Review: KYLVER “The Mountain Ghost” (2015)

Review by Mohsen Fayazi

Artist: KYLVER
Album: The Mountain Ghost
Label: Self-Release
Release date: 21 May 2015

Tracklist:

The Mountain Has Ghosts
The Feast Of The Mountain Ghost
The Dance Of The Mountain Ghost
The Death Of The Mountain Ghost

Hailing from the city Newcastle upon Tyne in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, KYLVER is an instrumental progressive rock and metal band. Although they don’t have a long history, their music promises a shining one. That means these four young genius musicians have a long road and challenges ahead, one on which I hope they can continue with their wisdom, passion and hard work.

KYLVER are set to see the release of their first studio album, “The Mountain Ghost” which consists of four instrumental tracks, which means those are really long songs. The problem of the lengthy song is that can easily become boring, especially after seven or eight minutes. But there are ways to make it exciting and KYLVER seem to know the secret well. Changing and switching into different themes and atmospheres is one of those ways and that’s what these young fellows have done. For example the first track, ‘The Mountain Has Ghosts’, which is about 14 minutes long, starts with a simple mysterious and dark melody, then it changes to a heavy riff which gives you an epic theme, then switches to a horror type atmosphere.

“The Mountain Ghost” is an instrumental album, so of course there is no vocal and obviously no lyrics, but it doesn’t mean there is no story there. In fact, I found it to be a kind of conceptual album, as KYLVER have their own way of talking with musical notes, instead of words and letters. It is Genius. By listening to this album, with full of your attention, you will find yourself in all of those stories, sometimes upon a mysterious mountain, sometimes in a quiet but weird masquerade and you will even hear a story about the death of an un-dying creature. So I think we should give the credit of vocals to those instruments and their players.

The whole album is written, recorded, mastered and produced very well. Opposite to the artwork, the music is not boring at all, but creative. So “The Mountain Ghost” has the potential to give you the joy of listening to good music, even if progressive music is not your cup of tea.

Rate: 8/10

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