[Gig Review] BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME (US) w/ THE OMNIFIC (AUS) @ Croxton Bandroom, Melbourne (AUS), 18.07.2026.
Tonight was an interesting one for me, before I’d even set eyes on The Croxton, let alone stepped into its’ uncharacteristically-sparse-for-a-Saturday-and-these-headliners’ cavernous, wide Bandroom.
This marks not only the first Gig Review I’ve done fresh after moving back to Melbourne from the Bellarine Peninsula (I’m not from Victoria etc - something something, Alexa play Sepultura’s ‘Nomad’/Thrice’s ‘In Exile’ , etc etc)… it’s actually the first review I’ve ever done for my own publication as a Melbourne local!
On top of that, after four years of battling the misery of Organonthe stretch from Werribee to Westgate (and many surprise Geelong council pop-up roadworks) and 90-120+min commutes. (By the way, I’d also like to point out that’s small gripes - fellow ISC scribe and even keener/more regular attendee of gigs than myself, Sammy O’Flynn, regularly drives to and from goddamned Camperdown for gigs. Like, on practically a weekly basis. So yeah, shove that in your pipe and smoke it next time you’re whinging about a gig being in the suburbs instead of the CBD.)
The novelty-factor isn’t stopping there, as tonight feels like a bit of a post/prog-metal/ISC/writing full-circle moment. I’m joined by fellow scribe, madcat-drummer and fellow Overdrive Music Mag alumni Hamza Siddiqi. The bulk of what we contributed and wrote for Sebastian’s old outlet was heavily in this musical domain, with both of us pretty heavy into that scene late 2010s/early 2020s as well. Not wanting to pull rank on such an iconic gig for review as this between us two, I’d made the promise that if there was a +1 ticket, it’s got his name on it.
Oh, it gets even more surreal, honestly - my first ever Victorian Between The Buried and Me experience was also my very last gig before we were plunged under the gig Iron Curtain of multiple lockdowns. It’s therefore a bittersweet but ultimately positive memory, with the An Evening With Between The Buried and Me double-setlist show at The Corner being one of my favourites so far - right before live music was snatched up and stolen from us by a nasty little piece of viral work. Little bastard.
Feeling like this is a lot of review setup that’s ultimately apropos-of-nothing? Well… look, I won’t argue that. See this godawful 2010’s stomp-clap hits’ chorus for a handy explainer, and let’s move on.
The actual physical entry into the gig and shimmy up to the front barrier was the strangest part of all, for me. Here we have one of the most accomplished, skilled and well known progressive metal/progressive metalcore bands of the modern metal collective conscious, and yet you could freely swing cats with helicopter blades in here, no issues. Where the hell is everyone?! Bro. I know the temperature dials’ been firmly set to Full Blown Siberia all week. I get you’re a prog-head and thus have probably seen the openers multiple times. But like… dude, Between The Buried and Me…?! There’s only two bands, you’ll cop the headliners very soon anyway…?!
It was honestly jarring for me as I also typically associate most gigs at The Croxton Bandroom with near-overwhelm. Packed-out with sold-out or close-to-it shows, this place turns into the average socially-anxious/neurodivergent spending too much time inside lately’s sensory faculties into a fizzling, overheated lump. Completely the opposite, to the point where I sidled up to the bar for an Obligatory Review Pint Of Moving This Plot Forward, sipping it and shrugging at bar staff who returned the gesture with “I dunno, man” shrug. They’re certainly not looking gift horses in the mouth - not when they could be serving us at a (bar staff shuddering and gulping) thrash-metal gig or something.
‘Least we had the easiest time ever sidling up to the front for the first band, The Omnific. A mainstay and staple of the Melbourne progressive-metal scene, accomplished musicians and gung-go giggers, I did remind myself that these guys are a pretty darn reliable and consistent staple of the Melbourne/domestic prog-metal gigging scene. As such, there’s likely a whole swathe of payers for whom this’d be very, very far from their first rodeo.
I mean yeah, same here, but I’m here not just because I’m tethered to The Stone of Music-Journo Perfectionism That Exists Nowhere Except Mt Stupid Head - they’re just plainly, a great and novel band to catch live. Remember, bassist attending gig with drummer, right?
Well, The Omnific aren’t your usual prog arrangement of a couple guitarists, bassist and drummer. Hell… if you’ve only ever listened to their studio material, replete with multiple bass-guitar tracks aplenty, even with the knowledge they lack a six-stringer you might be surprised to only see three individuals on the stage.
