Pain of Salvation – Panther

Pain of Salvation

Panther

InsideOut Music

Progressive Metal/Rock FFO: Riverside, Leprous, Wolverine, Haken, Caligula’s Horse, Gallows Tree

Throughout their career, Sweden’s Pain of Salvation (PoS) have delivered not only some stellar albums, but some modern classics of the progressive metal genre. The last decade has seen PoS gather their strength once more with the band releasing their latest album ‘Panther’.

                What ‘Panther’ shows is a band on top form, not only are PoS content on taking elements from both progressive rock and metal, but the band show that they have one foot in the contemporary with some math and djent touches. Furthermore, the band explore hip-hop rhythms and vocal delivery especially during the title track; but whilst this may sound like a disaster, actually it works exceptionally well and the band deliver something fantastically orchestrated with even ‘Icon’ the epic closing track being so sublime that it is easy to underestimate. In fact, the entire of ‘Panther’ has a sublime nature to it, with each listen there is always something new to discover and unearth through multiple layers of melodies, polyrhythms and beautiful lyrics. Therefore, all these ultimately have the appeal of Riverside, Leprous and the even touching likes of Wolverine and Haken as tracks such as ‘Restless Boy’, ‘Species’ and ‘Accelerator’ all excellent demonstrations of not only what ‘Panther’ is about, but also PoS.

                PoS have delivered yet another masterstroke with ‘Panther’, progressive fans will undoubtedly love this album and it would not be surprising if that at the end of the year, ‘Panther’ is riding high.

Adam McCann