Progressive metal has yielded countless great bands over time, many of whom exchange the convenience of an easily classifiable sound for challenging and off-the-wall compositions. Enter Cyborg Octopus.
One listen to the Northern California group confirms that they are indeed hard to describe, but easy to remember. Cyborg Octopus fuse jazz, Latin, funk and electronic music with progressive metal; the end result is an album’s worth of songs, called Learning to Breathe, that have all of the aforementioned sounds plus an abundance of chunky grooves and face melting solos.
We can see how it would be easy to believe an actual cyborg is making Cyborg Octopus’ music, but you can ditch that thought. Check out this clip of Cyborg Octopus playing “Baptism of Clay” for a SharkBite Studio Session.
“Cyborg Octopus is extremely proud to present this studio session of one of our heaviest songs,” guitarist David Wu comments. “Many may not know this but the band’s vocalist, Ian Forsythe, has a deep-seated fear of claymation. In ‘Baptism Of Clay’ he recounts a particularly disturbing period of his life and expresses it through the lens of his phobia.”
“The recording process really pushed us to perform at the next level and we unanimously agree that the final product speaks for itself,” Wu added.
You can grab a copy of Learning to Breathe through Apewhale.
