DARK DESIGN — Prey for the Future (review)

DARK DESIGN — Prey for the Future album cover

Album · 2013 · US Power Metal

5/5 · 2013-08-29
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Prey for the Future (2013) is the debut full-length album by US metal act Dark Design. There's actually also a Swedish metal act going around with the same name who released the album Time is an Illusion (2011), but although they may have beaten the US Dark Design in releasing a full-length, this band pre-dates their formation by a couple of years and previously released a demo in 2010. Prey for the Future's CD version comes with an extra track, Dust in the Wind, not available on the digital download which is actually released a little earlier than the CD.

As a reviewer I get a lot of albums to listen to, and although being impartial is crucial in this business, every so often an album comes along that kicks my arse so hard that everything else has to be put on the back-burner to make sure it gets covered ASAP. Dark Design's Prey for the Future is one such album. Playing a progressive and technical form of the power-thrash hybrid genre, with mostly clean but still quite edgy singing over the top while forgoing the keyboards of European power metal in favour of a strictly guitar driven sound, Prey for the Future is an absolute beast of an album which will at first lull you into a false sense of security with its acoustic instrumental intro In Media Res before the band hurtles into a self-titled song (band name, not album title) and refuses to let the listener go until, almost fifty minutes later, the album comes to a close, seemingly still with energy and aggression to spare. Prey for the Future is one of the most relentless albums I've heard all year in this sense.

In a sense though there's not much that can be said about an album like this, on account of words really aren't going to do it the slightest bit of justice. Although you can discount the intro track, everything else here is easily a contender for my favourite song from the album, although I do admit to being extra partial to the killer No Death and the lengthy Spice World. The musicianship and vocals are both top notch. The guitar playing is often technical and the bass can often be heard quite prominently. Melodic aspects don't go ignored though with great lead guitar lines and clean/acoustic sections cropping up. In short it has all the best bits of power metal, thrash metal and progressive metal rolled together in about equal measure, and the result is as out of this world as that sci-fi cover art!

When I started reviewing 2013 albums, the first one I turned my attention to happened to end up being really highly rated and has actually been sitting at the top of my 2013 list ever since. I was beginning to think it would be there all year now but Dark Design are the band who have upset it and have gone storming into the Album of the Year position, something that Preying for the Future claimed for them after a single listen (and further listens have further strengthened the claim). A perfect rating is deserved.

100/100

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven: http://metaltube.freeforums.org/dark-design-preying-for-the-future-t3149.html)