Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
To have free reign over your imagination is arguably the greatest gift that we can hold onto, especially in a time in which demands to the point of almost bombastic, ordered without question, fascist intent that we think of nothing but the next Pound, Euro, Yen or Dollar. To have the ability to withstand this featureless political doctrine and exemplify the beauty of marrying both hard science and science fiction in a cold merciless machine, is to know that the possibilities are still endless, that humanity still matters above all else.
It is the pulse of humanity that soars with fierce independence in Helion Prime’s Terror of the Cybernetic Monster, not just a beast of an album but one that brings in from the shadows, its own demonic ideal and the answer to such nightmares, the collective will and fury of the people tasked with protecting us, giving us a reason of hope in which believe that a group can install in us the beauty of great expectation of delivery and confidence of salvation.
In Sozos Michael’s vocals the compliment of the music is extraordinary and as Chad Anderson’s and Jason Anderson’s lead and rhythm guitar, Jeremy Steinhouse’s ravaging bass, Alexander Bosson’s dynamic but also precision- minded drums, the power of this new album is enough to shake the mind out of any complacent thoughts it might have regarding the future of the genre.
In tracks such as Failed Hypothesis, Atlas Obscura, Urth, the faithful to the cause The Human Condition, Spectrum, Silent Skies and the epic finale of the album’s title track, Terror of the Cybernetic Monster, Helion Prime take the genre out for a short walk, allow it to feel comfortable in its own accord and past, and then, with all the finesse of a duchess removing one sheer laced black glove, finds a gauntlet in which to smack the backside of what went before and the stern voice of authority to suggest that this is the new way in which to head.
There are moments in which the mammoth comes over the horizon and suggests that you should cower in its wake; in others the gigantic seems foreboding, but ultimately is there in the skin of the kindly and benevolent; it just asks you to believe in the loud roar that it will display. Terror of the Cybernetic Monster is very much in the latter camp, but it still thunders across the valley of music with power.
Helion Prime release Terror of the Cybernetic Monster on August 31st via AFM Records.
Ian D. Hall