The musical landscape is a lush, fertile one, scattered with as many sub-genres as there are grains of sand. The ever pressing desire of artist to push the edge just a bit further combined with the ever advancing technology that can make their own personal musical desires possible, new and intriguing sounds can constantly be discovered. But some artist don’t go for straying away from the nest to explore new and experimental styles, some stay close to the roots and just become as solid and technically sound as possible. This of course doesn’t limit the artist imagination of course, quite the contrary. With enough talent, and a tremendous amount of heart and soul, incredible things can happen. Such is the case with OmnisighT.
OmnisighT was initially collaboration between guitarist/vocalist Raj Krishna and drummer Chris Warunki. The two put out a debut album, The Path with the assistance of producer/musician Dave Shannon on their own label Warunki Media. With the addition of their live cohorts, Shannon on bass and guitarist Blake Rurik, they have carried on with their work in the form of the EP Wave Particle.
Though OmnisighT has many of the fringe elements of progressive and metal, their core sound is straight up, in your face hard rock. These guys don’t screw around with any fancy crap, they just shred shit up. Case in point is the opening instrumental piece, String Theory. Now a name like that leaves little to the imagination as to what the song sounds like, opening with some rapid fire solo guitar punishment, then quickly adding the second guitar doing the exact same thing. But this isn’t all about flash and flare, as the melody of the track kicks in, and the rhythm section of Warunki and Shannon take the helm, the two guitars are free to lay down some serious work. They pay some mad respect to the shredders who came before them, some serious Satriani vibe coming through it for me, that ethereal sound that practically lifts you out of your body. The hard opening chords of the second and title track Wave Particle slap us right back down though, and the song settles into a hard, kick ass groove that had me headbanging old school style, like I was trying to free myself from possessing demons. The lead vocals of Krishna are deep and powerful, singing from a place most men are still searching for. It’s not technically perfect vocals, but it is more than made up for with heart.
For track three, Sheltered Mind, they throw away any thoughts of breaching out for new grounds and experimentation and instead go for the throat with a deep, ballsy chord assault paired with beastly drumming and bass that is pocketed perfectly, Lay on those power vocals and I must say folks, we have ourselves on hard assed song that just kills it on every angle. No bullshit here, just rock done right. They saved all their fancy trickeration for the fourth track, Eleven. Not to say that this one doesn’t wail, it does in quite the same fashion, but at almost nine minutes, they gave themselves a lot more room to play. Where Sheltered Mind put the rabid bull in a china shop, on Eleven that bull is allowed to run free, much to our delight. Kicking off with a slightly more subdued tone, and by that I mean more melodic and less in your face, they set up the brutal and technically mind melting instrumental work that follows. Every member of the band shines, in turn and together, this one just needs to be heard to be truly respected for the rock solid production that it is. I can truly say I just plain loved this song. The album closes out with Hectic, another short instrumental piece. With String Theory, we were lifted up and carried; Hectic is more a full frontal assault, sheer power metal with the technical brilliance they have showed throughout the album.
With musicianship that is beyond solid, brilliant writing and song structure, and an honest and up front approach, OmnisighT tickled me bloody with their virtuoso caliber brand of hard rock/metal. Let all the other bands push the edges and experiment with new territories, these guys are too busy bringing that sweet, delicious pain.
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