The Australians of 'Caligula's Horse' have become over the years an essential formation of progressive music as well as combos like 'Leprous' (see their last album here) or 'Pain of Salvation' (see their latest album here) and 'Rise Radiant' is already their 5th album since their first studio recording 'Moments from Ephemeral City' in 2011. After the very good 'In Contact' in 2017, this new opus, which borders on 60 minutes, demonstrates, if it were still necessary, a talent for progressive pieces that we are gradually appropriating and which, finally, thanks to a wealth and overflowing inventiveness, enter the list of albums that will forever remain in your memory with this style that keeps total creative freedom that allows them to evolve over the years.
The album begins with 'The Tempest' and 'Slow Violence' which are typical of a progressive metal alternating power and relaxation without ever being too technical because the melodic lines are easily assimilated, then, the first long development arrives with 'Salt' which evolves towards a less demonstrative progressive but which, for my part, conveys much more emotion and which can make think of 'Leprous' in the musical approach with this feeling of being constantly on the razor's edge, ready to implode. And it is in the direction taken in the title 'Salt' that the other titles will follow with first of all 'Resonate' while retaining which is far from the power of metal but which brings a real breath of fresh air to the album, then 'Oceanrise', even if it presents powerful passages, continues in this atmosphere alternating tensions and relaxation and 'Valkyrie' returns to a more direct style but still as imaginative. Then come the two major titles of the album : first the peaceful 'Autumn' which is a magnificent progressive ballad with atmospheric instrumental parts, then the long development 'The Ascent' of more than 10 minutes which is a bit a summary of these two directions taken in the album and which is at the peak of a metal which is constantly in opposition between overflowing energy and contained tension. The album ends with 2 covers, first, the remarkable 'Don't Give Up' of 'Pater Gabriel' which corresponds well to the direction taken by the group with an interpretation full of restraint and completely revisited, then, 'Message To My Girl' from 'K's Choice' also completely reappropriated.
In summary, this last album still shows an evolution among the Australians of 'Caligula's Horse' who offer us 2 different facets, the one we already knew, with a powerful, inventive and rich progressive metal but also another facet that we knew less, eyeing towards 'Leprous' and much more contained which will make this album, without a doubt, one of the best releases of 2020 in progressive metal and should reach a relatively informed public who likes big gaps in metal because 'Rise Radiant' necessarily requires a lot of listenings to extract all the substantial marrow... | |
