Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Soen
Label: UDR
Release: 2017
Runtime: 57:52
Rating: 4/5
Unbelievable. Soen, the Swedish band founded in 2010 by ex-Opeth drummer Martin Lopez, are slowly turning into one of the key players in the progressive rock revival, with one crucial difference: they’ve managed to carve out a musical and artistic identity all their own. Something Opeth, after their chameleon-like transformation, frankly struggle more and more to justify with each new album.
The excellent new album »Lykaia« simply confirms that Soen are still effectively “cruising” around the proving ground of their musical vision. The album is a new manifesto of musical uncommonness, and the occasional glimpse of “experimental weirdness” adds to its artistic allure. There are still parallels to be drawn with Opeth, especially from Lopez’s days with them (the spell of some guitar transitions in Opal, sections of the tracks Sectarian and Sister). But as Soen keep deepening their homegrown art culture, they’re slowly becoming a prog rock force that can catch up with the status of Riverside, Porcupine Tree and Opeth (after their genre transformation). The only question is whether Soen will ever reach the popularity those bands enjoy.
»Lykaia« delivers a new package of exceptional compositions: highly infectious musicality that also boasts complex arrangements, a whole bag of mighty, solemn, melancholy- and darkness-gazing, highly vibrant moods, a sense of spontaneous unfolding (or rather an unexpected development across the album), and a superbly mixed balance of calm passages alternating with moments of hard-hitting, metallic riff catchiness. As a whole, the album once again shows Soen flirting mostly with mid-tempo songs, while the keyboards join the guitars as equals in building atmospheric swells and soundscapes. The album works like a really good opiate. It’s psychedelic, “cerebral” and “trippy”. While you’re consuming it, it’s not hard to switch off the rational brain and freely drift through the universe of this band’s musical language. The contrasts between quiet passages and those ruled by a massive wall of guitars, underpinned by the constantly exploratory, thrilling drum escapades of Martin Lopez, are once again hugely pronounced. The rhythms are progressively fractured, keep challenging you with a top-shelf crop of improvisation, and so fan the flames of the dynamic momentum that is outstanding on this album. There’s the clearly audible, restlessly rattling pulse of the penetrating bass guitar, and, of course, above all of it, that pure, melodic, authoritative, perpetually sorrowful vocal, with its occasionally soapy, sensual softness and an incredibly invasive signature quality, in the consistently highly charismatic delivery of Joel Ekelöf.
The band has grown into a quintet. Keyboards have become an integral part of the lineup, and a new guitarist, Marcus Jidell, has joined the ranks too. His name is a jaw-dropper, since you immediately wonder what the hell a former Royal Hunt guitarist is doing in the stylistically very different Soen. It’s like trying to marry a spider and a fly. But Jidell is an excellent replacement for Platzbarzdis. He slotted perfectly into the band’s new musical substance and essence, and the change of guitarist is barely noticeable stylistically, if at all.
On »Lykaia« Soen don’t offer anything new and unheard. They keep gnawing away at the musical cues of its predecessor »Tellurian«, and in that respect they effectively nurture and build on the artistic and expressive reach of the previous album. The feeling is that the arrangements are a touch looser, more fragmented, even livelier in a prog rock sense, although the massive wall of sound built on voluminous, crushing riffing is as authentic as ever. Still, the general feeling is that »Lykaia« comes across a little “softer” than its predecessor, thanks to the further stretched-out and even more fragmented arrangements.
The look of the track Lucidity is a bit of a nuisance. It’s funny that Soen shot a promo video for it and picked it as the new album’s promotional single, even though with that move the band did themselves a downright thankless favor. Why? The song itself is an exceptionally beautiful, dreamy, melancholically yearning heartbreaker, but its resemblance to what David Gilmour made on his solo albums is distracting (the lead vocal melodies pull toward something Gilmour could have used on his album »On An Island«). At that point the psychedelic aesthetic of the album does swell, but the whole thing might also unsettle Pink Floyd connoisseurs. If I may stay a little barbed for the rest of these lines, David Gilmour can only dream these days of the inspiration to create a composition like Lucidity (Jidell’s striking solo in the second half included). Well, the parallels with Gilmour in Jidell’s guitar soloing return in the middle instrumental passage of Paragon (don’t get me wrong, that solo “sits” perfectly in the composition).
So, what was written at the end of the review of its predecessor »Tellurian« can be loudly repeated here. »Lykaia« is yet another gorgeous album, full of polished melodies, ambitiously loosened up with experimental exploration and progressive, technically complex musical figures. This approach is sure to thrill all the music purists and gourmets out there who are looking for musical perfection, uncommon expression and the allure of artistic challenge.
Soen – Sectarian (official audio):
Lineup
Joel Ekelöf – vocals
Lars Åhlund – guitar, keyboards
Marcus Jidell – guitar
Stefan Senberg – bass
Martin Lopez – drums
Production
Marcus Jidell
Tracklist
01. Sectarian
02. Orison
03. Lucidity
04. Opal
05. Jinn
06. Sister
07. Stray
08. Paragon
09. Gods Acre
10. Vitriol
