Focus (Cynic album)

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Focus
Studio album by Cynic

Publication
(s)

September 14, 1993

Label (s) Roadrunner Records

Genre (s)

Technical Death Metal , Progressive Metal , Fusion

Title (number)

8th

running time

34:49, 70:39 (remaster)

occupation

production

Scott Burns , Cynic

Studio (s)

Morrisound Recording Studios

chronology
- Focus Traced in Air
(2008)

Focus is the debut album by the American band Cynic . It was released on Roadrunner Records in September 1993 .

Music genre

The album combined elements of fusion jazz with those of progressive metal and sophisticated death metal and is therefore considered to be a groundbreaking milestone in technical death metal . The band stood out from other representatives of Florida Death Metal such as Death or the original bands of the Cynic members, Monstrosity , Pestilence , Master and Atheist , who also had technically sophisticated songwriting , but almost exclusively growling in their vocals put.

Cynic was one of the first bands of the Extreme Metal genre to use an alternating vocals between Death Metal growls and a clear voice that was slightly alienated by a vocoder effect. Such alternating vocals had previously been heard in an innovative way on Fear Factory's Soul of a New Machine (1992) and was also used by them. Other bands like Depressive Age ( Lying in Wait , 1993) also picked up on this element at this time. The death growls were implemented by keyboardist Tony Teagarden, as singer Paul Masvidal had vocal problems at the time. The fretless bass played by Sean Malone is also characteristic of the sound of the album .

Emergence

The recordings had already been planned in 1991 at Morrisound Recording following Deaths Human , in which Paul Masvidal and Sean Reinert had been involved. But they had been postponed because of the possibility of a tour with Death. Due to the destruction of Jason Gobel's house by Hurricane Andrew , some recordings were lost, so the studio stay could not begin until March 1993.

reception

In Rock Hard magazine , Markus Müller called the album “unique”. The musicians went to “show their old bread makers with their own project what a rake is”. He awarded nine out of ten points. In the edition, the album reached the editorial charts together with the release of Rage only 22nd place out of 38 albums discussed. The magazine put the album in 496th place in its 500 album best list. Jenny Rönnebeck gave it "cult status", and from today's perspective (2007) it still has avant-garde traits. Eduardo Rivadavia wrote in Allmusic .com : "Simply put, Focus remains a wholly original and Widely respected release amongst the small progressive metal community, many of whom stopped regard it as the ultimate statement in the genre." He forgave 4.5 out of five Stars.

Track list

  1. "Veil of Maya" - 5:23
  2. "Celestial Voyage" - 3:40
  3. "The Eagle Nature" - 3:30
  4. "Sentiment" - 4:23
  5. "I'm But a Wave to ..." - 5:30
  6. "Uroboric Forms" - 3:32
  7. "Textures" - 4:42
  8. "How Could I" - 5:29

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Jenny Rönnebeck: Cynic - Focus , in: Best of Rock & Metal , Königswinter: Heel-Verlag, 2007
  2. ↑ a b www.metal-observer.com: Review Focus
  3. ↑ www.decibelmagazine.com: Cynic - Focus, Hall of Fame
  4. ↑ Markus Müller: Review Focus in: Rock Hard, No. 77, October 1993, p. 79
  5. ↑ www.allmusic.com: Focus review by Eduardo Rivadavia