Headquake

The phenomenon of "hidden gems" is an interesting one. In the years since its commercial peak in the 80s, metal has gradually come to accept its place in the eternal underground - most band members are perfectly content to keep day jobs, and see metal more as a hobby or side job than a career that will rocket them to superstardom and mainstream success. Too many have seen what happens when metal bands do actually achieve superstardom to put much stock in that old dream.

In a backwards way, this growing realization has led to the subconscious, only half-believed conviction that because popularity so often equals bad, obscurity may often equal good. Add to that metal's eternal love of rebellion and resentment of the music industry at large, and it becomes clear why the narrative of the "hidden gem" - a release that, despite its high inherent quality, never received its due - is so appealing to metal culture. The advent of the internet has also made discovering and listening to these previously hidden gems easier than ever before, as well as the crucial second step of sharing them with compatriots for kudos. This has resulted in an explosion in the popularity of "hidden gems," both the seeking of and the sharing, which a visit to any metal community will quickly demonstrate.

This is all fine as far as it goes. But the hunger of metalheads for discovery and the E-glory it brings, coupled with the necessarily limited supply of "hidden gems," has given us forum threads and chatrooms full of dingy glass and scuffed plastic being hawked as amethyst and sapphire by over-enthusiastic spelunkers, so enamored of their own private discoveries that they inflate their quality either out of simple over-excitement, or in an attempt to capture the attention of their comrades, who are of course spectacularly jaded of all such discoveries save their own.

No doubt you, faithful reader, are aware of this phenomenon, and now you know that I am as well. Yet, here I am, fresh out of the mines (face dirty, hands cracked and torn, supply of Mountain Dew running dangerously low), to present to you my own hidden gem and explain to you, my spectacularly jaded reader, why MY hidden gem is SPECIAL.

Most "hidden gems" do at least one thing very well - perhaps the riff style is distinctive, or the atmosphere is thick and tasty, or the singer is unusually talented. Where they fail in comparison to the true greats, the Judas Priests and Dismembers and Candlemasses and Darkthrones, is when it comes to the whole package. Many spelunkers, myself included, are willing to overlook glaring flaws, or at least glaring mediocrity, if there is some element of genuine interest on offer. There is nothing wrong with this. However, after spending too much time in the depths of metal, digging up ancient demos not even the band themselves have ever heard, it becomes very easy (and in this I include myself) to forget what an album sounds like when there isn't anything that needs to be overlooked, when every single element is not only good, but a masterpiece in itself. In Headquake, everything is that good all the time. Riffs fly left and right, some catchy and easily digestible, some meaty and tough, some serrated with jagged complexity - guitar leads and solos of dazzling fluency pop up everywhere, highlighting important bits and putting yet another hook in the ear of the listener - even keyboards are used to incredible effect, neither fading entirely into the background nor farting everything up Rhapsody-style. Keyboards in metal are so rarely used well. Here, their role is generally to create a slick asphalt track for the guitars to hurtle across, but they often surface in the idiom of a guitar lead, adding a bit of melody in counterpoint to the riffs. Midnight Circus are the only other band I know that use them in this manner as effectively - all keyboardists ought to take note. These elements come together to craft a powerful mood of angst and introspection tinged with fantasy, reminiscent of Crimson Glory and Queensryche mixed with Threshold and Lost Horizon and early Angra.

While every song on Headquake is excellent, a few stand out. "Erase" is the most aggressive cut, with furious, pummeling riffs taking center stage. With "Lord of an Empty Place", Eldritch ratchet back the complexity a bit and crank up the catchiness to 11, crafting a classic Europower tune that sounds like Angels Cry with bulging biceps. In "The Quest(Ion)", Eldritch bustle us through a gleaming nautilus labyrinth, in which we never know the direction the next turn will take, only that each new chamber will be more amazing and astonishing than the last.

If a criticism can be leveled at Headquake, it's that the whole album tends to run together. The songs contain many elements and repeat them only a few times, so the album can come across like a single behemoth track with a nigh-endless succession of themes and variations appearing, performing, and departing without reprise. Only "Lord of an Empty Place" and "The Quest(Ion)" really stick out as their own unique tracks, due to the incredibly catchy chorus in the case of the former and the abrupt, confrontational introduction of the latter. However, even as a single long song comprised of multiple movements, Headquake is a success, and does not become tiresome at all despite its hour-plus runtime. In fact, it's likely that this effect was intentional, as most songs both begin and end gently, easing transitions between tracks and rendering them, while not quite seamless, still buttery-smooth.

At times, this album reminds me more of reading Borges than listening to metal. Dense, challenging, and, though it might not seem so at first, very to-the-point - it's just that Eldritch's points are so complex that they necessarily take a lot of time and effort to make. There's no redundancy here - there are layers upon layers of meaning just dying to be unraveled, without ever giving the sense of pretension or falsity. It's honestly pretty overwhelming, but in this case, that's a good thing. If you like progressive power metal, you'll love Headquake. Headquake already loves you.