Album Rating: 3.5

Some really lovely guitar work on this

Album Rating: 3.5

The average is about right. Let's not pretend this even approaches TiA or Focus, y'all gonna get over this album and feel silly for giving it a 9/10.

Album Rating: 4.5

it does approach them, it's not as good as them, but it sure as fuck does approach them. let's wait and see, you may be right in the long run tho, but I would bet on the opposite

Album Rating: 3.5

I mean, I wanna make clear that I still think this is a highly enjoyable album, and personally I find I take a few listens longer than most to like most music, but this hit me much faster and I've had a lot of fun with it. It's just the more I've listened to it, the more it feels like it isn't as clever and masterful as TiA, let alone Focus. I've grown tired of this surprisingly fast, and I'm not having that wonderful experience I've had with Focus and TiA of hearing so many wonderful little moments I didn't notice before.

Album Rating: 4.5

TiA is one of my favorite albums of all time. Focus is a masterpiece for what it is, but to me this is ultimately more enjoyable as a listening experience in the sense that it's less taxing. It took me months to even start liking Focus 10+ years ago, but that's because it's so fucking weird and different.



I for one have had a blast with this album and I keep coming back to it more than I thought I would (I basically can't listen to anything else for the last 2 weeks). It remains to be seen what happens in the following months / years, but all's I know is that I do get the wonderful Cynic experience of things unravelling after several listens from this one, and I'm bummed for you that it didn't open up in such a way. Didn't get that from either CBA or KBTFU



It's not better than either Focus or Traced but the "discog" list changed for me as follows (if I had the permission to rate it with such decimals):



Traced in Air - 5

Focus - 4.7

Ascension Codes - 4.3

The Portal Tapes - 4

Carbon-Based Anatomy - 3.8

Re-Traced - 3.8

Kindly Bent to Free us - 3.3



That alone makes this album very a very worthwhile addition to their discography and should be given more attention. But I understand the band's been on a downward spiral since '08 and given what happened to the Seans nobody expected this, so it takes a bit of adjusting to appreciate that this really is THAT good

If this record had come out as the follow up to Traced, instead of Kindly Bent..., I think people would be more hyped yah - that's how it goes tho

Album Rating: 3.5

Yeah man I'm hoping it grows on me, gonna give it a rest and come back to it. I agree about Focus being taxing, I first heard the hype around it over a decade ago when I first started lurking on this site, but just didn't "get" it. Only really learnt to appreciate it last year when I decided to go back through the backlog. The stuff I'm hooked on at the moment is Be'lakor's new album, maybe when I give Ascension Codes another spin after a break it'll grow on me like Coherence has (for some reason, most Be'lakor is a hard grower experience for me).

Album Rating: 4.5

Well, glad we're on the same page, I came from over-a-month's long Coherence run, now I'm pretty much hooked in a similar way. While I agree with Be'lakor's albums being growers, I liked their stuff almost as soon as I heard it whereas Cynic is a lot more of a... well, refined taste though I don't wanna sound like a jackass saying that



Yup Cotton agree 100%

Album Rating: 3.5

This is roughly as good as TiA remove ur nostalgia gogs pls

Album Rating: 2.5

too much nostalgia for when I heard Traced in Air last year 😎

"This is roughly as good as TiA remove ur nostalgia gogs pls"

bruh

Traced is their best, for sure...but the idea that this could be seen as the foil to Focus' "all out innovation with rough edges" in their discog (this being a really sensitive whole without any genius moments), is a pretty huge win for me tbh

Gonna stop coming here for a few days, feeling preachy haha

Album Rating: 4.0

Avg for this is dumb, agreed.

Feel like quite a few people would've gone into this wanting to hate it, due to how poorly received KBTFU was.

Album Rating: 3.5

Mythical Serpents is so good whew

Album Rating: 4.0

Aurora is next level.

Album Rating: 3.5

I mean people hating on KBTFU should chill, it's just a bit of a misstep, takes balls to change your sound. At the same time, y'all keep bringing it up and need to get over it. Let's just enjoy Aurora and assume people don't wake up in the morning to review bomb.

Album Rating: 3.5

Wow, you gonna say "u mad" to me repeatedly now? Is that how this works?



If you're gonna try and strawman me, it'd be better if my post wasn't like, directly above yours for comparison. I never said people were en masse whining about KBTFU. I thought my point was clear but I guess not: anyone butthurt over KBTFU, and anyone butthurt that others didn't like KBTFU (and thus are blaming low ratings for this album on such a bias) need to chill.



I myself can arguably be included in this, but this does not make me exempt from needing to chill.

Album Rating: 3.5

kindly bent was terrible tho

Album Rating: 3.0

This ain’t bad but peeps fr putting this within spitting distance of Focus and TiA?