Sublimation

Canvas Solaris- “Sublimation”

This is a new band from the town of Statesboro, Georgia. They are a 3 member band with:

Nathan Sapp on lead and rhythm guitars,6 and 12 string acoustic guitars, Micromoog, Yamaha cs60 synthesizers.

Ben Simpkins on rhythm and lead guitars, bass guitar, 12 string acoustic guitar.

Hunter Ginn on djembe, table drums, congas, shekere.

There are 7 songs and the time lasts about 39 minutes.
Musically these guys are an instrumental heavy technical metal band with some jazzy interludes/influences. Being instrumental they rely on dynamics and speed to make the songs interesting, oh and also super playing ability. These guys can play with the utmost speed, agility and wank ability/chops of almost any band out there. These guys are very “tasty”. Musically they sound like a lot of bands such as Spiral Architect, King Crimson, the fucking champs, Cynic, and Behold the Arctopus.

The songs all have lots of interesting things going on. Most are begun with finger picked intros and also with synth efx to add some differentness. The guys can play fast runs or slow down and play for effect and “feel”. The drums and bass are really well recorded and together the band is really tight and well rehearsed.
One thing they do is that they “name” their solos within the songs. I think they are the only ones I know of that does this.

Arranging is very good, these guys mix acoustic guitars with electrics and very tasty synth burps and bleeps as well. The drummer is excellent as he uses congas and other percussion for a very dramatic effect on some of the songs such as “When solar winds collide”. The drummer Hunter, also throws in some tribal drums and bells into the song “Sublimation” for an Indian feel that makes this one my favorite tunes on this cd. The electric guitar playing is done very tastefully. They mix lots of clean tones with some varied types of distortion (Mesa to Marshall) to change the sounds so as to always make for an interesting mix. The crunchy, heavy bits and riffing are all over the place but not a focus of the music and when they are heard make the music more visceral and powerful.

This is a very good release of technical modern metal. The only thing that may be missing is more or better melodies within the songs so as to make them memorable for listeners. The changes in speed and the variations in dynamics are very cool but are not enough to make this a great Cd.