my tastes in music have done nothing but expand since then, Metal remains closest to my heart. In addition, I have played bass, still play guitar and have literally 1000's of CDs/MP3s, so my knowledge is long steeped and honest. I don't buy the whole splintered, sub-genres thing and choose to like bands and music based solely on individual merits. Obviously, this is always colored by my mood, what I need at any given point and time and what is generally pleasing to my ear. I also don't like to rip any music or band, instead having an open mind and ear for it all because I have a passion for it all. It is completely subjective and in a constant state of flux. Consider me a music "nerd" not a music "snob". As an extension of this love, I hope to share this passion with everyone here and learn from your passion as well! - Odyssey -

State of the Art: Tr3ason

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*This is part of our State Of The Art series, showcasing bands every Monday from the featured State*

This month’s State is Utah!

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So we enter into week number two for our State of the Art: Utah series. Man, this Metal scene is replete with really, really good bands! I have run into so many, as a matter of fact, I am putting back a number of them for review later. A month will simply not cover everything that has caught my ear while looking for bands to cover in Utah! Seriously, if you are looking for new music, do a search for “Utah Metal” on Google, ReverbNation, Spotify, Soundcloud, Bandcamp or whatever you use and rest assured you will be rewarded with a plethora of killer bands for any musical palate. My next band is so good that I was hooked from the first song I heard, “I, Machine”. Any band that drops something that hits this hard musically and emotionally cannot be a fluke! I was not disappointed. While “I, Machine” remains my favorite, as well as the band’s, everything is else is great as well. The band is Tr3ason and they are one of Metal’s future shining stars!

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Colin Tench Project: “Hair In A G-String (Unfinished But Sweet)”, The Prog Mad Hatter!

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A domino falls and strikes another, causing a chain reaction that continues until there are no dominoes left to fall. Such is the case with this review of Hair in a G-String (Unfinished but Sweet) by the U.K. artists in the Colin Tench Project. Mr. Tench is also known for his work with Corvus Stone and, wait for it, Coalition. There it is! The first domino! After recently reviewing Coalition’s spectacular new release, Bridge Across Time, I was offered a listen to Colin’s solo project, which is due for CD release on the 28th of November. Refuse new music that is related to a newly found gem? Nah, I’ll pass… Yeah right! Keep believing that! Hell yes I am interested. In a single listen, I was sold. Killer guitar? Check. Good song-writing skills? Absolutely. Entertaining? In freaking spades and in a manner few albums have been able to. So, as he so eloquently puts it on his website: “Who the hell is Colin Tench?”

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We Explore Animals As Leaders “The Madness Of Many”

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Formed in 2007 by guitarist Tosin Abassi, Los Angeles native, Animals as Leaders’ music has become a staple among instrumental/instrumental guitar-based heavy Progressive Rock fans throughout the world. The collective chins of guitarists everywhere simultaneously hit the floor when their self-titled album hit the presses in 2009 which elevated Animals as Leaders into the spotlight as one of the premiere instrumental bands in the world. Upping their game in 2011, Weightless was released to critical and fan acclaim everywhere. Staying on schedule with an album release every three years, The Joy of Motion was released in 2014 which put them on the Billboard charts in position 23, a whopping jump of 69 spots from the previous album’s placing. An extremely impressive showing for any band, much less from a band sans vocalist and bass player. This successful run is about to continue with Animals as Leaders release of The Madness of Many on November 11, 2016 on Sumerian Records and also saves fans an additional year’s wait for more of what they have grown to love.

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State Of The Art: Utah – Truce In Blood

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*This is part of our State Of The Art series, showcasing bands every Monday from the featured State*

This month’s State is Utah!

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Utah was my pick for this month’s SOTA series. Tons of good Metal available from this western state surrounded by Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada. Being the 45th state (January 4, 1896), Utah is known for the natural beauty of its deserts, Wasatch mountain range and The Great Salt lakes it also serves as the main hub for the Morman church whose choir is internationally lauded. Utah’s population sits just below 3,000,000 spread over 84,899 square miles, ranking it as the 31st most populated state in the U.S., 80% of whom live in the center of the state, along the Wasatch Front. In addition, Utah is considered to be the best state to live in, based on a 2012 Gallup poll, due to its low income inequality, and a variety of economic, lifestyle and health related metrics. Well, coming from the state capital of Salt Lake City comes my first State of the Art: Utah pick: Truce in Blood.

