Pekka During the last couple of decades Finland has gotten a reputation for yielding a lot of quality metal bands from many genres, but straight up Prog Metal has very much remained in the shadows. Reversion is a band trying to change that. Coming slowly together during the first half of the decade and recording a bunch of unreleased and released demos they honed their chops to the condition you now hear on their debut full length album released in 2008.

Reversion draws influence from bands such as Dream Theater, Meshuggah and Tool, and especially the first two are audible on this album. And that's the biggest problem I have with it. It's too easy to pinpoint the DT moments, the Meshuggah moments and perhaps some Tool moments here and there as well. Instead of mixing the influences and coming up with something completely original one might get the feeling that they're out to compose a DT section here and follow it with a Meshuggah section there with not all that much own input. But luckily there are lots of pure Reversion sections as well.

Despite these bad words the material is fortunately mostly very good. The band members are all top notch musicians and they write powerful riffs and quite catchy melodies. And in the great Prog Metal tradition they have a lot of fun with their instruments, the soloing sections handled mostly by the quick-fingered and melodic guitarist Samuli Federley. His sometimes lightning fast solos are contrasted well by keyboardist Jonne Jauhiainen's more soaring touch. Bassist Jaakko Nikko's fat sound gives a great kick for the riffing and the drum powerhouse Toni Paananen is flawless throughout. And they all play really well together, I especially enjoy the rather unexpected unison breaks of the opening track Mindstorm that manage to not cut the flow of the music but give a great touch of plain enjoyment of playing. Perhaps the greatest single asset of the band is vocalist Aleksi Parviainen who can do a lot of things with his voice from the highest power metal yells to the lowest growls but concentrates on singing instead of showing off. It's very difficult to pinpoint any highlight tracks from the album, they all feature their tasty sections and some a little less, all in all making a solid bunch of tracks. Perhaps the album closing title track with the long repetitive arpeggio pattern strikes the chord the most with me.

A very good debut despite the flaws mentioned. Given that they continue developing their own voice with future releases they might become a very big thing in the Prog Metal scene. Recommendable but not essential.

Pekka This is the first promotional demo of the Finnish prog metal group Reversion. Containing just two tracks it's quite a nice mouthful for the purpose of making acquintance with their work, only if it was available anymore. Their later works contain a lot of almost clone-like Dream Theater passages, but these two tracks give them a bit more original face. You can still hear strong hints that the main songwriter Samuli Federley's favourite band begins with a D, and he's not completely unfamiliar with some heavier acts like Pantera, but you won't catch yourself trying to figure out where a certain melody or riff might be stolen from.

The first track Mindstorm features a technical crunching riff, a soaring chorus and a slower heavy interlude morphing into a unison riffage by guitar and keyboard followed by nice solos by both. The vocals are a bit out of tune and generally less convincing than on their later studio works. The second track Blueflame is a slower number with a very Panteresque main riff followed by a verse reminiscent of early Dream Theater in spirit, until the vocalist applies his rougher edge, which again lacks some of the power he has later had. The band slows things down for a mid section revisiting the main riff and add a keyboard solo on top before going back to the chorus and on to a shredding guitar solo. The vocals get very rough towards the end.

All the instrumentalists provide a solid performance, instrumental prowess being very much a forte of theirs. To this day I feel that while the band is technically excellent and tight as a unit, their material lacks some uniqueness that would make their music really theirs. Now it's more like a bunch of different influences thrown in a bucket, though very well executed. Both of these tracks would make it to their debut full length album where they're given a bit more polished treating, the production of this two tracker being very decent demo quality.

A good start despite some flaws.

(Review originally written for Progarchives on May 7, 2009)