Canvas Solaris

In the terse prog-metal tradition of Cynic, Symmetry, Spastic Ink, and Watchtower, Georgia instrumentalists Canvas Solaris release their four-song debut EP, which translates to 28 minutes of pure technical ecstasy. Less jazzy than Dysrhythmia’s latest, Pretest, but more metal than the Cancer Conspiracy’s swan song, The Audio Medium, Spatial/Design offers rapid-fire drum fills, impossible guitar acrobatics, and concise harmony lines that will leave most three- and four-chord guitar hopefuls panting for oxygen. "Camera Obscura” features pockets here and there of either Fucking Champs-like fret board gymnastics or Aghora’s jazz-metal progressions. "Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation” and "The Non-Terminating Integer” add more melody and guitar-synth interludes, but the epic "Dark Matter, Accretion Disk and Interacting Binary Neutron Star In A Self-Reproducing Inflationary Universe” will have King Crimson crying like babies. The only drawback is that their music is a bit too fast to take in all at once (e.g., Spiral Architect), but in truth, Canvas Solaris eat Gordian Knot as a snack while doing their physics homework blindfolded.