Mother of Millions: Human

Greece's Mother of Millions have released a very melodic metal recording entitled Human. Vocal duties are deftly handled by George Prokopiou; Kostas Konstantinidis plays tuned-down yet dynamic guitars; Panos Priftis plays bass; Makis Tsamkosoglou handles keyboards/samples; George Boukaouris plays drums/percussion.

Human is a start-to-finish type listen as songs are presented in suites and proceed seamlessly. I'm impressed when listening and considering this is a debut release. The songs seem to be void of fat and unnecessary flash. The opening track "Orientation" dials us in with static and vocal samples. Soon a keyboard melody joins slowly chugging tuned-down guitars. Prokopiou has a wide range and a solid melodic metal-type clean voice (I'm reminded of Maynard of Tool and Hetfield of Metallica) "The Parallel" features progressive metal traits of syncopated guitar and double bass drums and vocal harmonies with a challenging melody.

"Ignition" begins with more sound clips and samples over acoustic guitars and a piano; quite an emotional prelude to "Evloving," with a rhythmic, percussive opening and a very Fates Warning-esque guitar riff. "Evolved" slides in with tremolo guitar and atmospheric keyboards and vocal quotes of the previous track. The second half of "Fire" reminds me of Pain of Salvation which is always a welcome occurrence.

At the beginning of "Loss" I hear footsteps, computers, and a phone ringing. I'm intrigued as to what the Human narrative might be and for this I say "well done!" I generally don't delve into lyrics when writing reviews (unless they are heinous hard rock lyrics about beer and chicks), but causing a listener to want to explore the lyrical theme of your music is not an easy task.

Instrumental "Running" brings us to the longest and final track "Human." This track features slide guitar, extra percussion, and a pronounced bass line. Influences of latter-day Tool are appreciated.

While these songs never have super quick tempos, there is enough interplay between the guitars, bass, keyboards and drums to keep the ears entertained. Definitely not a rip-off of the aforementioned bands, Mother of Millions has quite a debut for fans of emotional, melodic progressive metal. The production does have a muddy quality so I hope the next recording has better mastering, but I surely will keep listening.

Track Listing
State I
1. Orientation 5:13
2. Propaganda Techniques 5:30
3. The Parallel 4:51
State II
4. Ignition 2:05
5. Evolving 3:19
6. Evolved 2:20
7. Fire 3:33
State III
8. Loss 4:18
9. Running 2:06
10. Human 6:59

Added: August 19th 2014
Reviewer: Ryan Good
Score:
Related Link: Band Facebook Page
Hits: 2357
Language: english

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