Israeli prog-rock/metal outfit Mental Fracture recently dropped their debut full-length album, Disaccord, a collection of nine tracks revolving around cognitive dissonance.
Disaccord follows the band’s 2019 EP, The Mind’s Desire, a conceptual EP about creation and the mind’s desire to escape in order to effect permanency.
Made up of Ori Mazuz (vocals, keyboards), Hai Maler (drums), Philip Tsukerman (bass), and Yogev Shpilman (guitars), Mental Fracture’s sound edges the line between prog-rock and metal. The band’s sound, influenced by Dream Theater, Opeth, Porcupine Tree, Camel, and King Crimson, is simultaneously multifaceted, heavy, and innovative.
Entry points on Disaccord include “Echo of a Heartbeat,” a short prologue opening on low-slung, cinematic prog-rock tone, followed by moussing up to washes of metal. “Summer Dies” begins with a dazzling intro composed of piano and guitar, and then descends into a mid-tempo rhythm topped by skiffing guitars flowing into intricate layers of sound.
“Concrete Wall” merges savors of prog-rock with hints of jazz flavors, riding a syncopated rhythm. When the guitars take on surging resonance and darker colors, the tune shifts and rolls and rumbles as Ori’s high tenor imbues the lyrics with dreamy potency. Pay close attention to Hai Maler’s impressive drumming, at once finessed and complicated.
“Inception of Fear” travels on snarling guitars as a baroque organ fills the harmonics with luminous accents. Ori’s voice, laced with portentous timbres, establishes the mood of developing fear. As the tune ebbs and rises on manifold tiers, the sophistication of the composition electrifies.
The title track’s complexity recalls Rush’s “La Villa Strangiato,” while the final track, “Hearts of Stone,” perhaps the preeminent track on the album, brims with hefty guitars and soft melodic interludes. Highlighted by Yogev Shpilman’s astounding guitar, the song recedes and swells on multiplex leitmotifs.
Painted by sprawling soundscapes of compound strata, Disaccord is a phenomenal work of music, polychromatic, and wonderfully wrought.
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