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Delta Viridian (2013) is the fourth full-length album by UK metal act Sandstone. Although Sandstone is generally considered to have begun life as a more traditionally orientated metal band these days they're turning out power metal infused melodic progressive metal music. Sandstone has expanded their line-up since previous effort Cultural Dissonance (2011) with the addition of Dee Kivlehan as a second guitarist. A new drummer, Decky Donohue, is also on board to replace Paddy Flemming. Tim "Ripper" Owens (come on, do you really need me to tell you what bands this guy's sung with?) also guests on the album's closing track Vitruvian Man. Delta Viridian is a loose semi-concept album based on the novel Cat's Cradle by American author Kurt Vonnegut. The opening introductory track shares the novel's name to reflect this.
The music on Delta Viridian, as mentioned above, is power metal infused progressive metal. By that I mean a progressive metal album that draws on power metal but not enough to be fully considered as a complete progressive power metal release. Sandstone also make sure of some light symphonic elements here and there, as in the track King of Cipher. Their sound is quite polished and so allows the fine details of the band's playing to be put across with ease. As can perhaps be expected though when the power metal influences in the sound come to the fore, as happens in Red Mist, there's a noticeable feeling of increased energy. This tends to result in album highlights, but has the side effect of making the usual melodic prog metal sound come over as missing something, although it's all well-played and enjoyable music. Out of all the tracks they save the best for last with Vitruvian Man. This is the longest and also the most openly progressive track on the album to my ears. Cartesia and Monument are also due a mention as some of the best work here while the only track that hasn't managed to leave suite as high a mark on me is Transgression.
What stops me from enjoying Delta Viridian more than I do though is vocalist Sean McBay. He has a good voice to be sure but his is just one of those voices that starts to grate on me after a relatively short period of time, especially if he starts trying to hit higher notes. The album comes over as being typical power metal cheese when this happens, even if the music at the time isn't drawing on power metal. I don't dislike the individual songs that much less when this happens, but when taking the album in one hit there are some times where it feels more like a chore than a pleasure. His vocals are a hit and miss thing in terms of how much I like them though, there are songs here where he fits really well, one of the album's highlights, the symphonic backed Monument is one of these.
A solid album with some issues which I admit are probably related more to my personal taste than anything being inherently bad, Delta Viridian is a nice effort from Sandstone. I have to be fair even if the vocals stayed in the sort of zone I'd deem as good the album still couldn't be considered as essential listening, but it's a satisfactory effort with a mostly high grade of writing, definitely worth checking out if you like bands like Anubis Gate or Tellus Requiem. A slightly tricky one to rate, but my positive thoughts do outweigh the negatives and so it's a great album tier rating for Delta Viridian.
82/100
(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven: http://metaltube.freeforums.org/sandstone-delta-viridian-t3062.html)