Review Summary: Animals as Leaders release another excellent album that offers some promising glimpses into their future.
Animals as Leaders have been around for almost a decade now, but over the course of the three (now four) full-lengths they’ve released, their style really hasn’t changed that much. Their djenty, jazzy take on instrumental progressive metal has consistently brought them success and a loyal following, so they really don’t have any
obligation to change, but it would certainly be interesting to see them evolve into something greater than they already are. As it stands, their 2009 self-titled breakthrough is still their strongest work to date: a brilliantly composed, highly varied and surprisingly
memorable album in a genre that can sometimes slip in one ear and out the other. 2014’s
The Joy of Motion came close to achieving the heights of that album – the songwriting was very emotive and inspired, and the production was the band’s strongest to date – but it remained stuck in the band’s comfort zone. This was still a band that revelled in their virtuosity and their natural ability to write flashy, interesting prog metal songs – there was no overarching concept or unity to the album that offered anything more than what the self-titled album had already achieved. It showed a band that was absolutely ready to burst out of its shell, but was simply refusing to – a refusal that I fear may continue and stunt the band’s growth for the rest of their career. That being said, the band have always been able to do what they do in interesting and effective ways – something that their newest LP,
The Madness of Many, absolutely sustains.
As
The Madness of Many begins, we immediately hear some fresh ideas that indicate that AAL may finally be changing up their sound in a significant way. The first four songs on the album are some of the darkest and most claustrophobic material the band has yet recorded, featuring tons of rhythmic interplay between the drums and guitars, dissonant harmonies, and winding, unpredictable song structures. The bass and guitar have taken on a highly rhythmic role in these songs, resulting in some sections that sound more like Meshuggah than Scale the Summit. The overall aesthetic of the sound seems to have changed – the beginning of Ectogenesis even uses an industrial bassline that sets a very unusual and moody tone for the rest of the song. The band seem to have a desire here to darken their sound and to distance themselves from the freer, more emotive style of songwriting that has defined them until this point. The first part of this album consistently shows this departure, and it had me very excited that AAL had finally left their comfort zone.
However, the latter half of the album doesn’t quite follow in the footsteps of the darker first half. At the end of “Inner Assassins”, we start to hear elements of the older AAL sound creep back in. Brighter and less dissonant harmonies make a homecoming here, and with “Private Visions of the World”, we see a near-complete return to the band’s past sound, with jazzy melodies and solos taking the main stage. While it is nevertheless an excellent song, it comes as somewhat of a disappointment after the four very innovative tracks that make up the first part of the album. The album continues in this more conservative direction rather than ever reprising the character of the first four songs, showing a more
Joy of Motion-esque style, still with some hints of darkness and introspection but never enough to solidify the album as a complete stylistic departure from the band’s previous work. This isn’t to say that there aren’t great moments in the latter half of
The Madness of Many, though; the last two tracks are actually very successful, “The Brain Dance” demonstrating a slowly developing and winding song structure that brings the album to a very intriguing climax, and “Apeirophobia” ending the album on a very lowkey, jazzy and Spanish-influenced note and making excellent use of the acoustic guitar. As the album drew to a close, however, I couldn’t help but long for the very experimental and dissonant elements of the first part of the album – it’s some of the most exciting music that Animals as Leaders have ever crafted, and I wish they had kept going further in that direction.
While
The Madness of Many may not be as stylistically consistent as AAL’s earlier works, it is absolutely consistent in the sense that every song is highly enjoyable and well-composed. Even when they’re playing songs that sound exactly like they could have been on any of their previous albums, the band are absolute masters at what they do, and the songs are always structured cleverly and executed effectively. On future releases, I hope that they do finally break completely from their previous sound and start to experiment with the intricate rhythms and surreal atmospheres that made the first four songs on this album so interesting and fresh. This darker sound suits the band very well, and exploring it further would make future releases even more worthwhile and interesting. For now, though, we have another excellent addition to Animals as Leaders’ discography, one that may reveal more secrets as time goes on, and one that is as consistent and effectively executed as any of us could have expected.
