LEFT EYE PERSPECTIVE ~ CONUNDRUM ...., review

 

For those of you out there with a friend who has one foot in the camp of grunge/alt-metal and one foot in the sludge/stoner metal camp Desert Psychlist has found the perfect gift for you to place under their Christmas Tree, an album that takes the best of both disciplines and merges them with elements of prog and post metal to create something a little bit moody and intense but also a little bit blustering and heavy. The band hails from Ghent, Belgium and go by the name Left Eye Perspective and the album in question is called "Conundrum".

Left Eye Perspective come out of the traps wild eyed and feral with opening track "Arrival" a song that shows not a hint of the grungy/alt-metal we alluded to in the opening piece of this review, this is a full on sludgy and metallic assault on the senses replete with crunchy off-centred guitar refrains, growling bass and furious drumming accompanied by a vocals that share a similar dynamic to the bass and drums, growly and furious. Next track "Breathcatcher" begins much in the same vein as its predecessor and may have many of you wondering when those grunge/alt-metal elements are going to kick in, well they appear not in the songs music, which is a furious blending of sludge/stoner metal riffs and rhythms, but in the songs vocals which when not delivered in bear like roars channel a tone that sits between Nirvana's Kurt Cobain and Bush's Gavin Rossdale. "Across The Styx" is up next and is a song that shows that besides having bluster and swagger in their armoury Left Eye Perspective are also a band with complexity and melody in their locker. The prog-like complexities and occasional grungy vocal melodies of the previous track are revisited on both "Oumuamua" and "P97"  but are this time given a little more space to call their own while "Massacre" sees the band adding a little NOLA type groove into the mix as well as some far eastern guitar flavouring. Penultimate track "Atlantis" feels like its in a rush to get somewhere fast and nothing is going to get in its way, a furious galloping behemoth that briefly comes to a trot for a period of post-metal languidity before taking off again on a sprint to the hills. The band close out by revisiting "Oumuamua" but this time as an instrumental piece, a chance for the listener to truly appreciate the bands skill as musicians without the distraction of vocals.

Left Eye Perspective's first debut EP "Defiance" was a very good collection of tunes but saw a band not quite yet decided on their direction or for that matter fully finding their voice, it was a release full of promise but lacked a little of the magic that could of made it a great release. For "Conundrum" Left Eye Perspective have discovered that elusive magic and made an album that fully delivers on that promise.

Check it out ...

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