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A Celebration of Central Florida Metal With Seven Kingdoms, Martyrs Asylum, Kill The Sound, Arakara, Armor of God and Ornimental

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“What happened to the Metal scene here?” “Man, this sucks! I gotta drive to <pick a town> to see any good shows anymore.” “Nobody is playing around here this weekend.” “There are only a couple of good bands here and I have seen them a million times. Uhhhghh!” “We never get any good shows here anymore.” These are all statements that I constantly see, hear and read just about every day, from folks all over the world. Thankfully, these sentiments do not apply to my home state of Florida. No matter where you live here, there are almost too many shows to choose from on any given evening, especially on the weekends. The more difficult decision usually becomes “Do I go to see ‘X’ or do I see ‘Y’ or drive a little further to see ‘Z’?” We have also seen the rise of legendary bands like Death, Deicide, Obituary, Nonpoint, Trivium, Shinedown, Savatage, Cynic, Iced Earth, Kamelot, Six Feet Under, Molly Hatchet, Alter Bridge, Limp Bizkit, A Day to Remember, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Black Tide, Creed and many, many others over the years. The pool of talent seems to be bottomless here. All of these bands had to start somewhere and the next generation of bands continue to emerge in Florida at an exponential rate. Such was the case with the Halloween show at The Haven in Winter Park, FL, Saturday, October 29th, 2016 which highlighted some of the premiere Metal acts available from Central and South Florida. Although it is exhilarating to see national and international acts in a large venue, local bands have the fire and talent at a comparable or higher levels in our own back yards.

As a special treat, all pictures are credited to my guest photographer Matthew Degele!

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Oblivion’s “Cyclogenesis: Songs from the Apocalypse”: Breathing Fresh Fire Into A Twenty Year Old Dragon

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Recently, Divebomb Records had the brilliant idea of remastering and re-releasing all-but-lost Metal gems from the eighties and nineties in their Bootcamp Series. Albums like Aftermath’s Killing the Future, Holosade’s Hell House, Intrinsic’s “lost album” entitled Nails, Swedish Thrash Metal masters Apocalypse for their debut and Faithless albums, Skeptic Sense’s Mind Versus Soul: The Anthology, Miasmal’s third album, Tides of Omniscience (first time it has been made available in North America) and many, many others seeing the light of day once again, with plans to continue these releases well into the future. Many of these bands have, unfortunately, disappeared into obscurity, broken up and been usurped into other bands or even gotten back together; picking up where they left off years ago. One such band that falls into the third category is Oblivion, who recently released their double CD Cyclogenesis: Songs from the Apocalypse as Divebomb Boot Camp Series #27. What was once old, becomes new again and, in this case, lightening strikes twice as brightly!

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Prog Super Group TILT Announces Plans for Vinyl Release of “Hinterland” and New HD Video Edit of “Against the Rain”

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Tilt, one of the best new, Progressive Rock bands out of the UK released their masterpiece, entitled Hinterland on the 30th of June this year to raving reviews including one of our own that can be found here: MN TILT “Hinterland” Review.

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Interview with Malice’s “The Metal Warrior” Rayman James

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BloodRoseRed wisely chose Malice as one of her SOTA:Minnesota bands back in September (please see: Malice spotlight), which trumped my choice of them the week before. Well, we were offered an interview with founder, primary songwriter and bass player, “The Metal Warrior” Rayman James through Online Metal Promotion and BloodRoseRed kindly offered me the interview since I had also become a fan and missed out on their SOTA. Gotta love a group that gets along as well as we do! We would like to thank Mr. James for his time answering our questions and giving us his gift of music! Love this band!

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State of the Art: Bokor Law

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*This is part of our State Of The Art series, showcasing bands every Monday from the featured State*

This month’s State is South Carolina!

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Happy freaking Halloween everyone! This also means that we are closing this chapter on our State of the Art: South Carolina series. Definitely another state that has proven to have no lack of killer bands to listen to and choose from. If all of the stellar bands presented thus far by our staff has not convinced you that Metal is alive and well in SC, let me offer you Bokor Law.

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Maeth Continues To Astound With “Shrouded Mountain”

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Maeth is:

David Ports – Green to White Technician

Boone Ipstenu – Shaman

Jay Schwartz – Meat Puncher

Sam Tygiel – Airbender

Steve Bergquist – Party Master

“The Haint” – मृत्योर्मामृतं गमय (Hindu prayer for peace)

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release: October 28, 2016

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