No vocalist, no guitarist, no long-haired Tommy bolting between the foldbacks and a keyboard/synth. None of them required either - this trio brings out an expressive range of the rhythm section normally sequestered to deeper parts of a studio mix/live arrangement.
With an open field of sonic range to play in, the Melburnian trio engage in both lockstep marching and fanciful, footloose musical frolicking. Often at the same time. Take for instance, opener ‘Double Malt Ditty’ - full Helix Nebula in its’ disgustingly, grossly, deliciously stabbing punctuated thick slap-pop stabs to bullshit-good drummer Jerome Lematua’s water-tight single kick plods. Lematua’s style is underrated in that calmly but boldly present lean onto crash, cymbal and hi-hat as rhythmic drivers, rounding his kit out in a sensationally tasty, expressive way throughout. Of the three, he’s physically working the hardest but looks the most footloose (pun intended, really) and fancy-free, swinging like a drunken octopus over all sorts of syncopated fills and riffs that, to the average audience member, look about as troublesome to weave as sinking a pint in a beer garden on Sunday.
Throughout the set, the bassist-duo onstage rile through a panoply of tones, effects, techniques and subtle use of two-hand dynamics, intonation etc to paint a much more colourful bass picture than just your usual ‘progressive’ thud-thud-clack-clack-am-I-Nolly-yet-Mom caper.
Doing everything from extensive ghost/mute-note heavy slap breakdowns on the first five frets that make my own hands sympathetically ache, it’s impressive watching them flit from low-string thumb-punches to G-string slides (instrumental, people, mind outta the gutter) far past the twelfth fret, trilling and weaving various pressure-points via arpeggiation and the like to provide our own spines some sonic acupressure. If those basses had vertebrae, this would be chiropracting in action - those things are getting kneaded, shredded, slapped, popped, muted, raked, soloed over, and more.
Toby Peterson-Stewart brings a lot of distortion/fuzz-heavy lead-guitar styled harmonic flair into the mix, taking a good portion of the two-handed tapping and spindly arpeggiation duties whilst Matthew holds down an impossibly groovy pocket-fort alongside the ridiculous beast-man behind the kit. Neither of the two relegate one another to traditional lead
In a rallying verbal jolt, mid stick-swing, Lematua barks a hearty “COME ON!” into the mic, his first of many hearty roars to get the audience participation. It works a treat, sending the crowd from sullen and silent to hooting and cheering as his band-mates twist wrists into contorted shapes to pop/slap a goddamned solid prog-metal breakdown. He even jumps up out of the throne itself, star-jumping and getting us to clap along like it’s pre-Cheez TV 90’s/00’s weekday TV and therefore time for vigorous clap-heavy calisthenics. It’s an odd but honestly fun and charming jilt, breaking them a bit out of that why-so-serious moodiness that often can enshroud live prog. The fact that Toby and Matthew are only ever giving lip-biting, proverbial eating “Oh yeah, baby!” grins and nods to the audience shows these guys are musically tight but also just straight up enjoying themselves. Again, you would or wouldn’t be surprised how many progressive rock/metal bands play with a level of consternation that makes you legitimately question if they enjoy their jobs, at times.
There’s no question, here. And it’s the fun-factor that separates this from similar instrumental acts where it might otherwise end up feeling like we watched a dry-run rehearsal. “FUCK YEAH Melbourne!", Jerome cries from the drum-throne. “We released this song… last year? Two years ago?! Anyway, it’s called ‘Full Circle!”.
Don’t worry Jerome - release dates are temporal, glory is eternal. Or something similarly whimsical/Warhammer 40k-sounding like that. It IS a glorious display, by the by. A trundling and heavily up-tempo flurry of ghost/mute notes, slaps and pops competing to fill sonic space against jerky, janky kicks and hat/cymbal stabs, right before Toby closes his eyes, waves his head around like John Petrucci in front of a high-speed fan onstage (always cracks me up, that guy), an impressive reach with some chordal tapping before moving into a very mellow, slight solo. Later on, he and Matthew will trade off these little lead spurts, the latter joining Jerome to crush in a massive, djenty breakdown as the former really cuts sick on the upper frets.
At just the right moment - imagine that, a rhythm-section band timing calls-to-action nicely, mind boggles! - Lematua roars a “Come on Melbourne, let me see those horns in the air!”, pulling back with an appreciative grin to smash us alongside his bandmates with a chest-bursting breakdown filled with so much bass-and-kick-oomph it feels like energy transmuted from sound into pure bone-rattle. The crowd eats it the hell up, works a damn treat.
notices ur music video mentioned in review
0w0 What’s This?!
