Sage of Shekhinah

Time has shown that line-up from "Only Time Will Tell" (sic!) functioned - unfortunately - for a relatively short time, not to say temporarily. However, this did not stop the core of Contrarian enough for guitarists Jim Tasikas and Brian Mason to stop further activity. They quite quickly, in 2022, assembled a new line-up, including vocalist Jakob Sin and drummer Alex Cohen, as well as an old friend, i.e. bassist Ed Paulsen. With them, they composed and recorded together their fifth longplay, "Sage Of Shekhinah", which premiered in 2023 and caused...quite moderate interest. I don't want to fall into some crazy conspiracy theories (although...why not!), but after Contrarian toured alongside Suffocation and Atheist, the next album after such successes should have resonated much wider.

Meanwhile, it's quite different. "Sage Of Shekhinh", although quite good and maintaining a very equal level, imitates the late Atheist too much - so it lacks any catchy point beyond this band. The way the riffs are constructed, numerous twists, jazzy bass, screeching vocals, twisted drumming, emphasis on progression - at first you can think that you are actually listening to some newer, lost album of Kelly Scheafer's band. And it wouldn't be a bad thing if the topic concerned debutants or someone who is obsessed with "Unquestionable Presence" (after all, there is not a lot of such music), but the problem is that on one of their previous albums, more precisely "To Perceive Is To Suffer", the Americans could transform these influences into something their own and memorable. There is no such thing here; the disc is neither distinguished nor attracts for longer. Some oriental influences in the first track? Middle Eastern-sounding concept album? A few spatial guitar parts reminiscent of the Cynic from the times of "Traced In Air" in "In Gehenna" and "Ibn Al Rawandi"? It's definitely not enough to make "Sage Of Shekhinh" stand out from the known band beyond recognition. These kind of fresh elements are still overshadowed by how much Contrarian has pulled out of Atheist's discography here.

So there is a simple conclusion: "Sage Of Shekhinh" is disappointing compared to their previous albums. It's not totally bad, of course, but it lacks soul and something more than being a more contemporary Atheist. This is all surprising, because on several previous albums, these Americans had no major problems with transforming patterns of Kelly Scheafer's group into their own style.

Originally on A bit of subjectivism...in metal