Oni - Ironshore

When you go to fam's house and he's all like "Check out my water feature, bro!"Looks like Ontario is coming up in the metal world. Metal bad-asses Oni are poised to take shit by storm with the release of their full-length debut Ironshore. Rooted in modern progressive metal à la Between The Buried And Me or Protest The Hero, Jake Oni (vocals) and company strive to rise above the genre conventions by making each song individual and meaningful apart from the others, and this is one impressive debut, let me tell you.

The first single off the album, Eternal Recurrence, provides a handy snapshot of the band's skill set. Thrilling unison runs, a thunderous backbeat (courtesy of Oni's bassist, Chase Bryant, and drummer, Joe Greulich), and even the addition of a Xylo-synth player in Johnny D - something you may have to see to believe. Meanwhile tracks like Spawn And Feed provide a salient example of the band's penchant for mixing sophisticated phrasing with brutal riffs. It's like prog for black metalheads. Thankfully, tracks like The Science give singer Jake Oni the chance showcase his skillz.

Producer Josh Wilbur (Gojira and Lamb Of God) pulls the strings behind the scenes to pull it all together, even bringing Randy Blythe along for some guest vocalizations on The Only Cure. It all comes together in the most satisfying way, marrying progmetal's erudite pyrotechnics with black metal's visceral energy. This is some good shit.

The Bottom Line: Having only been around as a band for about 3 years, Oni is a force to be reckoned with in terms of technique and chunk™, amirite? Get out there and see this band. NOW!

- Genghis is crossing his fingers these cats come rock Houston's collective ass...