Developing a progressive metal sound that is modern and experimental, Utopian Trap attain rarified stylistic differentiation on their sophomore album The Human Price. This quintet from San Jose started in 2005, slowly improving through over years to work their way up to a proper full-length — 2010’s Fiction Fades into Reality. The time passed by, and the band introduced a new vocalist Eric Boles, with whom they recorded and released their second studio full-length in July. There’s a hypnotic sense to a lot of the tempo shifts and riff segments – often switching moods up at the drop of a hat from tranquility to jackhammer cyber-fused heaviness, which along with the vocal employment gives Utopian Trap many colors and shades of arrangement exploration.

Two guitarists, Chandra Garud and Vinod Bhat, allow the band to tackle counterpoint elements while still giving an abundance of harmonic and melodic moments, occasionally shredding even in the keyboard department for the opening, almost 10-minute monster “The Human Price.” Fates Warning and Threshold come into the picture as prog metal riffs and melody are a focal point in many tracks, yet there’s also a bit of natural musicianship and dynamic contrast to the more streamlined “Atephobic.” You’ll find yourself humming along to many riffs or melody lines, and that’s a good thing in a genre that can sometimes be too technically sharp while forgetting to create a retainable, memorable song.

Boles handles the microphone duties in an excellent way; he is comfortable both in lower Russell Allen-registers and then anything piercing Tate high. Guitar solos punctuate instrumental sections, offering dramatic tension throughout The Human Price. The album features a boatload of drop on a dime tempo changes to highlight bassist Farhan Mohamed and drummer Roil Taggarsi as a fierce, schooled rhythm section.

Overall, The Human Price contains seven songs of stimulating song craft. Utopian Trap will gain converts, feeding social media buzz and aligning community attraction by the day.

Buy the album from Bandcamp.

We know how much The Beatles influenced Yes. But could Yes have influenced one of the Beatles? Paul Watson explores this amazing revelation.

Late 1973 saw a couple of amazing musical things happen. One of them was the release of Yes’s epic concept album, ’TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS’ and John Lennon’s track, ‘MIND GAMES.’

Coincidence?

Let’s see… Going back a few years before that Alan White was drumming for Lennon in 1969 on a number of things such as the Imagine album and touring with the ex-Beatle and his band. Years later John actually expressed over the telephone to Alan that he was a big Yes fan. That “he loved the band.”

John Lennon, Yoko Ono and Alan White 1970 performing Instant Karma! on Top Of The Pops.

Of course we know how much a big of a fan of The Beatles Yes were. When they started playing back in 1968 they were covering Beatles’ tracks, and Sgt Pepper’s was a great inspiration and blueprint to where they would take Progressive Rock in years to come. You only have to listen to “Your Move” to appreciate that. And what about the line – “Send an instant karma to me, initial it with loving care“? This has been attributed to a reference to Lennon’s ‘Instant Karma’ that came out a couple of years before. Yes even has a Beatles cover of  “Every Little Thing” on their first album. Even now Jon in concert likes to tell fans how much he loves John Lennon and his music.

Continue reading “WAS JON ‘JOHN’ IN ’73? THE SPIRITUAL CONNECTING OF ‘MIND GAMES’ AND ‘TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS.’” →