Anyone who has been reading this blog for a while knows that I’m not that excited about the state of progressive metal these days. That is, the genre, not music that is progressive. How a genre that is built on experimentation and outside the box songwriting ends up sounding all the same and using the same tricks just baffles me. But once in a while, an act shows up and makes me pay attention because of their knack for individual expression. Dissocia are such a band. Consisting of just two people, this band mix and match several ingredients that could easily make for a messy album if arranged poorly. Fortunately, the writing on To Lift the Veil is the main attraction, and stays engaging throughout. Dissocia is something of an odd duck in today’s metal scene — a rare band that is melodic enough for the melodic death metal label, but heavy enough to encroach on extreme metal territory, and not hold back when they go there.
Multi instrumentalist Daniel R. Flys (Persefone, Eternal Storm) handles the guitar, bass and synths while also providing a widely varied vocal performance. The songs on To Lift the Veil all have a kind of dreamy atmosphere to them that calls to mind The Flesh Prevails-era Fallujah without veering too far into technical death metal. Flys manages this by alternating trilling and bright, airy guitar riffs across the songs, accompanied by atmospheric synthwave that occasionally travels into glitch-territory (not unlike those used on Vvon Dogma‘s The Kvlt of Glitch). The riffing style is reminiscent of Flys‘ other band, Persefone, but differs in how openly melodic the riffs pulling along the songs sound. Unlike Persefone (and Eternal Storm), To Lift the Veil also has more melodically minded songwriting that doesn’t overstay its welcome, while managing to offer some real variety at the same time. Flys‘ harsh vocals sit somewhere in the range of shouted growls and screams that easily calls to mind Joe Duplantier of Gojira, and some of the more technical, groovier sections of the music makes that comparison stick. But Flys is versatile on To Lift the Veil, subtly varying his delivery according to whatever the situation calls for. In “He Who Dwells” a sudden outburst of death metal is accompanied by low gutturals, “Samsara” features some high shrieks and melodic metalcore-leaning clean vocals, while the showstopping “Zenosyne” has a synth-fueled breakdown with croons that I would hate in any other context than this. Flys‘ versatility is impressive, and his ability to transition between all of these vocal performances mid sentence shows what a powerful performer he is.
I have heard bright, airy and progressive long form metal before. If this is all Dissocia had going for them I would call it good and all, but To Lift the Veil has an ace up its sleeve that makes it infinitely more interesting: the drums on the album are played by Gabriel Valcázar of Wormed. Adding the drummer from such a technical brutal death metal band sends a shockwave throughout To Lift the Veil that colors all of its components in a different light. Valcázar shows up in full force, at once enforcing the variety on this album with intricate rhythms while also underpinning its heaviest moments with a muscular performance that hits with both heft and groove. He really sells the extreme moments of the album while also propelling the songs forward whenever the guitars opt for atmosphere. The dramatic guitars that open “He Who Dwells” and the swelling chaos at the end of “Samsara” would not be the same without this performance for instance.
To Lift the Veil is an album that speaks to my preference for highly melodic yet extremely heavy music. It’s one of those rare works that balances thoughtful writing, pacing and performances in a way that makes it easy to spin over and over again. Unfortunately, it has one flaw that makes me score it lower than I would like to, and that has to do with Max Morton‘s mix and master. The mix itself seems fine, as the drums, guitars and electronic elements all are present. Perhaps the bass is the only instrument that has to fight for space in some instances. But it’s all compressed to the point where it’s almost peaking at times. It’s a baffling choice to make music this dynamic and versatile sound as sharp and dry where it would likely have hit even harder if it had room to breathe. Maybe the challenge is balancing all of the elements while retaining the heft, but I have a hard time believing that this is the best that could be done with that. The fact remains that listening to this album in headphones is tiring, and eventually hurts my ears at moderate volume. It actively takes away some of my enjoyment when I have to adjust the volume between songs because of fatigue. Regardless, this is not enough to stop me from recommending To Lift the Veil to all fans progressive metal that want something that steps outside of the genre’s tropes, as long as they can lift the veil on that production.