L-L-Link-san…. w-what are you d-d-doing…..?!
(via the bands’ Youtube Channel):
Jerome vaults off the kit, scrambling hyperactively towards the vocal mic with the ease (and urgency) of a practiced frontman. He’s relishing the MC role - and why not? Unless you’re watching something drummer-vocalist specific such as The Furor, Lightning Bolt or similar, a drummer taking vocal lead alone is more an exception than the rule. Having the drummer act as band hype-man from behind the kit and onstage? It’s honestly a smart strategy, adding a bit more humanising (and fun/banter) to a set that could easily end up feeling like a rehearsal under pretty lights in other circumstance.
Relaxing back from the claw-gripped thundering of previous tracks, ‘Wax:Wane’ is perfectly positioned in both a musical, performative and titular sense. Watching both bassists and drummer all open-mouthed, closed-eyed as one during certain points, feeling pure-pocket - yeah, jeez, that’s almost steamy! Particularly when the fret touches are more subtle, recursive and reliant on slowly padding out palm-mutes, cymbals and ride, etc, rather than just obliterating their gear with a vice-grip. This also lends itself to some nicely sustained and warbling, fretless-like lead notes that are so deftly applied, the notes bleed out warmly like custard over a drum-and-bass rhythmic Christmas cake. One of those tracks that, if applied similarly across a set might make the whole thing boring, but particularly well-placed tonight as a palate-cleanser.
“Alright!” Jerome cheers into the mic as the crowd gives another equally hooty and polite prog-fan round of applause. “We’re stoked to be playing with Between The Buried And Me - last time was back in 2020. Long time ago…” he notes, and I catch myself in a pang of existential “2020 wasn’t that long ag- oh” dread, momentarily. Pressing on with the kit, he announces ‘Merlin’s Id’, which once more extends that setlist-bridge nicely in terms of progression (funny that, at a prog gig? Ba-dum-tiss). Clamouring for more sonic real-estate than the prior track but primarily through weaving both bassists’ lead/solo capacity into fore/background, it’s like a mostly slow-motion double-bass-guitar solo. I find instrumental bands can evoke mental imagery a fair bit in the absence of vocal/lyrical stimulus, and Jerome’s calm but playful drumming that brings all three together, locked-in, only to separate and spindle off into their own tangents, kind of like all those documentaries where protons, black holes and other particles dance consistently but chaotically around one another. Of all the tracks on offer tonight, I feel ‘Merlin’s’ is the one that pushes the bass-as-lead-guitar-too angle the most prominently, without lapsing into feeling like overcompensation.
Jerome also gave a shoutout to his own snare with a bit of self-deprecation during the track, asking us if we loved ‘that St. Anger snare?’. A few hearty boo’s resound around me - me? Nah. Dude, take that TWONG-TWONG out of that reprehensibly-pedestrian album and stick it where it fits snugly (see also: Last Days of Humanity, Fuck.. I’m Dead or Sanguisugaboigg)? Ah, bellisimo!
That’s also ADHD apropos of nothing and I yet again digress, so let’s turn back to our meal and pick ‘Fountainhead’ apart with a knife and fork. Sharing the moniker with a book that amounts to ‘you could’ve just said I love Daddy Capitalism/Boot Taste Good and saved us all a terrible novel’, at least The Omnific’s is more dynamic, interesting and thought-out. The textural layering here gets quite hectic as the bands (if I’m recalling correctly?) Neural DSP Quad Cortex processing, multi-tracked backing lines, plus the tonal possibilities switching between fanned-fret Dingwalls and regular-fret basses, multiple pedals, etc… it gets near cacophonous at times, but always stays planted in a central harmonic root, fed through by Jerome’s cautious but accurate fill/accent-heavy playing.
“Fuck yeah! Great set guys!” a couple of folks cheer out as Jerome fronts up to take the mic, also congratulating his bass-mates on some great playing. It just further entrenches the idea of The Omnific being one for the homies - the rhythm-section homies - without being exclusionary or virtue-signalling about it. They’re just bros who are talented and love a good groove.
Speaking of groove, eh? God ‘DWAM’ it (HEH!), these rhtyhmic-nerds will be god-dwamned if they’re left with such hefty sonic instruments just to float away in lofty lead-land forever.
