The name Furyon has been bandied around town for a good few years now. I'm not talking about anything to do with Dungeons And Dragons, I'm talking about Brighton's hottest property. Their debut album, 'Gravitas', was a cover mount on Metal Hammer late last year and now they've signed to Frontier Records, it's time for it to hit the shelves and stand up on its own.

Although Frontiers are starting to widen their roster of late, they are still pretty much associated with AOR releases, so don't let this put you off this album, as Furyon are far removed from that style. Furyon are definitely a band of this era and that is cemented by the first two tracks 'Disappear Again' and 'Stand Like Stone'. Although they take influence from the likes of Alice In Chains and Alterbridge, and even a slight nod towards Nirvana, there is something fresher about it, making it more current and even ever so slight mainstream friendly.

Article continues below...



And then you spot a couple of tracks that don't have the track length you'd expect on this kind of album and realise that this band have prog influences too. But if, like me, you don't like that kind of music, these boys know how to pull it off and tie it together a lot better in my opinion than the usual abstract and conceptual offering of that genre.

They first started working on this album back in 2009, and each year since someone has said they were going to be the next best thing. Whether 'Gravitas' is going to help escalate them just yet will remain to be seen. I'm not 100% convinced about the longer tracks and doubt these will be added to my daily playlist, but there are enough tracks on the album to keep any rock and Metal fan happy, and certainly a cracking first offering.

The Frontiers release has two bonus acoustic tracks, the first being 'Voodoo Me' which has some beautiful flamenco guitaring at the end, and then 'Souvenirs', one of the prog style tracks on the album, with this version being far more melodic and, thankfully, shorter.

This five-piece are a band that don't seem to want to pigeon-hole themselves into one particular genre. They are all talented musicians with some exceptional songs, so why should they.

To find out more about Furyon, head over to their website by clicking here and you can sample 'Disappear Again' by watching the official video right here.



27.3.12