Spheric Universe Experience – Unreal (2009)

Spheric Universe Experience (S.U.E for short) is a 5 man band from France that plays traditional Progressive Metal. “Unreal” is the band’s latest album that offers us 9 tracks, each one telling a story about different paranormal phenomena.

The music of S.U.E sounds like a child of Dream Theater, Symphony X and <insert major Progressive metal band’s name here>. While not original in any way, the band is pretty good at mimicking the previously mentioned bands.

Each track of this album is superb, all instruments blend well together creating the perfect musical harmony. But the problem lies that all the music feels very familiar like it’s been heard before, all the band’s influences are very noticeable to the point that you might get confused with regards of what band are you listening to. If you like all your Progressive Metal to sound the same then “Unreal” will be an amazing album for you since it’s very good. However if you are looking for originality, this band is not for you since it sounds too much like somebody else (except in the track “Dragged”).

I have to say the drumming and the guitar work is stellar and creates the perfect Progressive Metal vibe, the keyboards are great and over the top like in Dream Theater, making them one of the best features of this band. The singing is also very good, but it gets a bit monotonous after a few songs, much like in Dream Theater. Even the bass guitar solos and keyboard solos sound like DT.

I’m not going to say that this album is bad, because it’s not, but I will say that it’s not very original. That aside this band is very promising and has been improving since their first album “Mental Torments”, I just wish they find their own sound and try to be more original. They are great musicians and should be recognized for this, “Unreal” is a very good album as well, with superb music and production, just not very original.

Release: 2009

Country: France