Part of what gravitates a lot of bassists and percussionists to the craft is the physical heft, the actual physical weight of the instrument, not least to mention the cathartic thud of pure sonic chest-rattling low-frequency. ‘Dwam’ is hugely exemplary of such love, a complex, grinding interplay between thick, thudding slapping, pop and upper-neck soloing/two-hand tapping by the bass-lads, Jerome lockstep the entire time and patterning across his kit to embellish the tones either subtly or like a goddamn brick.
Earning themselves another polite but louder and fuller applause as patrons are slowly collected and drawn inter-set like moths to flame, Jerome hops up one last time (this guys’ both a showman and a mirror-reflection of my own hyperactivity/restlessness) to roar a hearty, Melbourne-accented “Oh fark-yeah, Melbourne! Next one’s the last one on our setlist… oh yep it is!” he says, jogging over to check out that indeed it’s ‘Ne Plus Ultra’ and the ripping closer ‘The Omnific ≈ Bass’. From the rip-and-tear destructiveness of the former into the chordally-driven, very harmonic latter track, the instrumentalists’ set comes to a thundering conclusion with hearty booms of appreciation from us punters.
Looking around, I’m feeling a little more appreciative of the turnout as the set progressed. Not to judge, really - lots of us are working two jobs to make ends meet, we’re exhausted, and this could’ve been what felt like the ten-millionth Omnific viewing. Fair, but even with their entrenched name on the local live circuit, I sincerely hope there were at least a few newcomers who had their minds blown and, as a result, some new merch acquired. Or at the very least an interesting and skilled local band to follow on socials for future gigs - you can certainly do that via the links down the bottom of this article, big-boss!
The Omnific - Links:
LinkTree
(see for: all Social Media, Email, Tour Dates/Tickets, Patreon, Streaming, Merch, Music Videos etc)
As a reader of my infamously overly-wordy reviews, you’ll be relieved to learn this is the part where we finally get to the headliners. The whole reason we’re here, to witness another iteration of masterful progressive-metal wizardry. With the recent overall-positive but in places still quite mixed/polarising reactions to latest LP The Blue Nowhere, I was definitely interested to how the more melodic (but no less sonically dense/layered) tracks would sit astride their discography.
As it turns out and on par with my expectations, it’s the live format that really brings the beastliness and raw, unrestrained power from North Carolina’s proggiest export in Between The Buried And Me. The wide reach of the Croxton Bandroom stage allows for the bands’ equipment to be spread further outward, all members relatively facing each other in those loosely hexagonal, scattered arrangement.
Even the standing arrangements’ atypical, and there’s more than a couple of surprised (possibly newbie) heads cock when slick-haired vocalist Tommy Rogers sidles back over to his synth/mic stand, busting out the first of many Michael Jackson film-clip-esque shimmies on the way. Planted almost wholly in his own nook off to our right, the wry frame of the sides-shaved-haired master bassist and also-sometimes-keyboardist-too Dan Briggs has his own setup, flailing a bass upon which his fingers won’t ever spend much time orbiting a single fret, scale or motif too long. Dude’s not miniscule, but the sheer heft of the axes he commands looks impressive to be flaunting like barbarians’ morningstars onstage.
Perched more humbly and quiescently for a lot of tonights’ performance is the observant and skilful eye of recent touring lead guitarist/will-they-won’t-they 2023-onwards axe-mercenary, Tristan Auman. Even in the wake of Dustie’s controversial departure from the band, it’s impressive that a band with a rich and complex canonical work will still abdicate the lead-guitar position to that of a ‘sessional’ (on paper and for now, perhaps?) musician. Known for his histrionic work in fellow NC natives Sometime in February, he’s also provided backing vocals to recent live/studio material. Hanging back and slightly left of stage most of the night, Tristan nevertheless creeps forward during many flashy soloing moments, raising a fist here and there but primarily concerning himself with a cool, collected performance.
It’s an interesting juxtaposition to rhythm guitarist (and lead on studio work, still) Paul Waggoner. Both of these guitarists are versed in an incomprehensible amount of slick technique, but it’s Paul’s expressiveness that gets me every time. Dude absolutely lives and loves for those moments of deep, warbling bends, bluesy twangs, face-melting solos and other intricate bits worthy of that guitarist-gurn. It’s a soulful, pinched-brow, eyes-closed expression, often with head waving in semi-disbelief… yeah, that visual’s starting to sound a bit fanfic eh? The man looks enraptured at times, but also stands lockstep up on the foldbacks, marching between members with head banging constantly.
