Slough Feg - Atavism

*=Staff's pick	Robustus* I Will Kill You/You Will Die* Portcullis Hiberno-Latin Invasion* Climax Of Generation Atavism Eumaeus The Swineherd Curse Of Athena Agnostic Grunt High Season V Starport Blues Man Out Of Time Agony Slalom Atavism II

Genre	Progressive Metal	Mike Scalzi	Vocals
Tracks	14	Mike Scalzi	Guitar
Runningtime	38 Min.	John Cobbett	Guitar
Label	Cruz Del Sur	Adrian Maestas	Bass
Release	06 May 2005	Greg Haa	Drums
Country	USA	-	Keyboards
Similar artists	Hammers Of Misfortune

As a general rule, I try not to read the promo sheet included with each new release until after I've listened to the disc and at least begun the review. My reasoning is that I like to be free of preconception before my review begins to avoid a misinterpretation of what I'm actually hearing (and feeling). In this case, I confess that I failed-seeing the names of Scalzi and Cobbett, I got immediately excited as both those guys are members of Hammers of Misfortune, and the previous HOM album "The August Engine Part. 1" is one of my absolute favourite discs in the last two years, so I broke with tradition which admittedly may have been a mistake.

Slough Feg are, according to the record company, nearly synonymous with traditional metal, and with that notion pre-planted in my consciousness, I was expecting a radical departure from Hammers of Misfortune. It stings a bit to be a little disappointed with this disc, and I regret having read the promo sheet now.

Whereas "Atavism" is not the first Slough Feg disc, it is my first introduction to this particular band. Being involved with so many different projects at once, I also confess to not having acquired a huge back catalog in conjunction with my return to writing, so I have no basis of reference to compare "Atavism" to except for "The August Engine". Consequently, I won't say this is the best or the worst this band has to offer and risk offending their diehard fans.

"Atavism" officially contains 14 tracks but is not an overly long disc-several of those tracks are intro and segue pieces less than two minutes long. The guitar work is admirable, embracing folkish forms (The Hiberno-Latin Invasion) and more than a few examples of straight traditional riffage, the strongest of these being "Climax of a Generation" and "High Season V". I have no complaints on the undeniable talent of the band, but as I stated before, I had hoped for something not so similar to HOM, which has been unduly given the label of a side project.

"The Ausgust Engine" struck a chord with me by being the right album at the right time, and has never been unseated from my top ten discs of recent years. I had hoped to put "Atavism" somewhere on that esteemed list, but I'm not sure that that would be truly deserved. It does meet my high standards of originality and creativity, which is always encouraging-Scalzi's voice makes "Atavism" different from the current crop of prog metal in that it's a bit more unpolished than some of the current faves-Dyecrest, Gothic Knights, Heavenly, etc.

A little more folkish than operatic,Slough Feg combines traditional metal with a bluesy, edgy style that harkens back to the appeal of early Diamondhead, and enough pure progressive ideas to make me envision a beefed up, steroided-out version of Jethro Tull-a version that might have actually deserved to edge Metallica out of a grammy. Interesting is a word I probably overuse, but "Atavism" does qualify as that, which is a bonus-there are few things as dangerous as a bored barbarian.

My source of disappointment in the disc is probably then just a few production standpoints-the guitar sound is a little thin, the bass tracks are buried and I like a richer, more resonant drum sound than what is offered here. There's a shitload of high end frequency here that is decidedly a little unbalanced, and the flaws are more evident when the volume of the playback is increased. All in all, this is a worthy album, but I would like to hear it remixed.