Album Review: Cog - Conflagration

By Denyong(rakista.com/v1)

Album: Conflagration.
Artist: Cog
Release Year: 2006

Lineup:
Yagi Olaguera - Vocals
Joel Patricio - Guitars
Eric Perlas - Guitars
Richie Ramos - Bass
Alan Po - Drums
Garon Honasan - Saxophone

Tracklisting:
1. The Sacrifice Will Never Be Enough
2. Dreadnaught
3. Follow
4. Stay Intact
5. Ellipses
6. Filicide
7. Vacant
8. Our Feet Never Touch the Ground
9. Stabbing The Shoulder of Giants
10. Collapse
11. Birthright
12. Over
13. Conflagration
14. Unbecoming

Man, too bad I wasn't able to attend Cog's album launch last July 9, 2006 at Purple Haze Bar in tomas Morato because of my feverish state. But I'm sure glad that metal will slowly draw much attention to the
unitiated rock fan who digs the same old sh*t everyday in his life. Which tells us all, there is still hope for the local metal scene to emerge from its long eternal sleep.

What is conflagration? A large destructive fire? Yeah right. But any relevance with the songs in this debut album from local metal band Cog? Definitely! Most songs are clad with irony but delivered a shattering blow compressed in this enhanced CD loaded with lots of features from a Flash presentation to images and wallpapers and including the music video for "Collapse".

First track "The Sacrifice Will Never Be Enough" has this entrancing intro reminiscing some trademark song intros from Amorphis. This song has a feeling with a lot of twists delivered by various chord progressions, which is the ideal sound for metal these days. "Dreadnaught" is a heavy tune somewhat backed up with a choir sounding vocals. Guitar riffs progressed from one pattern to another. Then delivered a moderate tempo but a sledgehammering crunch (3:25-3:59) then progressed with another riff. "Follow" started of with Yagi singing in clear church-choir voice until heavy guitar riffs blasted out. The song made singing and growling an essence and recognition to what Cog can sound in a really uninitiated crowd. "Stay Intact" also came up with Yagi singing like a dying god matching the various progression of the song. One thing I noticed on the vocals, clear voices are somewhat an audible reminiscence of old school darkwave era. "Filicide" sounds more hard rock but anticipated on the gloomy vocal work and bodes well with its groovy-ish guitar riff. "Vacant" came passing by with a Slipknot sounding intro-verse riff. But really, the gloomy clear voice has somewhat made me felt the coming of an impending doom. And yet delivered an angst-ridden mastefully crafted lyrics. "Our Feet Never Touch The Ground" started off with that ethereal/darkwave vocals. A slow-delivered song but emphasizes more on riff progression but I was stunned with its ending break.

"Stabbing on the Shoulders of Giants" (Not to be confused with Oasis' fifth album. "standing" and not "stabbing"), marched off with crunches but then progresses with much smooth sailing heaviness. Yagi's clear voice here made him sound like an occult leader preaching to his followers and about to stab a virgin sacrifice or something. Maybe that's what all the repetitive "push, push, push" is all about. "Collapse" is a heavy and fast song, making this track my personal favorite. Vocals here become more tormenting in each passing second of the song. "Birthright" combines an atmospheric feel of heavy chord progression plus the melodic riffing. The clear voice sounds more gloomy than before but the lyrics sung becomes easy to the ear. Overall the ambience and mood becomes sad like some of My Dying Bride songs. An impressive guitar riff all throughout (6:55-7:32) is one of Cog's finest moment in the guitar section. Cog pours more of its kinda like Meshuggah-style influence on "Over". Perfect combination on this song would be the angry growls and the scratching guitar work. Main track "Conflagration" is an instrumental representation of the entire album. Mixed emotions on the mood of the song is suddenly broken by "Unbecoming" like a raging typhoon. Heavy and unpredictable at a point, it also has a lot of impressive guitar riffing. In some point Yagi's clear voice in this song sent chills down my spine maybe because of gloom and doom combined, and slowly realizing that no other local band could top that off.

But I slowly asked myself "Where is the saxophone part?", Garon's saxophone is barely heard on all songs. Though in some part it is inclined with the guitar delivery. But in other way around, the album is impressive! From the growls and hypnotic Gregorian chant-sounding clear voices to a complex harmony of guitars, bass and drums made this more like of a progressive metal album that seems to slowly conquer its first time listeners. Truth is, in my opinion, Cog will be one hard band to topple off, or should we say one tough nut to crack.