Let’s start with a question…….have Resistor come up with the best album Rush never made?
Until I had this album sent to me, I was completely oblivious to Resistor. Who they were, what they do I had no idea.
Thankfully the blurb sheet filled in some blanks for me and I learned that Resistor is a progressive rock band, they’ve been around since 2005, released their debut album in 2008 and that Beyond is their first since Illuminator 2023.
With Beyond, Resistor have come up with an album of quite sublime progressive metal of epic proportions.
The opening track of Nostalgia is described as an homage to the record which made Resistor pick up their instruments in the first place. It’s not hard to see, or rather listen, to why.
Nostalgia is marvellous thirteen minutes of free-flowing prog/metal which very much screams Rush. Heck, if you heard it without the vocals you’d swear it was Rush around the Hemispheres and say bits of Power Windows and Counterparts.
The vocals are somewhat Geddy-esque and the lyrics do give a Rush-direction nod. Nostalgia indeed.
It’s so skilfully done. The guitars are very Lifeson as they free flow. The bass is also free-flowing and intricate and the thirteen minutes flash by. Some quirky time signatures and passages which remind me of Max Webster. So there’s another Rush connection.
Then comes Antares. A seven minute instrumental which sounds like a merging of YYZ and The Main Monkey Business.
The title track is next. A truly magnificent twenty-four minutes of jaw dropping, sweeping epicness which needs listening to be appreciated.
Sure, the Rush influences are again obvious yet it doesn’t sound like Resistor are trying to use Beyond as a Rush tribute as they have the chops and skill to pull it off. And do it to a superb standard.
Beyond is up there with any prog/prog metal epic you’d care to mention or can recall.
It can stand tall alongside anything comparable with Rush (again), Dream Theatre, Crown Lands and similar have done. I hear more Max Webster style quirks here and there. And they folk-prog it up with some flute passges.
In my opinions the answer to the question I posed at the start is an emphatic yes. With Beyond, Resistor have come up with the best album Rush never wrote. And they do it on their own terms.
Decide for yourself by giving it a listen, then go over to Resistor’s BandCamp page to get it.
According to the blurb sheet, it’s a digital release though with CD availability in the US and Italy. Though I have found CDs available here in the UK listed on Burning Shed.
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