Travels With Nate

To many people, Devin Townsend is regarded as the king of progressive metal music and I can't disagree with them. He has been making progressive metal both as solo projects like this one and with bands like Strapping Young Lad for almost two decades. Whenever Devin's name is credited to an album the immediate thought for fans is "What is this crazy bastard gonna do next?"

If you follow me on twitter or read my ramblings on this here blog, you would’ve seen that I did a Beer of the Month post. It was a difficult decision to make. You may also notice if you follow me on twitter that I listen to A LOT of different music; I think I got something like 30 new albums in August alone which is ridiculous. You’d think with that much new music, picking an album of the month would be difficult, right? Wrong. This was a simple choice. So, which band wins the almighty honour of Booze, Beats & Bites’ first ever album of the month? The award goes to…

Stealing Axion was formed in the winter of 2009 by guitarists Dan Forbrich, Josh DeShazo, and Phil Willmarth. The three friends would get together to hang out and write riffs. Slowly, actual songs started coming together. By early 2010 they self-recorded and released their EP which rapidly spread across the net and garnered them tons of praise from fans and critics alike. With these songs as a solid foundation, the band maintained a steady regiment of writing and developing their sound and soon had enough material to serve as a full length album. Stealing Axion is yet another band whose name I instantly recognised when I was sent Moments and yet again, I can’t for the life of me think where. I just knew I’d heard some of their music previously so I had to check the album out.

Beardfish is a Swedish progressive rock quartet that formed in 2001. They are often compared to bands such as King Crimson, Yes and Genesis & while those are the kinds of bands that influenced them, they really are doing their own thing. The Void is their seventh release to date and the band say that fans will be surprised by the ‘twists and turns’ of this album...