Album Review: TETRAFUSION – Dreaming of Sleep

By Nick Leonardi on April 25, 2017

Tetrafusion’s first album in five years, and a follow-up to 2012’s Horizons EP, titled Dreaming of Sleep, comes out on April 28th. After their departure from Scale the Summit, for bassist Mark Mitchell and drummer J.C. Bryant it was a no-brainer what comes next. They have invested a lot into writing and releasing Dreaming of Sleep, and the result is really fascinating.

Nine tracks of perfect musicianship and instrumentation topped with Gary Tubbs fantastic vocal delivery will satisfy both Prog Metal geeks and Jazz Fusion gourmets. Indeed, on Dreaming of Sleep Tetrafusion display a variety which goes all over the place—one moment you hear Prog Metal pounding riffs, the other you are carried by a lush clean guitar melody, courtesy of Brooks Tarkington, in the vein of John McLaughlin, with expressive rhythm section and more than convincing singing of Tubbs.

This switching between the stylistically diverse elements and moods feels rather smooth. Comparing with their previous work, the songs on Dreaming of Sleep are more structured and the flow of each song is flawless, allowing each idea to express itself fully without sounding jarring and misplaced. You can hear each member’s influence within their sound: some parts wouldn’t sound out of place in metal, there are very melodic elements and there is not one genre left untouched by this album.

The opening “Blank Pages” rips right in with bass and drums hammering and guitar wailing overhead. It’s groovier and at the same time more frantic and frenetic. This leads in to “Echo Chamber,” a brutal and off-kilter song that leads into the more thematic and dramatic “The Void.” “10,001” tears into itself with some jazz bass noodling, and atmospheric keyboard which give it an unsettling feeling. The guitar, on the other side, adds on dynamic by employing the series of riffs. About a minute in, “Sisyphus” recalls Sean Malone’s bass work with Cynic before it engages into a passage entirely filled with repetitive piano line and Tubbs’ singing. It is the second part of the song where the band goes free, letting their inner King Crimson in a Cynic mosh pit—you get the point.

By the end of the album, Tetrafusion continue to constantly shift their mood, volume and tempo, delivering much more than complex structures. Dreaming of Sleep is a record that, in shortly, collects and displays influences from Frank Zappa, Weather Report and King Crimson to Cynic, TesseracT and Opeth.

Tracklist:

01. Blank Pages
02. Echo Chamber
03. The Void
04. 10,001
05. Sisyphus
06. Simulate:Captivate
07. Awakening
08. Vestige
09. Perfect Silence

Line-up:

* Mark Michell – bass
* J.C. Bryant – drums
* Gary Tubbs – lead vocals/keys
* Brooks Tarkington – guitars/vocals

Links:

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