Shattered Skies: Symphony X for the Djent Djeneration

I’d never heard of Irish progressive metallers Shattered Skies before a press release landed in the MS inbox earlier this week, and Chen-Chen — one of the MS Mansion Monkeys with a special predilection for all things proggy — rushed into the Vince Division of the MS Mansion, chirping excitedly and flailing his arms about.

I understand why Chen-Chen was so titillated. Shattered Skies straddle the lines between power metal, djent and prog, wrapping up the soaring, epic vocals and aggro-catchy riffs of bands like Mercenary and Raintime in a sound that’s distinctly more modern, but at the same time harks back to prog masters like Symphony X and Dream Theater. When I pressed play on new album The World We Used to Know for the first time I let the record play all the way through, which is, like, REALLY rare for a band I’ve never heard of before. And then I listened to it AGAIN. So, thanks Chen-Chen! I’ll make sure to send some extra-sweet bananas your way for dinner tonight.

Shattered Skies released their debut album The World We Used to Know this week. Stream it in full below and purchase it here, and if you live in the UK you can catch them on tour at the following dates:

02/02 – King’s Lynn, The Wenns (free show)
03/02 – Oxford, The Wheatsheaf
04/02 – Bristol, The Gryphon
05/02 – Basingstoke, Sanctuary
06/02 – London, The Unicorn (free show)
07/02 – Southend-on-Sea, Chinnery’s
08/02 – Brighton, Sticky Mike’s