An absolute beast behind a fearsome amount of kit, and the engine-room of all the carefully-orchestrated cacophony, drummer Blake Richardson is a partially obscured but sonically and physically larger-than-life force. Even from the front row, I was slightly bummed about how little I was able to clock the guys’ form. Funnily enough, I started getting way more interested in drummers live after picking up a bass, but there’s a dynamicism to this guys’ playing that can not be understated and is worth just basking in, in a live setting. Think about the bands’ deft riff-writing - all those subtle (or sharp) timing shifts, key changes, brief spurts of both harmonic and atonal notes. Now imagine pretty much all of those either accented or given the appropriate space in a delivery that’s both tasteful and surgical. Great stuff.
It’s a very different iteration of the band to what we’ve seen before, sure, and some folks have their panties in a twist about TBN not being Colors III. That’s fine. From tonight’s performance at least, it’s arguable you don’t need to like the new album very much at all in order to appreciate and enjoy the sheer sonic spectacle.
First and foremost, the sarcastic jabber-scat that Tommy’s been howling a little more on permeates opener ‘Mirador Uncoil’. Hammering down on synths with fingers splayed across alternate chords and arpeggiations, some DJ-style knob-twiddling and the like - yep, Tommy and Dan are playing with their toys, warping the audible warmth, plinking keys and almost chiptune-style electronica in and out of sparse, twanging leads. The bleed-over into follow-up track ‘Psychomanteum’. Tommy’s vocal presence takes more of a backseat for this one, feeling like a dynamic ad-insertion rather than the main thrust of a podcast rant. This allows our guitarists to physically step back and forwards under the glowering focal lights, bright flashes of orange capturing plenty of shit-hot, intricate riffs and leads whilst Dan’s half groove-bassist posing, half nodding on the keys.
The run through from the jangling playful discordance, reminiscent of a more proggy Mr Bungle, snaps satisfyingly into some locked-in, serpentine riffs and blazing classic-metal style leads. All of that brings home the audience-bacon nicely, as the first break rings out to huge applause from us.
And then… Woah! We’re following this up with that one? Damn, no rest for the wicked, I guess. Just being ‘Condemned To The Gallows’! No whimsical little interlude-breaks or other musical hors d'oeuvres for us, apparently. Straight under more of those chameleonic red, blue, white and green lights, tinkling guitar as Tommy’s croons of “‘Condemned To The Gallows”, Con-demned… to-the-Gallows” and that whisper of “Goodnight” precludes a massive, stompy intro that sets the first two rows off.
I’ve been a little too music-nerd thus far so let’s pull back to the visual again: Tommy’s swagger and physically stomp-heavy gait is also inflected with all manner of stage-moves that at first look random but after a while you realise are also accentuated on/off beats, deliberately. From shaking visibly upfront, barking snarls with raised fists, raising his arm disco-style and all manner of gesticulation, he’s rarely ever still and always reacting directly to rhythm, key changes and the like. It’s a refreshing to see a progressive-metal frontman just so actively joyed by their craft that he’s constantly hitting invisible snares, strumming invisible riffs, pumping his fists, leading claps or ripping moves from an everything-goes playbook.
There’s some room for these moves and gyrations in ‘Condemned’s’ opening measures, but it’s soon focus-time for Rogers as half bends over to growl with extra ferocity. It’s an expedient run through the songs’ first-half that, if not for the injection of multiple off-tangent fills and tricky runs, could just about be considered death-thrash in intensity. But also Steve DiGorgio style death-thrash, ‘cause damn if Briggs’ fret-ADHD is intense on this one. The cumulative build of pressure in this track feels like a lurching post-metal number from the 2000s, were it not for the caustic growls and soaring croons of our vocalist. Per the track before, there’s a repetitive refrain and a seriously slick, larger-than-life breakdown that feels produced by four enraged Devin Townsends, it’s that thick. The song rings out and an audience of stunned mullets lose their got-dang minds.
‘The Coma Machine’ taught us “What was/Out there”, and it’s funny to think back of the prog-metal patrician-snobbery that surrounded that album, back in the mid-2010s. Especially considering how much broader and less metal-conscious The Blue Nowhere is comparatively, tonights’ newer offerings just serve to also make tracks like ‘Coma’ much heavier live than before.
Plus even the snootiest, most Dorito-encrusted “play-yer-old-stuff” prog-neckbeard in here can dig the thudding boom of the riff that sharply accompanies those piano chords in the intro. The swinginess of “You teach us what was/Out there” and “Lift our lamps to focus/We soon drift through the night” - two morose, croony, lilting vocals over sparse chords, soon mashed into that good ol’-fashioned BTBaM metal/hardcore/prog grinder.
