Artist: Prosperina
Release: Faith In Sleep (Album)
Release Date: Out Now
There’s something huge about ‘Faith In Sleep’. From the opening drawl of sludgy epic ‘Piper Alpha’ it’s an intoxicatingly titanic experience, clouds of stoner rock drifting past mountainous doom metal riffs in the melodic landscape Prosperina have created. At the same time it doesn’t have any of those genre trademark heaviness which allows much more rhythm and instrumental to leak through the smoke screen, ‘God Vs Darwin’ being a writhing mass of leaden bass footsteps and ascendant vocals that would just be completely lost in a heavier record. Title ‘Faith In Sleep’ encapsulates the entire album perfectly, a spacey, gentle instrumental packed with ominous foreboding.
‘Snow Leopard’ halts the album’s quality slightly, it becomes apparent that the lead vocals are a little on the weak side without any echo effects layered on or instruments lifting them up past mundane. It’s not to say that the vocalist is bad, but hearing him repeat the lyrics “Into the jaws of death we ride” in a bland monotone for what feels like ten minutes isn’t exciting or ominous, it’s just boring, and throws off the rest of the track even when he starts singing properly again. The vocals don’t stand well on their own, but you can ignore its weak points when the pace tears off with ‘Trees Have Eyes’ which redeems some of the flailing lyrics. This record doesn’t struggle to make an impact, effortlessly switching tempo into eight minute long ‘Hypnagog’ which is a much stronger showcase of what the band can do during slower, more paced songs. When the album works, it really works, but should it slow down too much, the cracks in the vocals start to become more and more obvious, the distance between the exceptional instrumental and the weaker spoken lyrics becomes quite distinct. Again, it’s not that the vocals are particularly bad – it just feels like the music doesn’t really need them in the first place.
Prosperina sound like a band from another time but it could be the past or the future – this album is one part pioneering and one part falling back on what Black Sabbath taught the world about metal. With some more pronounced vocals this band could be something incredible but right now they’d be better off as an instrumental act.
7/10
Reviewer: Laurence Stark
