DisAgreement Online

A truly international band, with musicians coming from Slovenia, Belarus, Türkiye, Israel and Belgium, Seventh Station are a progressive metal band with a strong inclination towards the avantgarde. After two full-length albums, Between Life And Dreams (2016) and Heal The Unhealed (2022), they are now back with the five-track EP On Shoulders Of Giants consisting of interpretations of works of 20th century modern composers. So instead of Beethoven, Mozart, and Bach, we get a fascinating insight into the strange music that inspired this exceptional band.

The EP starts Three Days in Dresden, a piece by Dmitri Shostakovich, which a few years earlier was also covered by Norwegian progsters Shamblemaths. I dare say this is a coincidence, and both versions excel in their own ways. Seventh Station keep theirs short, reminding me of the orchestral instrumental works by Mekong Delta. The following Seid nüchtern und wachet is an excerpt from Alfred Schnittke’s Faust cantata, and manages to transpose this operatic piece into a spooky prog rock extravaganza. Thanks to my wife, I am somewhat familiar with Shostakovich and Schnittke, but the three following composers are new to me.

Tropical Limbo is a marimba and piano piece by Eckhard Kopetzki, the only composer on this EP who is still alive. The band doesn’t change much of the marimba part, but the livelier piano movement has been transformed into a cartoonish prog metal suite. Brazilian composer Heitor Villa Lobos’ Melodia Sentimental is a short ballad played mostly on acoustic guitar, with Brazilian Portuguese vocals that give it a certain tropical melancholy. The concluding Nagasaki Kisses is the first movement of Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Sixth Symphony, a harsher piece dealing with the atomic end of World War Two. This version still finds room to insert the occasional strange-sounding parts, which may be why Seventh Station is often compared to Spastic Ink and Mr. Bungle.

Compared to their longplayers consisting of their own material, I have to confess that I prefer this EP, because Seventh Station is one of the few bands that really manage to surprise with interpretations of works by composers that may not be that well known by the general population. It shows that this international bunch of skilled musicians are taking progressive metal to the next level, abandoning the soporific lull of white bread mainstream prog to explore what hasn’t been done yet. This may be challenging, but it is also deeply rewarding!