Believe it or not, but this time around it only took six years instead of eight for Abstract Rapture to release a new album! But rest assured, just as last time, it was worth the wait! Ascension To Downfall is going to be released this Saturday, October 18th, and I had the opportunity to spend a bit of time with it beforehand.
The quintet’s line-up remains unchanged from the predecessor and it can be noticeably felt, because everything just sounds that extra five percent tighter, which results in ten perfectly fine-tuned songs that might be my favorite material since the first full-length, Democadencia.
The biggest feat, to me, is the fact that the entire album is chock-full with different ideas and parts, but the guys manage to make them all flow into each other flawlessly. Even the two songs that exceed the six minute mark never made me lose my attention. The guitar magicians, there really is no other word for them, definitely worked overtime during the songwriting.
I believe this is my sixth or seventh time of writing about him, so I am obviously repeating myself, but the man with the sticks delivers another relentless performance during these fifty minutes.
The vocal performance is interesting to me, because it is as per usual on a high level, but it also goes in a few directions that I hadn’t expected, on one track in particular. Toward the middle of the album, there is a chorus that has, at least to my knowledge, the first harmonies on an AR song since their inception…and they work so well. Another aspect that surprised me is the fact that not every song has a classic chorus, but by clever use of vocal melodies each one has a part that imprints itself on your eardrums.
All in all, Abstract bring us one of their strongest albums since their first release twenty (!?) years ago, not counting the demo, with Ascension To Downfall and I for one am looking forward to 2031 for their next album. The band is going to play a release show in Arlon at l’Entrepôt, so be sure to head to their Facebook page to find more information about that.