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CRYPTIC SHIFT “Overspace and Supertime”
CRYPTIC SHIFT “Overspace and Supertime”
By Dr. Abner Mality
I’ve always been fond of huge space operas…science fiction tales on a colossal scale, dealing with billions of years and vast expanses of space. Everybody should check out the Suneater series by Christopher Ruocchio and the SF work of Adrian Tchaikovsky! And so I’m naturally drawn to metal bands who are also inspired by such cosmic grandeur. The latest…and definitely the most longwinded…of which is CRYPTIC SHIFT from the U.K.
These guys take their technical thrashing astro-metal to ridiculous and ultimately exhausting lengths. Yes, they take their epics even further than BLOOD INCANTATION…one of the tracks here is a few seconds shy of a half hour. By the time “Stratocumulus Evergaol” winds up, I felt like I had just gone around the Milky Way on a bicycle with a flat tire. Somebody needs to tell these guys more does not mean better. I appreciate the desire to do things on the biggest scale…my first musical loves were YES’ progressive opuses and RUSH’s mega-long tales of gods and starships. The difference is, those guys were better songwriters than CRYPTIC SHIFT. “Stratocumulus Evergaol” is a disjointed mishmash that starts with CYNIC- style jazz metal, slams into nervous, jerky death-thrash workouts and winds up in boring cacophony of space noises. It’s just too goddamn much and by the end, I was busy watching the second hand on my watch going round and round.
Although that’s the longest song, we have another 20 minute monster, which is the title track. Same thing applies…some cool moments of advanced tech riffing, some boring lengths of noise, jazzy noodling, etc, etc. The best parts of CRYPTIC SHIFT sound like hyperactive PESTILENCE, mid-period DEATH, even the heavier VOI VOD stitched together. There’s no doubting the musical acumen of these guys. It’s the FLOW that they haven’t figured out.
It doesn’t stack up with the best space metal. The greatest bands in that domain are the brilliant VEKTOR, the insane KHTONIIK CERVIIKS and the HAWKWIND of death metal, BLOOD INCANTATION. As avant-garde as those all can be, they know how to put a coherent tune together, even the mega-epics of BLOOD INCANTATION and the craziness of KTHONIIK. I don’t get that feeling from CRYPTIC SHIFT, even on their “shorter” tracks like “Cryogenically Frozen”, which comes in at a “modest” 9:24. As for the sci-fi aspect, I don’t get a “storytelling” vibe from the album. It takes more than crazy phrases like “Diverity Trepathymphaszym” to make a real SF tale. Listen to RUSH’s “2112” for proof.
In the end, it was kind of a chore getting through this even though I love space operas and extreme metal. I’m hoping CRYPTIC SHIFT will learn the wisdom of self-editing and come up with the galactic masterpiece they have within them.
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