Do you like TesseracT? Djenty prog-metal five piece Construct like TesseracT. They like TesseracT so much that their debut album ‘The Deity’ sounds like a collection of B-sides, rarities and demos from the more renowned band’s vaults.
This might come off as overly unfair on the Stoke-On-Trent based Construct. Everyone has those that inspire them – it’s perfectly forgivable to evoke or emulate other bands that you love, especially when you’re just starting out. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. But there’s a distinct difference between channeling inspiration and sounding like a tribute act. You could argue that in the tech-metal genre there’s only so much room to manoeuvre without sounding like one of the heavyweights, like Periphery, Meshuggah or Textures.
To their credit, Construct have moments where they step away from safe ground and inject something original into their work. ‘Justify The Means’ has a goofy groove, reminiscent of a slightly heavier At The Drive In, alternating with the bands’ muscular, djenty pummeling. ‘Riding Through’ features a dual guitar line that sits over the racing, breathless tempo like a slowed down Iron Maiden cut. ‘Opposing Force’ jams in with some clean guitar noodling that sounds very similar to a snippet of RX Bandits, and ‘Whole Again’ (although disappointingly not a reimagining of the Atomic Kitten song) stomps away with a defiant, Trivium-esque flair.
There are five clearly talented musicians at the heart of ‘The Deity’. They effortlessly capture the chaotic grooves; stuttering, palm muted chugs and glossy, lilting and stripped back sections that comprise the bulk of the record. When they lock in and focus, it’s tight and driven, and Callum Howle offers up a vocal turn that runs the gamut from soaring high cleans to raspy screams, and the dense layering on some tracks is used well.
It’s a real shame that all of these positives are outweighed by the aching lack of originality. The rhythmic, palm muted stuttering, the occasional flashes of grunting bass and the interplay of breathy high range vocals and barked shouts all orbit far too close to TesseracT’s sound for them to truly stand on their own merits. The guitar solos that pepper the album, while technically proficient in isolation, don’t gel with the rest of the tracks they are part of and come off as cheesy; a vain attempt at sounding like Animals As Leaders. Some of the lyrics are a little too trite, asking “could you walk a mile in my shoes”, lamenting the “stakes so high”. Although the band push towards the sweeping, epically positive, it comes off as a touch too cloyingly saccharine, and there’s no real heavy depth to balance this.
Construct also make the classic error of overloading the listener. While it’s understandable that an act might want to put everything they’re proud of on a debut release, and it’s always frustrating when bands tease us with three, four or five songs on an EP, too many tracks at once risk listener burn out after the first few. Eleven may not seem like too many, but when only a handful differentiate themselves, it leaves the remainder seeming like all too similar deadweight.
These points aside, there’s undeniable promise here. The band are technically competent and clearly understand what they want to execute. They just need to make a real, concerted effort to step out of the shadows of their more established peers.
JAY HAMPSHIRE