Controlled cacophony ensues as per the prior two tracks, smoothing out over time as Briggs takes a more prominent melodic role. For once, the guitarists and their surely butchered (or inorganic/cybernetic) fingers finally get a break from endless reams of white-hot soloing, arpeggiation and plain painful-looking chordal shapes. It’s a midsection with breathing room that collapses slowly and powerfully like shore-waves on high tide. Naturally, it’s a fan fave, as evidenced by the audience-wide vocal chantalongs, as well as the screeching applause as the track lapses into feedback.
With some fan-servicing and discography butter spread, we launch back into another The Blue Nowhere double-backer of recent singles ‘God Terror’ and ‘Absolute Thereafter’. I feel these are best served listened to in succession, and the live recount warrants the same. The notable lack of distortion and guttural palm-muting across this one, as well as Blake spreading accents across bars rather than compacting in tighter flourishes, helps all on both sides to physically regroup, not to mention emotionally recover from so much intensity. This is still a busy, intricate number, intermingling some subtle industrial electronic tones nicely, but it’s not a semi-impenetrable prog-fortress like the more demanding numbers on the setlist. ‘Absent’ was one that by this point to me was feeling like a musical Salvador Dali, more a wash of competing textures that still somehow swarmed around like angry nanomachines in some post apocalyptic offworld dust-devil. There’s a musical impatience to the newer material, stylistic shifts that are so fast you can be bopping to a blues-riff one second, reeling from a blastbeat the next, honky-tonked and loudspeakered by Tommy right before he leaps to the front to bark over the front.
Those earn a weary if still enthusiastic response, but it’s that Cyberpunk-coded warble of the synth riff (and subsequently harmonised by guitar/bass) scale-running riff signifying ‘Selkies: The Endless Obsession’ that makes us really, really lose our shit. Perfectly exemplary of Alaska’s masterful blend of long-song aesthetic with short-fast-loud extreme-metal aggression, we’re frantically headbanging and cheering as things go brutal Dream Theater. I recorded about 11 minutes of this track and didn’t look at the screen once. Just completely entranced by the labyrinthine, twisting endless corridors, that very slow initial vocal drawl always ill-preparing those for the chaos that erupts. The epic clash of fusion, trad-metal, jazz, prog and metalcore in the one… ah man, Alaska.
Yep, perfectly renditioned under washing lights, chest thudding with the added oomph of real amps and a kit just metres away. This is the life.
“Melbourne, thank you!” Tommy repeats, bowing graciously. He notes the aforementioned last time they were out here for the 2020 show, commenting on the interim being ‘far too long’ and that ‘we’ve got a couple more for you - we’d absolutely love to play more for you if we had the time!’ to which we holler an enthusiastic yowl ‘sif to say “G’arn then mate, have a crack!”. He gave a nod to The Omnific and their masterful playing (earning a proud local cheer) and dedicated the next number to them.
‘The Future Is Behind Us’ earns the band little to no reprieve, being a splintering and dynamic shape-shifter of a track. Of the newer tracks on offer, this one’s tonally less distorted and sonically hefty. That said, it’s the sheer rate of haphazard riffs and ideas swirling at you constantly, the bands’ constant motion, and Tommy’s veering between soulful croon, sarcastic yeah-yeah alt-rocker wail and straight up dog-in-a-coal-bunker throaty growl that all catch up to you. It’s busy but punctuated with some tasty breakdowns with the proper-metal-innit dialled up just enough and long enough to sate.
I almost breathe trepidation alongside my excitement as I recognise the broad, unending plains of technically dense, layered and punishing soundscapes that await us next. I can’t wait. Break my brain harder, Daddy Buried! ‘Sun of Nothing’ eclipses the grandiosity of all other tracks, a sheer tour-de-force in riff composition. The sheer amount of time spent cranking out jagged, technical and spasmodic metal/hardcore/prog/death/etc riffage in the tracks’ hectic first-half is damn near brain-frying. The blokes onstage haven’t relented energetically this whole time, either, and by this stage I’m just plain impressed these prog nerds can move so much for so long, let alone when their poor hands all have hell to pay in terms of notes. Dan and Blake’s melodic rivers stretch the song like some sort of black-hole event horizon, seeming to warp the air around us as Waggoner’s eyes are off on some nebulae, blissfully blazing the instrument.
