Bengaluru’s love affair with modern prog continues with the latest release from a city trio, Tangents.
For a band who took the stage recently as a three-piece (minus a guitarist, with the guitar riffs going into a backing track) and a sound engineer adding synth from behind the console, Tangents sure have shown just the right kind of conviction you want to see from a metal band.
Coming together in 2014, the band has had its share of lineup changes, so that explains why it has taken them exactly three years to release their first set of studio material. They proudly claim in their bio, “What started out with six optimistic members is now half that number featuring twice the confusion.” Nonetheless, the layered chaos of prog is brought to ears with just as much conviction as they’ve exhibited on stage. The sound recreated with producer Yogeendra Hariprasad, Tangents – vocalist Siddharth Nair, bassist Abheet Anand and drummer Daniel Ancheril – have a snarling, mind-bending vibe that is a good fit for anyone who digs international djent bands such as Tesseract, Periphery and Monuments on their seven-track album Motion/Emotion .
While ‘Ira’ gives the album a more light-headed start with clean vocals from Shiyasz Abdul, it quickly takes the mould of a loud, aggressive metal banger.
They get more help from Delhi-based stringsman Moses Koul on the super melodic, solo-crazy ‘Solus’. The two-part ‘Avalanche’ might sound a little too close to what Tesseract does, but once you’re tuned into the pandemonium that arrives with Nair’s ruthless growls, you know you have to bob your head along.
Surprisingly, where Tangents really shine are on two of their shortest tracks – ‘Surface’ and ‘Verge’ – the thundering spiral of odd-metered riffage are instant hooks, as they dive into stomp-around grooves. The slower more mammoth riffs lead ‘Inevitable’, as well as Nair’s exceptional throat-shredding range and a breakdown that’s a treat to any prog fan. If you stick around and let it play, there’s a bit of mucking about, as hidden tracks are known for.
Motion/Emotion is a worthy step forward into Bengaluru’s metal scene for Tangents. Among the crop of prog metal bands, they’ve got a freshness they can do well to nurture.
Get the album on tangentsofficialaf.com