READERS’ CHOICE: THE NERDY PROG EDITION

This one’s for all the nerdy prog-metal fiends of the world. Dorks, recognize!

• Gladiator: Up-beat, driving instrumental prog metal in the vein of Scale the Summit meets Dream Theater, with a tad bit of Intronaut jazziness thrown in (especially in the bass department… heyo Joe Lester). If you like any of those bands, Gladiator are a sure hit for you. Listen to their entire Circular Reasoning record on their Bandcamp page.
• Distributor: So I’m listening to this and thinking “Wow, this is really good, it’s like the best parts of Meshuggah, Dream Theater and Devin Townsend mixed together!” and then the song changes and the vocals start around 2:20 and I’m all “whhhaaaaa???” I’m not gonna lie, that part definitely turned me off — as do the female vocals in the second verse — but when the rest of the instruments come back in it kind of redeems itself. I realize this band isn’t for everyone, but I happen to think they’re pretty decent. [Thanks: Lance Zeran]
• Heironymus Bosch: Progressive death metal from Russia in the vein of Obscura, but a tad less technical and more melodic. [Thanks: Jack Low]
• Drewsif Stalin: Brutal tech-death that doesn’t make any apologies about being weedily weedily tech-death. Great stuff, though; I’d say it’s some of the very best I’ve heard, up there with Gorod and Obscura! [Thanks: Tre Watson]

-VN