And - oh, my, GOD. So ah, here’s the thing. I have a pretty big bass-practice-routine crush for Between The Buried and Me. With Dan often hanging fractionally ahead of the beat at times, I find that useful for warming up - right before I curse one of his many sudden jerky, warbling, harmonically/rhythmically I-do-what-I-want finger-snaps on the frets.
The track that comes up next is always the one I use where I want to test my stamina, but it’s also one I love conceptually. ‘Fossil A - Genera: Feedback From Cloud Mountain’ will never not bring strong visuals of The Greys, the owls as their messengers/reconnaissance, and so many conspiracies buried like Lemurian gold under Mount Shasta. I just also love it as a self-contained lyrical journey, a message of warning from wisened creatures we’re investigating and threatening when ironically, they’re only bringing us pertinent news of our potential demise or success as a species.
Anyway, modern-art-museum-wanker coded interpretation of lyrics aside, it’s just a solid launch back into the meaty mid-section of the bands’ career via The Great Misdirect. The honky-tonk, Donkey Kong Country soundtrack vibes are particularly funny, plinking samples at the start also act as a stepping stone off the jazzy, jangly sillier vibes of some of the new direction back into their midway-years. Thick neck-slides from Briggs and guitarists giving a lurching, washing-machine feel, not helped by Richardson’s selective kit-bashes. Tommy’s half spoken-word scatting through the next section feels like it could be lilting down from the rafters of a city jazz bar at night, somewhere especially rainy and smoke-filled. The sneer on the repeated refrain is as catty as on-disc with:
“We have for centuries... hearing every breath... watching every disease
Indeed we work from here
We have for centuries... hearing every breath... watching every disease
Indeed we work from here
We have for centuries... hearing every breath... watching every disease
Indeed we work from here
We have for centuries... hearing every breath... watching every disease!”
It’s a repetitive vocal refrain where Rogers gets even more play-room to accentuate vowels and consonants, something you’d notice him doing throughout… but admittedly, if you are picking up to that level, you’ve probably flogged this LP into the ground and then some.
The holding on certain accented vocal notes and/or decision to slide right back down the neck, also gives the repeated refrain kind of a mocking, sickly, shape-shifting quality. The same can really be said of any BTBaM set writ large though, right?! It’s an exercise of being roped in towards the visage of one sub-genre whilst being clubbed with another, five technical juggernaughts prancing around you like foolhardy satyrs just having fun. Which they are, judging by those Cheshire-cat grins and hell-yeah-bro nods constantly being traded.
Things pull to a more aggressive head, churning into the distention of organised riff-chaos the band are known for. Overlapping as though competing with one another, even whilst occupying similar sonic space, the fretted instruments feel blurred around Blake’s rolling toms and Rogers’ barked snarl.
As Tommy pulls back into a more vulnerable yet no less powerful register, under the ambience afforded by his bandmates, the lights flicker and hue to a deep red. With the singer semi Christ-like by the piano, slightly foregrounded by his bandmates, that monotonal throb and exploratory lead playing over washy synth-effects takes on a new sinister foreboding. But it’s after that puncturing, near death-metal churn, multiple minutes of caustic and bruising, harsh metallic hardcore inflected with an Atheist’s worth of jazz-prog weirdness until the labels are insurmountable and bunk. It’s after that point that is the true zenith.
The clean bluesy trilling, floating ahead lazily to pepper a quieter moment as Tommy croons:
“In simple times, we must take control
With simple skies, we create... more sky
A simple land we must change... for man... is god
A simple life we must break... move on
How fast we grow…”
If you’re a fan of their material, I don’t need to tell you how epic it felt to have the lights surge and watch the man basically double over, the other band members chorally gang-changing over that endless refrain of “We must move on/We must move oooooooooo-n…”.
The thing about reviewing a band like this that is both fantastic and imposing, is that it’s pretty redundant for them to have ‘that one-size-fits-all’ final piece as the showcase of their discography. Because all of it is there, all the time, just in cleverly subtle and kaleidosopic forms.
Tommy gives a humble wave and a “Thank-You!”, and we cheer eagerly. Folks are bug-eyed after that one, just absolutely floored. I’ve probably kicked my lower-jaw somewhere closer to the barrier, personally. Just aghast, in the best way.
“Align the love inside me/Let misery wake me/
Searching low/Abandoned ♬”
(‘Condemned’ clip, via the Inner-Strength Check Youtube Channel):
And good progressive-metal Lord Almighty - following up that with the impenetrably dense, prog-metallers-on-PCP outright riff-fest that is ‘Sun of Nothing’?!
