At the Soundawn - Shifting (Lifeforce Records) By: Max Barrett

[7/10] Spiralling you into another universe with their experimental progressive rock, Italy’s At The Soundawn create another cleverly written journey on their second release, Shifting. With only seven tracks, it is by no means a short journey as it plays out for just over 45 epic minutes.

Each track is beautifully written and structured as they jump between melodic, percussion and metal parts which all flow together nicely. When the vocals are raspy, it sounds as if they are tearing straight out of the heart, and when they are clean and melodic it flows effortlessly with the musicianship.

There aren’t many to which you can compare At The Soundawn to, but names such as Tool, Isis and Mogwai do ring bells though it is only fair to suggest that this is still a fairly unique effort by today’s standards of processed generic drivel flooding the industry.

For the most part, Shifting is quite a soft mover, however when it does explode in songs like “Mudra In Acceptance And Regret” and “Prometheus Bring Us The Fire,” it is a whole different monster scratching at the surface only to plummet back into a state of melancholy. The balance between the two works just about perfectly as you are never quite given the chance to get comfortable in either state before your mind is rocked once more.

It’s not quite as free-flowing an experience as one might like however, as some of the tracks do tend to drag out the instrumental parts a little longer than needed which does affect the listen slightly. Whether it was a conscious choice to create an epic ambience or just a case of over doing it is unknown, but I think At The Soundawn can be given the benefit of the doubt.

Shifting is a decent effort on the whole comprising of some elegant musicianship. It’s not perfect but is certainly travelling in the right direction.

www.myspace.com/atthesoundawn