Sony, 2010
10/10
No album has gotten me this excited about a progressive rock band since the day I discovered Porcupine Tree many years ago. Australia’s Karnivool have unveiled a sonic masterpiece that leaves one gasping for breath at the level of depth and quality to Sound Awake. Karnivool have followed up their impressive debut album, Themata, with a record that is more diverse, complex, and interesting. Many of the songs on Sound Awake are longer (five land between six and thirteen minutes), allowing room for expansion of lush melodies and complex arrangements. “Simple Boy” and “Goliath” lead off the album, and set the album’s style by taking simple rhythms and building them into astonishingly beautiful songs. The first long song is “New Day”, which takes several minutes to build from a dark, somber melody into a crushing wall of guitars. “Set Fire To The Hive” is an fast, aggressive rumbler that could have fit on Themata, and whose rhythmic spurts remind me of I Mother Earth. The slow turn of “Umbra” offers a mellow respite before the most immediately accessible track, “All I Know”, complete with layered vocal tracks and a catchy guitar line. Following the short number “The Medicine Wears Off” is “The Caudal Lure”, probably the least dynamic song on the album. “Illumine” begins with a wall of guitar distortion before relying upon strong vocal lines to carry most of the song. The two longest tracks on the album, “Deadman” and “Change”, bring Sound Awake to a grand conclusion with their slow, intense buildups to late song climaxes. Sound Awake is a monumental release that has Karnivool making a quantum leap in development from Themata. Karnivool blends the complex meanderings of ELP and King Crimson, the vocal play and melodies of Yes, the songwriting craftsmanship of Porcupine Tree, and the technology and emotiveness of Radiohead and The Pineapple Thief into a sonic journey that begs for rapt attention through multiple listens. If Sound Awake finds its audience, it will surely be lauded as a modern progressive masterpiece.
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