There are some albums that could be put into the larger than life category due to their complexity and intricacy. Hence, they are not easy to write about for many reasons. One of them is that it is very difficult to make comparisons because there is no other similar or, at least, minimally similar. You know, making comparisons is mandatory to write a review that a fan might understand the music the band makes.
I see references as Focus, Gwar, Jeff Beck, Nuclear Assault, some kind of Jazz Rock, Free Jazz constructions There are moments where cacophony would be the right term to describe what musically happens in tracks as, for instance, “Bozzadevil.” Ram-Zet added so many textures into the song that it sounds as a musical chaos, or cacophony. The initial shock – I do not know if shock would the right term, but it does it right – is with the growly voices that haunt the fan with album initial pain “Zerocane.” It is hard to explain exactly with happens in the tracks because movement is what really happens here. I mean, the track shifts all the time its tempo and pace and instrumentals being almost a kinf of Free Metal – clearly inspired on the constructions of Free Jazz, a genre that I never really understood. Throughtout the album there are plenty constructions using vaudeville and, what I call, circus music – it is the best example I got to explain it. “Zerocane” is heavy not only due to the guitars and drumming, but also due to extreme variation of themes Ram-Zet imply. “Cranium“ would be the track of the album with the most references from the 1970s experimental music with some dashes of the Prog Rock of Focus, a band that was a little bit experimental as well. Its vocals contributed a lot to create a kind of musical chaos, but not that chaos Black Metal bands build, the chaos generated by the choice of chords and paces as experimental Jazz makes. By the way, all tracks are Progressive Metal long, I mean, around the six or seven average which allows the band to add many, but many references and weird stuff. It is intesresting how the band mix Progressive Metal easy features with all kinds of out of the box features. Miriam Renvåg’s does most of it by having a voice with an incredible range of vocal tricks, I mean, she is able to sing clean and growl at the same time and in the middle of it make some weird vocals parts. My congrats!
To some extent, the music “Sapien” is disturbing due to the instrumental choices Ram-Zet made while writing them. The music here has to face the extremely complex songwriting that sometimes kills the musicallity. On the other hand, it deals with the band’s ability to even so write songs that can be appreciated by the melodic constructions. Yeah, even though all the aforementioned the tracks here are still listenable. Of course, fans that are not used to this kind of Metal music will not agree with me, but c’est la vie.
“Sapien” is not an easy album to listent to even if the fan is used to this kind of music. It takes some trained ears to understand Ram-Zet‘s brightness, but it is so worthy. So worthy at all.
Ram-Zet “Sapien” will be released on March 27th via ViciSolum Productions.
Track Listing:
- Zerocane
- Cranium
- Sleepers
- Bozzadevil
- Peace25?
- As Worlds Collide
- Psychosis
- In The Mirror
- Catching Flies
- Hangmans Jazz
Watch “Zerocane” official music video here:
I’m just a lucky guy who has chosen metal to live with for a long time. Metal changed my life for good. It made me more confident and stronger. Metalheads are naturally far away from the mass mediocrity and don’t accept impostures from anybody else. Metal is more than music, it’s a life changing oportunity!