Now -- what are you listening to? V2

Hi Travis, I'm genuinely sorry you feel this way about my review. I hope I can explain my position on it to your satisfaction here:

Firstly I probably did go overboard with the amount of Vektor mentions in this one. I'm sure you're aware that this isn't my usual style of review though. I do mention other artists every so often in reviews, such as in these recent ones:

Esoctrilihum | Brume

But it's not something I actively do. I actually avoid it when I can, unless I feel the comparison was in some way justified. 

In my defence, the paragraph which actually describes this album's music in the most detail doesn't, intentionally, mention Vektor once and it's this paragraph that would normally form the main section of a standard review I wrote:

Madrost favour a raw and unadulterated aggression when it comes to their music, which is enhanced perfectly by the production which is professional yet not overly slick and polished. There is some melody to be found, but its used quite subtly. Their style retains the death metal element of albums past but they are certainly a case where the thrash metal elements are considerable more prominent than the death metal ones. While The Essence of Time Matches No Flesh can even get a little bit progressive as well as technical Madrost don't mess around with fancy frills and unexpected influences and just get the job done, happily kicking arse along the way via the occasional softer atmospheric 'breather' section, which really only serve to further highlight the intensity of the album when Madrost shift things back into fifth gear. It is, needless to say, a hard hitting and powerful album with insane musicianship that's technically proficient but never self-indulgent and that's exactly why it works so well. If I had to pick a few favourites from it I'd have to name Abstractions, Dimensions and Eyes of the Deceit but the remaining four certainly aren't lesser tracks in any way.

I also don't think my review was written in a way which put Vektor down, which was something I was consciously trying to avoid. Obviously the review's direction was inspired by the fact that I don't consider Terminal Redux to be an untouchable masterpiece and this album immediately stuck me as getting the things right that kept Terminal Redux 'only' on a 4.5 rating for me. The goal was to point out not that Terminal Redux didn't deserve the praise it got (in fact I actually went out of my way to say that before I got too far into the review ("I'm sure most thrash metal listeners will be sceptical over any band being able to touch Vektor, who are of course absolutely insanely talented musicians who undoubtedly deserve the praise they have gotten to date") but that other releases in the genre shouldn't be easily dismissed. I also made comparisons between this and Madrost's previous album Into the Aquatic Sector, so I'll stand by my review and say it was well balanced even considering the regular mentions of Vektor. 

Vektor are, objectively, the more proficient musicians (or rather musician now, since only David is left in the band) at this point, but I personally enjoyed this album more largely because I felt they didn't go overboard and balanced technical skill with thrashy aggression in a stronger way. 

I've been off from work this week doing a lot of stuff around the house, so this is just a sampling of what I've been listening to during a week's worth of painting, closet cleaning, and general maintenance:

Warrant - Ultraphobic
Spinal Tap - Back From The Dead
Gamma Ray - To The Metal!
Kix - Rock Your Face Off
X-Sinner - Get It 
Shotgun Messiah - Second Coming
Winters Bane - Heart Of A Killer
Motorhead - Overnight Sensation
Judas Priest - Jugulator
Black Sabbath - The Best Of Black Sabbath (Tony Martin era comp)

nice! 

such an underrated band. 

http://www.metalmusicarchives.com/album/ea/ea