Cynthesis - ReEvolution

Holy crap those Tipton brothers know how to play some guitar, and they've got a great band with Cynthesis.Four piece prog outfit Cynthesis certainly has a good pedigree. To start with you've got twin Tipton guitar brothers, Jasun and Troy (Zero Hour),  drummer Sean Flanagan (Enchant), and finally, vocalist Erik Rosvold. While perhaps not household names outside of the prog community, those in the know would surely salivate at this lineup of talent. But if you require something to procure your aural investment, you need only check out a track like Convergence to know "we're dealing with a badass group of musicians over here".

Formed in 2010, Cynthesis wasted no time in releasing the first album (2011's DeEvolution) in a planned trilogy of dystopian concept albums. ReEvolution represents the next stage of this ambitious project with an intriguing storyline of a tribal shaman burdened with his participation in slave trading who uncovers a secret about his past. The lyrical content tries to be as complex as the music these mad geniuses weave...and does okay, but I wasn't exactly expecting the eloquent, poetic musings of Neil Peart. Besides, Erik's voice sounds great over the dynamic sound of Jasun, Troy and Sean.

There's always a danger when you're dealing with musicians as insanely skilled as the Tipton brothers; the temptation to go off on atonal, albiet precise, Jarzombekian unison runs at the expense of a cohesive sound that serves the song is great - and often indulged. But Jasun and Troy display a marvelous sense of restraint that makes this album all the more impressive. If you're a progressive/technical metal fan and like the concept album thing, this is right up your alley. And as much as I harp on it for those efforts that miss the mark, I have to give kudos to Forrester Savell's masterful mix of this album. Every instrument and vocal is crystal clear, making this an incredible headphone experience.

The Bottom Line: The Tipton brothers and company, known collectively as Cynthesis, have once again made that rare album where incredible skill meets genuinely enjoyable music with a sense of atmosphere and melody. Well done!

Tracks To Teach You About Skill Versus Listenability: Convergence, The Grand Facade, and Release the Deity

- Genghis just can't imagine being this good at guitar - ever...

Empyrios - Zion

If this is the kind of stuff you can produce with home studios and where no one has to be in the same room, I'm sold.The band Empyrios has only been around a few years but has managed to garner no small amount of accolades for their music. Formed by DGM guitarist Simone Mularoni, every one of its talented members have been touring relentlessly with other bands in between albums, leaving no downtime in those years. Amazingly, they've still managed to craft a fantastic new studio album in Zion, via long distance relationship, that feels as cohesive, melodic, and heavy as anything out there in the metal scene today.

The best way I can describe them is a mix of Symphony X, Ark and Angra. But while the lead guitar work stands out most for me, don't believe for a second that the rest of the band is riding anyone's coat tails. This is an outfit of tight, professional musicians from the drummer to the singer, and everyone is an integral part of Empyrios' huge sound.

The Bottom Line: This is more great, heavy, bad-ass progressive power metal from Italy in the vein of DGM (who shares guitarists with Empyrios). If you dig powerful melodic music like Ark or Jorn Lande, check these dudes out. Sbrigati!

Tracks To Make Your Head Fear Its Inevitable, Furious Banging: Nescience, Reverie, Renovation, Zion, and Wormhole

- Genghis is having a serious case of guitar hero worship lately...

Ethan Brosh - Live The Dream

Ethan Brosh is an amazing new guitar talent that is more than the sum of his parts - or should I say shrapnel?The heyday of instrumental guitar rock in the late 80s, burned into the popular consciousness by Joe Satriani's Surfing With The Alien, saw its best and brightest over at Mike Varney's Shrapnel Records. Like all things, the passage of time has dulled the edge a bit as the public's musical tastes wandered, but thankfully there are artists that carry the torch of the venerable virtuoso musician bringing his skill and prowess to audiences looking to be dazzled. I happen to be one of those people always on the lookout for a new instrumental thrill, which leads me to the latest from Ethan Brosh.

Growing up in Israel, Ethan began learning guitar - his parents insisting on classical music at first - at an early age, developing enough skill and technique that it earned him a scholarship at Berklee. Since then, he's released his debut on Varney's Magna Carta Records and has now finished his follow-up Live The Dream. Ethan's latest disc is chock full of the things us guitar lovers crave: incredible speed and dexterity wrapped up with flashy technique that never loses sight of a good melody or the overall sense of the song. And speaking of technique, Ethan's playing shows a great diversity of influences that spans the years of great instrumental guitar rock that's come before.

