Exist "Egoiista" Review

     I first heard of Exist in 2017, while they were supporting Gorguts and Defeated Sanity on a North American tour. Unfortunately, Defeated Sanity couldn't make that tour; visa trouble. I went to see Gorguts nonetheless, never having known Exist or the people related to such a project. At the time, So True, So Bound had just come out and, without listening to it, I didn't know what to expect. Needless to say, Exist kinda stole that show. Gorguts are and were amazing, and their set was a tour de force of their entire discography capped off by "Pleiades Dust". However, I came away from that show thinking of Exist. I walked out of the venue thinking of songs I didn't even know the names of at the time: "Self-Inflicted Disguise" and "Fault's Peak" being contenders for some of the most refreshing music I had heard in a long time. When I got home and saw who these people were I found myself unsurprised seeing ex-members of Cynic and contributions from Alex Rudinger and Adam Getgood. At the time I also mistook Alex Weber for Alex Webster of Blotted Science fame, but that's a pretty honest mistake given how amazing the former is (no, really, go subscribe to his youtube). 

    I was hooked, and I gave both So True, So Bound as well as their second release Sunlight a few genuine listens. I'm a sucker for throwback progressive metal that draws inspiration from the pantheon of early 90's gods: Cynic, Atheist, Pestilence. Exist belongs among these giants, in my honest opinion. They belong there along with some contemporaries like Serdce, whose only release is still a pinnacle of the genre. Exist are consistently displaying craftsmanship on a level that few modern metal bands can lay claim to, and here on their fourth album Egoiista that is equally true. This release is a well-produced, well-crafted, solid piece of progressive music that I find myself burdened with. It ticks the boxes for virtuosity and originality and creativity expected of its genre conventions. But I also find myself in want for something at the end of it all. So here I'll be trying to work through what exactly that is.

    What I feel Exist succeeds brilliantly at is a unity of textures. From front to back, Egoiista feels like a well-put-together conglomeration of several facets of progressive songwriting. In the opener "Through Suffering He Paints the Universe", we hear subdued and ethereal soundscape that Exist have been infusing into their otherwise heavy music for years now. Here it dominates and keeps center stage thru jazzy chord changes and syncopated harmonies. Halfway thru the song we are introduced to Exist's current take on metal, often punctuated by groovy riffs on top of a foundation of astoundingly thick bass. More often than not, these heavy riffs have some other guitar leads layered over them that add either ambiance or virtuosic intrigue. In either case, the experience is incredibly clean and well balanced. As always, Max Phelps' vocals cut thru the chaos in otherworldly shrieks; they do a fantastic job of lending an old school death metal edge to the otherwise modern edge. Exist are able to deftly switch between these styles and sound and make a convincing mesh of otherwise disparate influences, as in the post-solo bridge of "The Lottery" or the gradual slow down into the solo of "Until the Storm Comes". Speaking of solos, they're probably some of the most tasteful in the metal world right now. Phelps and Rossa utilize a blend of traditional harmony and a healthy smattering of Holdsworthian legato meandering that tends to make their leads teeter between cohesive and impenetrable. However, each performance is done with gusto and always feels purposeful. 

    Remaining in the positives, I have to commend the rhythmic density at work between all members here. Whether they are completely in sync or on multiple layers of syncopation, the metric puzzles on Egoiista are crafted with care and executed without fault. The combination of Weber, wielding an absolutely monstrous and, at times, perplexing bass tone accompanying the mile-a-minute percussion of Brody Smith makes for a stout foundation upon which to lay the riffs and the diversions into any sonic territory imaginable. 

    However, I feel it's here that I run out of stalwart praise for Egoiista. As I said previously, I find myself wishing for more in the end. This feeling begins with the stripped-down approach Exist have taken compared to previous outings. In fact, I find that the groovy riffage that permeated So True and Sunlight has taken a bit of a back seat to the airy, dreamlike wave of jazz inspired clean sections. Not that that in itself is a bad thing, but that style is used a platform upon which the clean vocals are laid. Which is to say I don't really care for the clean vocals and haven't all that much on previous releases either. They are a complete antipode to the harsh vocals, often lacking energy and feeling sleepy and monotonous, never challenging, always steady and predictable. An improvement could be made in simply varying the vocal style, injecting some of the over-the-top theatrics of a band like Moon Tooth or taking a page of of Toby Driver's playbook on what I'd describe as "chameleon-like" vocal approaches. I just would love to hear something unhinged, something that adds energy to the arrangement rather than plodding along, sapping energy away. 

    On the subject of energy, while I do enjoy getting down to some metrically strange riffs, I know for a fact that they aren't the only move in the Exist repertoire. Yet every time I find myself hoping to break out of the clean sections with some wild, barely held together whiplash of guitar wizardry, it almost inevitably falls back into prototypical syncopated chugging, symptomatic of modern progressive metal. I want more. This approach can be wildly successful, and I think Exist prove just that on tracks like "Infinite Monkey Theorem", my personal favorite. However, in other cases it just drags otherwise interesting ideas into the ground, as in the intro to "Spotlight's Glow", which sits up there on the 'riffs with amazing potential that become incredibly boring via chugs' alongside major disappointments like Car Bomb's "Cenotaph". In the end, Egoiista exits in a wind-down track that leans back on the ethereal and fades out, leaving me feeling this lack-thereof that I described at the beginning. This band has immense potential, and I understand that over time acts like this run out of the piss and vinegar that elevates their early work to such heights. But that doesn't mean the onset of "mature" songwriting needs to be so rife with under-utilized potential energy. I want to love this album. But for right now, I find it interesting at times and forgettable at plenty of other times, despite how well it is executed.

-Dalton