The intentionality behind that move is self-evident as the band explode, writhing like a bag of cut snakes as their equally-serpentine riffing bleeds in frantic overlaps. I’m reminded how, when looking over some BTBaM guitar tab-books and Rocksmith charts, wondering if it was just everyone else or if brother is really just picking and choosing certain points to stone-skip just ahead of the drums (or if I was still playing bass like a guitar, lol). Both things can be true at once, but it’s those pushy arpeggiated stabs and melodic runs underneath what feels like flashy thrash-metal-goes prog guitar overload. To hook all of this in under a persistent drumming framework that also lends accents, fills and tight hits/rolls etc is a feat of drumming engineering that can’t be understated.
It’s prog-metal sadomasochism, the brutality more artefactual of the unrelenting busy-ness of the track’s first half. You can tell they’re enjoying it though - the frowns of consternation are never without hearty, devilish, this’ll-show-em grins and sheer dat-riff-man gurns. Especially from Old Mate [guitarist] - there is a love he shows for that thing when a bend or a tone hits just right, and it’s an expression that’d make any girlfriend, wife or partner furiously jealous.
The denouement and fade into more melodic moments gives the room a collective kinetic exhale as even the sound-waves settle, Tommy’s croons shining through the musical restraint. Just wild to think that either strenuous and careful thought, super-human musical interpersonal intuition and/or a combination of the two and more must go into creating and performing this stuff.
I’ve always loved this track too, for the way it kind of awkwardly trips, bumbles and trundles off with a very sudden bouncing, off-kilter riff and abrupt finish. You just know the ensuing silence at the last snare hit and muted fret is going incite a whopper of a reaction from the audience. And yeah, I can feel my vocal chords basically shearing with the banshee-like shriek that erupts from me, like a spellbound Brit at a Beatles concert.
No sooner am I done wailing than I literally throw my hands up in that classically-WTF gesture of ‘And this as well?!’ as the sprawling, expansive epic that is Parallax II’s penultimate-track, ‘Silent Flight Parliament’ marches strongly offstage in those initially battering riffs. “This setlist is fucked!” someone yells to a friend nearby, and I couldn’t agree more (need I say expressed as a positive?). Metaphorically, there’s nowhere this track doesn’t go: village-level barbaric death-metal/hardcore savagery, the loftiest towers of scientific boffins or indeed straight off into the deep cosmos. The plonking of keys under soft lights, Tommy’s insistence of “I/Know/What/I/Must/Do” is hauntingly rhythmic, giving the chords a newly uninviting edge.
“I’m the night owl/I see all/I hear all” is a lyrical refrain punctuated by either soft croons or aggressive barks, depending on how forcefully the orator wants to remind you of the owls’ ever-present, omniscient and far-reaching sight, as a tool of extraterrestrial forces. It weaves the ‘Fossil Genera’ thread nicely through a loop in its’ own setlist, but the real joy is just the sheer, epic nature of this track. At 12+ minutes in length, it never outstays its’ welcome, throbbing with gnarled metal fury one minute, sombre ambient repentance another. Bends, legato, arpeggio - whatever you like, pick a guitar or check out the bass, it’s all here, and there’s plenty more injected by Tommy and Blake, too.
With a monolithic, leviathan march towards the end that reminds me of Pelican’s ‘March To The Sea’ and over lengthy post-metal epics, the track surges like a giant through slowly-ebbing creek-water. There’s a final almost despondent phase of wavering out, bleeding into a touching and surprisingly emotive rendition of ‘Goodbye to Everything (Reprise)’. It’s stitched into the album lining anyway, sure, but I damn near have to double-take to realise this final humble, melodic refrain with its’ few piercing lulls of riff are, in fact, the end. It’s a sombre fitting but the applause under shining white light is massive and jubilant, a hearty roar of approval at a complete mind-melter of an evening.
I’ll admit that when I put in to review this one, I had reservations. At first and see, well, everything I’ve ever written, brevity’s not my strong suit. I was a bit reticent as to whether I’d fly off into forever-land in trying to describe a Between The Buried And Me show, but what actually helped was to unhook completely from the outcome. After all, we’re talking about one of the most eclectic, idiomatic and uniquely their-own-thing progressive-metal bands in modern memory. No small feat in today’s metal scene, either.
Really, I just my review encourages those of you on the fence about seeing them to be swayed towards a ticket, next time. There really isn’t any proper justification words, images or even video can give to the sheer size, scale and complexity of these guys in live form. If you love interesting, technically-challenging and eclectic music, you owe it to yourself to check ‘em out next time.