As for the album's highlights, it all begins with the grand, energetic Shawn Lane-style phrasing of the fusiony title track.  I was then really impressed with the Malmsteenish baroque shred that broke into something like Darren Householder's swing-meets-metal groove on Bottomless Pit.  Knock On Wood is a great tapping extravaganza all played with the guitar on Ethan's lap. Space Invaders is a straight ahead pedal to the metal track that rocks along into another of those wonderful, sophisticated bits of fusiony phrasing (1:15-1:27) I really enjoy. The impressive Suspicious Exchange reminded me of Eric Johnson's contemplative, flamenco-tinged Desert Song but ups the game by skillfully blending nylon-stringed acoustic guitar with some distorted electric soloing (something like Marc Bonilla's American Matador). And mention must be made of Ethan's great take on Led Zeppelin, Up the Stairway, an impressive homage to Stanley Jordan's amazing reinventions of classic songs like Eleanor Rigby. Lastly, When Picks Fly is a fun chicken-pickin'-meets-hard-rock style piece that recalls the work of Michael Lee Firkins or Zakk Wylde's Farm Fiddlin'. All in all, this is a great album full of diversity and character and I can't recommend it enough. By the way, if you get a chance to see him and his band Burning Heat, check them out.

The Bottom Line: Ethan Brosh is an impressive guitarist that skillfully blends the best of the amazing techniques heard from the instrumental guitar gods that have come before him into his own unique style. I really look forward to hearing more from this guy. Shredheads, go get this album.

Tracks to Make You Feel Guilty About Not Practicing: Live The Dream, Space Invaders, Suspicious Exchange, and Up The Stairway

- Genghis really does want to brush up on his guitar playing...

Scale The Summit - The Migration

Holy smokes, these hometown heroes can play instrumental prog like nobody's damn business. This album is fucking amazing.It's hard enough to start a band these days in a town that's not known for having a thriving music scene, but that's exactly what Scale The Summit did in my home town of Houston, Texas back in the mid 2000s, putting out their debut album in 2007 on their own.  Since then, they've released three sucessive albums through Prosthetic Records bringing us to their latest work, The Migration.  And it's a progressive instrumental lover's sweet, melodic dream.

Far from the wankery of their brilliant-but-way-too-esoteric musical predecessors like Watchtower (another Texas band), Scale The Summit's strength is its firm foundation in melody; more Gordian Knot than Messhugah.  And no matter how intricate Chris [Letchford] and Travis [Levrier]'s complimentary guitar passages get, there's always a strong sense of direction from beginning to end like a boat floating down a river.  Indeed even when things go from pensive to energetic as on Evergreen, you never get the feeling of disorientation that some bands do; you need a melodic anchor in an instrumental piece when the vocals aren't there to tie it all together emotionally. Think Animals As Leaders meets...Eric Johnson? However you want to describe what they're doing, I just hope they keep doing [in Houston] it for a long time to come.

The Bottom Line: These hometown boys have done it again! They've put out an amazing catalog of music in the short time they've been around and they show no signs of stopping with each new album sounding better than the last. If you get a chance to see them live, DO IT!

Tracks To Make Your Guitar Playing Irrelevant: The whole damn album

- Genghis sometimes just looks at his guitars and asks "who am I kidding?"...

TesseracT - Altered State

The addition of Ashe O'Hara has really put this band at the top of their prog metal game - and they do it all without guitar solos! WTF?I have said it before, but it bears repeating that the key to good progmetal isn't just killer musical chops; there are loads of talented people all over the world - just check out YouTube some time. But there has to be a good listenable quality to it in the vocals and in the melodies. Luckily, UK-based TesseracT displays not only a good sense of that melodicism but also possess an extraordinary intensity in their music that makes for an exhilarating sense of momentum.

Despite a seemingly ever-changing [vocalist] lineup over the last several years, as heard on their debut CD and follow up EP, the band's drive to make a name for themselves clearly remains undaunted, and their sophomore effort, Altered State, attempts to reflect that sense of the dynamic nature of our existence. Based on the scientific Law of the Conservation of Energy, the album muses on the law's four stages of change. But, while there are deeper levels of thought involved lyrically, the music of Altered State is what hits you with the most impact. It is classic progmetal all the way, though thankfully light on the esoteric noodling that often permeates the genre today.

For a band that's apparently gone through as much inner turbulence as this one, the music has a remarkable focus and intensity - perhaps due to the creative energy brought to the table with the addition of vocalist Ashe O'Hara. His amazing voice injects the rest of the lads' incredible music with an organic presence that connects emotionally in a way too few fellow proggers do these days.

The Bottom Line: Let's hope that this lineup stays together for a good long while. This is progmetal at its finest, and I can't wait to hear more from this band!

Tracks To Make You A Believer: Of Matter - Proxy, Of Mind - Nocturne, and Of Reality - Palingenesis

- Genghis got through most of the album before he even realized: no guitar solos...