Bryan Klooster’s Theos - Beyond The Infinite

Bryan Klooster appears to be a metal producer from Holland, I know nothing of the man and you would think with such acclaimed musical experience that there would be a little soul and a little class to such a solo recording, but sadly not a fate like so many other solo projects I might add. This is a rather poorly executed musical experience that I can only really describe as confusing. Klooster’s claim to fame is to be able to records full length albums over a weekend, I would actually suggest more time is given as the arrangements are really too much for the average listener. So what exactly is this? It is supposed to be progressive death metal and said musical influences such as Opeth’s Michael Akerfeldt may play on the mind, but the real key is to transfer such influences into one’s own recordings. You hear this sometimes; you miss it more than often as a result of badly mixed tunes like ‘Fading Away’. This is confusing, there are far too many musical instruments massed together and it becomes rather irritating, although it is really the only song remotely death metal in the release. Although you could class ‘The Ultimate Price’ as death metal too but the criminality is again present by over burdening the listener with multiple layers and instruments. Yes I hear the ideas but not everything has to be in the same track and they really need to be mixed better. There is no wonder than man says he will never play these songs live, it would take a magician to pull this off successfully.

Better tunes do appear like ‘Seldom Seen’ although there is way too much hi-hat overbearing the mix but underneath this there is guitar work that is atmospheric and haunting. ‘Echoes of Cursed Souls’ has a Latin flavour, Santana playing elevator music essentially and the remainder of the release continues to flow out of Klooster’s mind that appears to have no idea of how to mix music. There are some decent ideas; the art is to transfer these ideas into tunes that are easy to digest. ‘Beyond The Infinite’ is rather too complicated to enjoy as nature would have intended it, if you are not a musical genius or gifted at dissecting multi-layer sounds then I would simply avoid this one, it is not worth the extra effort.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/v/QCzKha3EIiU[/embed]

  1. Expectations Of Life
  2. Fading Away
  3. Vanishing Skies
  4. Seldom Seen
  5. Greed Of The Soil
  6. Feeding Time
  7. The Ultimate Price
  8. Echoes Of Cursed Souls
  9. Beyond The Infinite
  10. I Am Theos

 

 


Self released
Reviewer: twansibon
Feb 3, 2013
Next review: Kaapora - Distainer

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