Review Summary: Epicurean is a melodic metal band that borrows heavily from the European sound à la Soilwork with a healthy dose of Nevermore's technicality and progressive undertones.
Between material for review and those items to make my latest haul, 2007 has already provided a substantial amount of quality metal. Minneapolis-based Epicurean keeps the quality music coming with A Consequence of Design. Although it was originally released in 2006, the album gained the attention of Metal Blade Records, which signed the band and subsequently re-released the album earlier in 2007.
To best describe the band's sound, Epicurean is a melodic metal band that borrows heavily from the European sound Ã* la Soilwork with a healthy dose of Nevermore's technicality and progressive undertones. Epicurean also uses hardcore influenced vocals, which requires the highly dreaded "core" suffix to be attached. While the vocals make the term applicable, any sort of musical connotation the term may reference is absent on this release. As the band's MySpace page states, Epicurean has been "Breakdown free since 2003" and that statement holds true for the material contained on A Consequence of Design.
In terms of musical ability, Epicurean has quite an abundance of options within the band, which they use to great effect. From the outset, Epicurean presents the listener with a whirlwind of guitar and vocal melodies nicely wrapped up in a dark, symphonic ambience and held together by a talented rhythm section.
The melody, or as is often the case melodies, constantly move throughout the band while never sounding jumbled or congested. Instead, Epicurean somehow combines these melodies, whether it is from the guitars, keyboards, or vocals, into a single, cohesive sound. A listen to tracks like "Anathema: The Gatekeeper" and "Of Malice and Majesty" will easily identify the band's ability to meld dark melodies together perfectly with epic soundscapes.
A Consequence of Design is not all ambience and mystique, though. Scorchers like "Dividing The Distance" and "The Departure" feature a vicious seven string assault with plenty of speed and aggression. Also, while the band incorporates plenty of keyboards in their music, the keyboards, like the other instruments, never completely dominate their sound.
What is truly special about this release is just how damn catchy all of the songs are on the album. The vocals, which combine the aforementioned hardcore-style with clean vocals, are competent with the latter style combining nicely with some of the more epic passages. Unfortunately, the manner in which the band chooses to utilize the clean vocals does become formulaic, typically reserved for the choruses, but this does not change the fact that the album contains some truly memorable, sing-along moments.
Overall, Epicurean knows how to write songs with enough variety to keep things interesting as well as enough hooks to keep things memorable. Anyone who enjoys melodic/progressive music, especially of the European variety, would find plenty to love on this album. A Consequence of Design is a great listen and definitely worthy of your time.
