Italian Sadist, from Genoa, are a historical progressive death metal band founded back in 1990. The band debuted in 1993 with Above the Light as a technical avant-gard death metal band that even then stood out for the high level of virtuosity, in particular the extraordinary guitarist Tommy Talamanca, in my opinion one of the greatest guitar heroes in the history of music and the only man I have ever seen playing simultaneously, and in a virtuosic way, electric guitar and keyboards. After that album, the band shifted towards a more genuinely prog direction, which is also reflected in the style of Talamanca, whose neoclassical leaks have given way to a less flashy but perhaps more intricate phrasing.
The latest album Hyaena, as usual when it comes to Sadist, continues to move across borders and to explore territories neglected by traditional death metal bands. Here you can feel the breath of bands like King Crimson, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Deep Purple and the like, with the only difference that here the whole has a death metal outfit. To give you an idea suffice to say that “The Devil Riding the Evil Steed” also contains verses in a language that I think is Zulu. From an intellectual point of view Hyaena is an immense album and Sadist prove to have a wide musical culture of which metal, and in particular extreme metal, is only a tiny part, which is admirable: this album taps mostly into prog rock, jazz, blues. One could even say that, apart from the distortion and the growl, this is not a metal album at all. Hyaena offers a challenging listening experience, unfortunately perhaps too challenging: if you are not an advanced musician and into complicated tricks and tempos, it will be difficult to appreciate the refined sophistication on it. But on the other hand, think of Opeth! So if you like prog music, this is definitely the album for you.
Notes:
Hyaena was released on October 16 2015 on Scarlet Music.
Personnel:
Tommy Talamanca: Guitars, Oud, Santur, Keyboards
Andy Marchini: Bass
Alessio Spallarossa: Drums, Percussion
Trevor Sadist: Vocals (lead)
Text by Herjann
herjann@unholyblackmetal.com
The latest album Hyaena, as usual when it comes to Sadist, continues to move across borders and to explore territories neglected by traditional death metal bands. Here you can feel the breath of bands like King Crimson, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Deep Purple and the like, with the only difference that here the whole has a death metal outfit. To give you an idea suffice to say that “The Devil Riding the Evil Steed” also contains verses in a language that I think is Zulu. From an intellectual point of view Hyaena is an immense album and Sadist prove to have a wide musical culture of which metal, and in particular extreme metal, is only a tiny part, which is admirable: this album taps mostly into prog rock, jazz, blues. One could even say that, apart from the distortion and the growl, this is not a metal album at all. Hyaena offers a challenging listening experience, unfortunately perhaps too challenging: if you are not an advanced musician and into complicated tricks and tempos, it will be difficult to appreciate the refined sophistication on it. But on the other hand, think of Opeth! So if you like prog music, this is definitely the album for you.
Notes:
Hyaena was released on October 16 2015 on Scarlet Music.
Personnel:
Tommy Talamanca: Guitars, Oud, Santur, Keyboards
Andy Marchini: Bass
Alessio Spallarossa: Drums, Percussion
Trevor Sadist: Vocals (lead)
Text by Herjann
herjann@unholyblackmetal.com
