Let Me Try Explain...

I know metal isn't for everyone, but we can still try.

Firstly, one needs to understand that there are SO many sub-genres of metal. I don't care for sub-genres. If it sounds good and it's metal, it's good metal.

Having said that, this particular style of metal (progressive metal, if you will) has been on the rise over the past few years. I like to think of it as a grown man's metal. Strange time signatures, odd tunings, technical riffing. It's mathematical and quite complex, musically.
The best part about this kind of metal is that it's so groove based. It will keep your head bobbing from start to finish. 

Now I've listened to this song about 40 times in the past few days. It has been on repeat for the most part of those few days and I've analysed it hard.


Let's try this.

Things you will need: Good headphones. An open mind. A head to bob.
If you can read and listen at the same time, this would be idea.



This song is easy to groove to. The beat coupled with the guitars building up into the main riff in the intro is like a warm you up for what is soon to happen.
Now comes the hardest part for most. At 0:34 a huge growl kicks in with the main riff. Now, this is hard to do - This man's voice is so big and powerful, you just get goosebumps as it fades out.

The key to listening to metal vocals is you need to focus on the melody. Screaming is by no means pretty to listen to, but if you listen through the vocal melody onto the guitar you will see how well the 2 work together.

The drum beat is constantly driving in the background, it's never too over the top and keeps a solid beat for you to bob along to.

The clean singing is a treat. His voice is worthy of awards, I reckon. I get shivers at the thought of being able to belt out notes like that.
What's better is the contrasting tones of the screams and clean vocals. Both melodies are really catchy, they compliment each other well. Tasteful!

Just sit back and take it in. Until the breakdown, that is.

The breakdown is the climax of most metal songs. It's heavy, it's catchy, it's groovy and it end things off with a bang.
This breakdown in particular is a treat. Why? Well, at 4:39 you'll encounter a belting high note where the music pauses and drops into the tastiest chugging and riffing, ending the song with you wanting to start it all over again. It's all about that groove, man.


I hope this has given you at least a better understanding of what makes a metalhead such as myself tick. I like a lot of different kinds of music, but metal always surprises me with great things like this.

<3