Band:	Periphery
Album:	Juggernaut: Alpha & Omega
Style:	Djent, Progressive math metal
Release date:	January 26, 2015
A review by:	Susan

Disc I [Alpha]
01. A Black Minute
02. MK Ultra
03. Heavy Heart
04. The Event
05. The Scourge
06. Alpha
07. 22 Faces
08. Rainbow Gravity
09. Four Lights
10. Psychosphere

Disc II [Omega]
01. Reprise
02. The Bad Thing
03. Priestess
04. Graveless
05. Hell Below
06. Omega
07. Stranger Things

Disc III [Bonus DVD]
+ Juggerdoc
+ Bonus Content

Juggernaut: Alpha and Omega are parts I and II of a crowning achievement in songwriting, storytelling, and performance. It is more emotional, more melodic, and far more jazz than anyone was expecting. Oh, it just oozes at times with a thick, dense jazz, which is kneaded into the metal music so well. But that's just one of many important ingredients.

Periphery has 3 guitarists, which is already awesome, but one of them is Misha Mansoor so they basically have 8 guitarists. If you like a dense sound with a heavy groove then this is it. The layers upon layers upon layers of meaningful and richly textured metal music will astound. They quite purposefully built this album and it shows. No, "built" is the wrong word; let's go with "grow." They GREW this album out of the deep recesses of their humanity. The press releases stated that these Juggernaut albums would be something new for the band: apparently all 6 musicians worked together to write this. Says Mansoor, "Everyone contributed to everything, even if it wasn't his instrument. It wasn't about confrontation. Everyone was focused on creating a really cool album." The band more than delivered. And the result is far greater than the sum of its parts.

This is not your grandmother's Periphery.

Periphery's brand of djent is a skilled use of the foundation laid by Meshuggah and others. The highly technical, progressive approach to thick, textured guitarwork is matched by clean and extreme vocals and a ridiculous rhythm section. Many songs are all about that bass, bout that thundering bass, which adds a somewhat menacing quality as well as confirms that your pulse will be seduced into the music. It's exciting how clearly we can hear the bass in the mix; same for the drums and all 3 guitars. Just as the songwriting served all six musicians, so does the incredible production.

At the mic, Spencer Soleto handles the cleans and the wide variety of extreme vocals. Hearing him move so easily between his many harsh voices can be a schooling experience. So, Periphery is known by some for their pop elements and their high-pitched and sometimes teen-angsty clean vocals. Yes, it's all true. It's all true and doesn't matter one bit. Because it ALL WORKS. What so often makes magic is taking all the wrong elements and using them to make right. Hearing some negativity about their pop elements is sadly one of the reasons that I never tried to get into this band before; I'm thankful that I gave them a chance via this particular album and recommend any other hesitant listeners to do the same. Pushing boundaries is so much more special than a bunch of dudes showing up and doing what they're supposed to do. Let others toe the line.

Listening to both the Alpha and Omega albums together is a joyous and rather mandatory experience. The emotional weight flows through you while time flies easily by; it's easy to see this as chapter 1 and 2 of the same story. While Alpha is crafted with its own distinct arc, at its culmination it indeed feels more like the end of Act 1. A few seconds of intermission and enter: Omega, which brings the closing act to our anti-hero's journey and resolves the overall arc of the album. A true opus, Juggernaut tells one story both with the lyrics and music. Themes and even melodies appear in more than one song. There has rarely been such a solid and satisfying arc of metal music laid out as each of these albums have been individually as well as together.

Oftentimes in metal, "jazzy" means a brief interlude of clean piano, sax, or guitar, etc., which is rather independent of the metal music. While Periphery brings several distortion-free interludes to Juggernaut, they are all pertinent. More importantly what they do well is incorporate the jazz into the metal. Sometimes they let loose and go nuts with songs like "MK Ultra," most other times it's a balanced addition. Texture is still the word of the day and Periphery uses many textures of jazz to re-define their just face-melting djent style.

Highlight track "The Scourge" starts off serene but grows quickly in weight, aggression, and emotion both musically and vocally. This is a great song to hear Sotelo's vocals go slowly from very clean to his full on screams and back again. Most tracks show a wide variety of his vocal spectrum but "The Scourge" is special in that he gives us smooth transitions all around and allows one to ride the emotional wave along with him.

What Juggernaut is above all else is universal; all is brought together by the exceptional musical storytelling. At each far end, fans of both extreme metal as well as fans of more pop rock-metal (and everyone in between) will appreciate the sheer variety in approaches to this purposefully made album. From the haunting "Priestess" to the following explosion of sound in Graveless," everyone is welcome. It's easy to hear that this album is important. Listening pulls you into their musical vortex where time and space ceases to exist. It never drags, you'll never look to see if it's nearing the end. The individuality and catchiness of the songs is only a bonus. They connect so easily and truly promote the "one journey" of this album.

This is an album for musicians, this an album for lovers, an album for thinkers, for travelers, for explorers, artists, for anyone who feels.