A triumphant return for The Scalar Process.
Five years after its initial formation and ten years after its inception, the band signed to Transcending Obscurity Records led by Mathieu Lefevre (vocals), Eloi Nicod (guitar, Dawohl), Vincent Amar (bass), Thomas Giroud (drums, live for Adelon) and Lucas Martinez (guitar, Avaland, Seven Works of Mercy) unveils its second album, Agnomysticism.
Physical Conquest greets us with majestic keyboards, but a first guitar quickly joins in, followed by a more distorted one, and finally the entire band comes crashing down on us at full speed, combining power and technical prowess while the vocalist roars with all his might. The mix is extremely effective, and even if there are a few moments of letup, the fiercely intense comeback leads us to the equally aggressive Far From The Flesh” which strikes without delay and offers a frenzied pace where the musicians all let loose to deliver an intense experience. Once again, the harmonics offer us that much-appreciated respite in the hurricane of heaviness and violence, which subsides once more with Incessant Continuum, the next track where the harmonics are initially much more ethereal before becoming piercing. The vocal contrast is provided by Andy Thomas (vocals, Black Crown Initiate, Rivers of Nihil), who delivers his enchanting clean vocals during the calmest moments, but who yields to the return of violence, followed by Illness, where the band welcomes Justin McKinney (guitar, The Zenith Passage, ex-The Faceless) to complement the combo’s ultra-jerky rhythm section. Another moment of levitation comes with Affluent Marea and its ethereal tones that gently soar before finally igniting and growing heavy, then A Breathing Moment gives us a few seconds to brace ourselves before pinning us to the ground with a rhythm section as thick as it is dissonant. Blast beats and double bass drumming energize a few passages before returning to a highly polished approach, but the track is ultimately quite short, giving way to the lengthy Agnomysticism, which takes its time developing each element with prog-rock technicality only to better unleash them all at once, revealing devastating violence. Although the band has included moments to catch our breath, the intensity quickly returns to lead us into Lack Of Colors, which takes over and mercilessly hammers us with riffs as virulent as they are polished. The track, however, quickly leads us to Sigil, a trippy interlude with trip-hop influences featuring a ghostly voice in the background, but you can feel the instrumental building up before it flows into the final track, In A Light Frame, which is infused with calm before finally falling back into its constant violence and complexity to close out the album.
If you liked their first album, Agnomysticism is going to be spinning on your turntables for a while! While the band was already at an excellent level, the expansion of the lineup gives The Scalar Process the tools to do even better!
90/100