ALBUM REVIEW: CENTERGAZE - ‘XENO’
The Canadian metal lords in Centergaze have an astounding new EP, Xeno, ready to destroy speakers and envelop psyches across the globe. This raucous pair of virtuoso players crank out a ton of loud and, most importantly, memorable tuneage for a duo. We’re not quite sure what’s in the water up North. Still, Centergaze continues the long history of stellar Canadian musicians, from Rush to Beneath The Massacre, successfully blending monster hooks with dazzling bursts of technical prowess.
Xeno pops off in a big way with the opening track, “Kagome Kagome.” This is an epic, nay, gargantuan song that features some of the gnarliest guitar harmonies, solos, and tasty double bass drums you’ll hear all year. Thematically, the band explores the realm of Lovecraftian, aka cosmic horror, and their music packs enough of an extra-dimensional wallop to back their eldritch obsessions up. But thanks to Centergaze’s stellar chops and Xeno’s pristine production sound, the band remains accessible enough to entice normie rock fiends and not alienate the masses with the pangs of niche metal subgenre stuff. In other words, the band rocks hard enough not to weird people out with odes to intergalactic space creatures.
“The Dreaming City” starts with a gorgeous guitar intro reminiscent of Metallica classic “Fade to Black” before Centergaze launches the listener beyond the stratosphere and into the vastness of space/pummeling riffage. This track features the mightiest breakdowns and ultra-haunting melodies on the entire record. There are many changes and layers of superb instrumentation throughout this EP, but “The Dreaming City” condenses it into an approximately five-minute epic. The vocals are harsh yet tailor-made to sing along with. As mentioned above, Centergaze uniquely makes the “unconventional” sound cool enough for ordinary folk to enjoy. After one listen of “The Dreaming City,” you’ll yearn to explore the cosmos with the ‘old ones’ ASAP.
Xeno might be an ambitious EP, but it’s still only a five-track sonic voyage that we can’t entirely spoil. We must, however, talk about the record’s monstrous closing track, “The Architect.” At nearly eight and half minutes long, this closing jam is a behemoth of a song that feels like three or four different tunes seamlessly blended into one. The dynamics of this song are off the charts. The guitar wails, the drums boom, and there are moments of relative calm where bass grooves lumber that eventually morph into a giant headbanging, forehead-smashing session. Fans of metal, prog, and insanely epic melodies can’t go wrong with Centergaze’s new record, Xeno. Take the journey into the cosmos…of rock.
Listen to Xeno below:
