July 2020 Feature Release - The Pit Edition
It's now July which of course means that we'll be nominating a brand new monthly feature release for each clan. This essentially means that we're asking you to rate, review & discuss our chosen features for no other reason than because we enjoy the process & banter.
This month's feature release for The Pit is 2009's classic debut album "Black Future" from Arizona-based technical thrash metal legends Vektor. This band has been in the media for all the wrong reasons over the last couple of years however there's an undeniable quality to their music that has seen many fans of your more progressive brand of thrash becoming somewhat infatuated. I've always found the "technical thrash metal" genre tag to be a bit misleading with most of the releases sitting underneath it being much closer to progressive thrash than being overly technical & I'll be interested to hear which side of that argument you think "Black Future" falls on.
https://metal.academy/releases/742
I did my review already. Here's a summary:
Vektor is way more of a new unique band than a so-called "Voivod ripoff". First off, the instruments really work together with precise drumming, tight riffing, and bass with more than one note per bar. The instrumentation is really cool, but what's really amazing is the vocal range of David DiSanto that's beyond belief. His vocals might remind some of Destruction's Schmier, but his high soaring screams are near-impossible! The guitars are so unique and really stick out in this album. One unique thing that marks a different approach is the F-tuning (a half-step higher than standard E tuning). I think more bands should start tuning their guitars up to F or F# 6-string, or even C or C# 7-string. When they play a riff that sounds familiar (other than the higher tuning), suddenly a different never-before-heard riff smashes into your face, while keeping constantly high quality. What's also pleasant is, the solos are magically placed in fields where you would never expect. But in the parts where you do expect a solo, they are short and end up coming out anti-climatic. However, the guitarists are really skilled and can master them easily. The songs here range from 4 to 7 minute thrashers to 10 to 13 minute progressive epics, and altogether they make Black Future a 98% flawless work of progressive thrash metal art. There are a couple weak points, but those weak points are really tiny flaws and they don't bring down this 5-star rating. With this album, Vektor has reached for the progressive thrash metal stars!
5/5
I couldn't quite get my head around the hype for Vektor when they first appeared and for some dumb reason presumed their debut couldn't ever be as good as the hype suggested so I didn't listen to it until a couple of years ago. I was wrong.
I still feel it is one of those records that you learn more about with each listen. I spent my first few listens wondering how they wrote such bewildering and involuted songs with such a random and yet flowing arrangement. Subsequent listens have my all like "what the hell is that, I haven't noticed that before!" Even though I feel I have more to learn still from this despite numerous listens I am still parking it at full marks for it being a constant challenge to listen to.
P.s. the track Forest of Legend would be on my top ten metal tracks if I ever bothered to take time to answer Andi's thread.
5/5
"Black Future" is certainly a very interesting record & I regard it as Vektor's best work but I still can't that say I've ever felt it deserving of the classic status that so many critics seem to label it with. I'd describe it as a cross between the technical thrash metal of Coroner & Sadus & the progressive metal of Voivod with little bits of the more melodic Swedish black/death metal bands like Dissection or At The Gates tossed in here & there. All of that sounds brilliant on paper but in reality I only find myself saying "Yeah I quite like this" instead of "FFFUUUUCCCKKKINNNNN YYYEEAAAHHHHH!!!!". It's just missing something for me & I feel very similarly about later works like "Terminal Redux" too. They're high quality thrash records but I struggle with overall engagement at times.
3.5/5
Black Future is one of those albums that is really good, but I wish I enjoyed more than I actually do. In my review of the album, I described how forward thinking this album feels in comparison to other timed thrash metal records. But it does fall into the trap of being overindulgent in the progressive and technical elements from time to time. I can certainly see why some people might find an album such as this to be an acquired taste in the thrash community, but I believe this album only laid the framework for better records later on, and helped influence other tech-thrash bands of the 2010s, including Revocation, Black Fast and Cryptic Shift.
7/10
Vektor in general just absolutely rips. They've been a favorite of mine from the more progressive but still aggressive Thrash scene for quite some time now and even though they don't make it onto my normal listening rotations very often, it's always a treat when they do. I only listened to snippets of their first two albums so getting to check out Black Future in full was a fantastic, albeit drawn out experience. For me, these guys just do everything right when it comes to Progressive and Technical Thrash with only a few minor gripes getting in the way of giving this album perfect marks. The high-pitched squeals are an important element to Vektor's sound, but they're a bit too random and overused on this one compared to their next two albums which use them a bit more tastefully. The length is also an issue, with certain songs and the album itself feeling a bit too drug out at times since Vektor hardly ever give you any room to breathe.
I would have to really buckle down and listen to all three of their albums to pick favorites and compare, but as for now both Black Future and Outer Isolation live up to Terminal Redux, the first Vektor album I heard, in terms of raw Progressive Thrash power. This band seriously hasn't missed a beat yet.
4.5/5