Coming onto the album, the first released single REACHING HOME and the best track of the record tells you that they have mellowed down the technicality and pumped up the melody. The track has its moments and one of the “laced with instruments” songs I have heard in recent months. BURNING THE MIDNIGHT OIL is brilliant and is so complex yet melodic that you are left confused as to which “beat” you should head-bang. The best part about it being – its Instrumental! SINGULARITY and MINOR EARTH, MAJOR SKIES gives the ardent TEXTURES fans a reason to rejoice since they pack maximum punch and maximum growl.
With this release the band resonates their name in true sense – the songs are woven ,one after the other -creating varied textures of rhythmic outbursts and ambient serenity. As musicians they stick to their Math Metal songwriting but the sound now caters to more "alternative sounding song structures".
I am tad disappointed because I was looking forward to another ground-breaking technical ear-blast. The growling is bare minimum and those epic surging moments of their previous albums take a backseat. But after a few listens and a unbiased mindset – the clean vocals mixed with strategically placed growls make sense. This one is not certainly the album but they manage to venture into new territory and win substantial part of it. They may loose a bit of their fan-base but at the same time face a fresh new “alternative” audience and make most of this release with their decent REACHING HOME music video and strong PR.
Bottom Line
TEXTURES reached a new benchmark of musical complexity laced beautifully with melodic outbursts and come out with a ground-breaking record even after heavy change in their line-up.
