What Lies Ahead Of Us is the beauty album by Pentral who are a Progressive metal band from Belem in northern Brazil and this album is a good look at the dark chaos currently engulfing Brazil and what it feel like to be living that reality while hoping and dreaming of a better way forwards than this. The band are a trio of Victor and Vagna Lima and Joe Ferri and the album was produced by Tim Palmer.
The album opens with the sounds of rain falling onto the Silent Trees and a siren calling out Shanti as a mantra as the bird sounds tweet away before the guitars and drums come crashing in along side a buried mantra and then the vocals come in sounding like Bruce Dickinson as this song about troubles in the Brazilian rainforest unfolds and takes us through a few phases including a very cool acoustic breakdown.
All My Wounds is heavy riffage and dense drums and almost rap sung vocals tearing at the pain and agony of the wound's life inflicts on you.
Disconnected has pounding drums and super speedy vocals that sound like they are reciting a list of the things they are disconnected from, it opens out into a plea for an end to starvation I hope we can all work towards that noble end as the guitars rise and fall, when this isn't raging it feels quite contemplative as they try to work out how to bring about positive change in modern day Brazil, which as this was recorded before the current crisis really unfolded in Brazil is totally on the money.
Letters From Nowhere has a very proggy opening and has that wandering in a magical forest feel to it as they send missives from the middle of nowhere, or Belem in North Brazil eventually the riff arrives to guide us towards the path to somewhere.
Aiming For The Sun sounds like early Iron Maiden, well just post D'Ianno anyway as it pulls you in, in places the production is good and sludgy, lots of power, as they try to jet propel themselves towards the Sun and free themselves from the Soldiers.
A Gift From God opens with strings and a 12" string acoustic I'd guess for a mystical tale of god and man with very gentle percussion a couple of minutes in.
No Real Colours In Souls would sound good next to These Colours Don't Run it has a great central riff and lots of builds and runs as this tale of bondage and despair unfolds over 8 and a half minutes.
The Shell I'm Living In sounds like a Faith No More style heavy grunge rocker with a good paranoid edge and hints of the despair of where we are at.
The album closes with the frankly monumental The Law a frantic proggy metal mauler that has a brawl of an intro that finds some peace before the vocals come in to lay down Pentral's view of The Law and how it should be used with odd shrieking guitars and some odd drum fills and several different passages as we find our way through the maze that is The Law.
Find out more at https://pentralmusic.com/ https://pentral.lnk.to/WhatLiesAheadOfUs https://www.facebook.com/pentralmusic
