Pteroglyph – The Great Unseen

Simon Bower 22 August 2013 Album Reviews

Open your eyes and ears to the great unseen.

Tech Metal can be off limits for a lot of listeners, by its very nature the twisting and turning, sporadic riffs and fast changing rhythms can be difficult to digest and absorb. So it was with a slice of trepidation that I approached this E.P. (the follow up to last years “Found”). My reservations and fears were proven unfounded after about 2.2 seconds of what I can only describe as 13 minutes of musical genius. The fact that is the product and labour of love of one man and one man alone makes it even more remarkable.

Jimmy MacGregor cut his teeth if you like as an integral part of Mishkin before taking the leap of faith and throwing himself full blooded into this project. Billed as a three track E.P. it moves and blends more into a single body of work subdivided into three separate movements, all of which flow in a beautifully organic fashion as well as being highly technical and precise in their construction.

Inevitably comparisons with bands such as Gojira and Meshuggah, whilst understandable, are not obvious enough to detract from this highly original and forward thinking release. The first two pieces are in essence, hard hitting and riff laden compositions which are beautifully balanced by the third progressive, all together softer section, providing a welcome respite from the preceding mayhem.

An album’s ability to take the listener on a journey of different emotions and scenarios is a sign of a quality body of work, when all this is accomplished within the short time frame of thirteen minutes, then that is nothing short of astounding.

To keep with the technical ambience, I will sum up by saying that this is the best thing since a cooked dough mixture, conveniently dissected into units of equal proportions. Buy it!

Pteroglyph is;