Proghma-C is Your New Favorite Band

They really are. You just don't know it yet. Like the sound of Polish Prog-ShuggahTool Core? It sounds like either the most awkward sexual fetish, or a genre of metal that is most awesome. Their debut album, Bar-Do Travel, is now available in the states, via our good friends over at Eagle Rock/Armoury Records.

The album kicks off with "Kana", a slow-burn, grinding Meshuggah riff, balanced by vocalist Piotr Gibner's Maynard-esque croon to near At The Gates gutteral screams. Countless bands abuse this technique and fail, but Proghma-C found that delicate balance where verses, choruses, segues and interludes flow seamlessly.

If the album has any faults, it would be the single mistake of covering Bjork's "Army of Me". Not because it's not good...Helmet covered this track years ago for a Music For Our Mother Ocean comp and it fucking killed. Hey, without Helmet, most of these bands wouldn't exist, so their cover of a cover of a cover gets a free pass. Solid logic, I know.

As far as new bands go, there's not a whole lot out there that's getting me excited this year. Proghma-C kicked me square in the dick. This record takes all the elements of what makes prog and atmospheric metal so amazing, and leaves out the bullshit wanking and overplaying. Buy this shit.

"Spitted Out":

Let's talk about Katatonia, shall we?

It's all I can talk about. We might be looking at album of the year candidate...A career best with their new darkened opus, Night Is The New Day. Released last week around the world and this past Tuesday here in the States, this 48 minute haunting epic masterpiece is another in the fine line of jaw-dropping albums by the most underrated band on the planet. I said it in my update yesterday and I meant it. The fact that Katatonia isn't as big as Opeth, Porcupine Tree or even Tool, is criminal. Recognize.

"Forsaker" kicks off this motherfucker, bringing the listener in with sweeping harmonies by vocalist Jonas Renske, then crushing skulls with some of their heaviest riffing to date. Other highlights include the rest of the album. I know, a shitty review but it's the truth. No weak spots, no filler, no fat. This record is lean and hungry...The only other band in their space that seems to have drive like this is Paradise Lost. Ther new LP is amazing as well...A post for another day I suppose.

Bottom line: Pick this record up and support a band that will truly hit on your every emotion and work their way into "favorite band territory" in no time. If you're not a fan yet, work backwards. Their early material is killer melo-doom-death (w/a certain someone from Opeth on vocals) and is quite different from where they've been heading from 1997's Discouraged Ones and on.

I tagged their new video on the last post, so check some of this out...

Night Is The New Day is in stores now. Why are you not in one buying it this very second?

"Cold Ways" (live):

"Deadhouse" (live):