In much the same way that Pantera created the blueprint for contemporary metal with A Vulgar Display Of Power, so Tool spawned an entire school of progressive/alternative metal in the early 90s.
There’s also an awful lot of Tool on the second album from London’s Isurus. Frontman Braun Amore certainly has a distinctive voice, although his keening wail may not be to everyone’s taste, and periodically he suffers from an advanced form of Eddie Vedder Syndrome, stretching syllables into incomprehensibility. Drummer Thomas Drew stays busy throughout, although there is a surfeit of mid-tempo tracks and either some bursts of speed or doom-like moments of crushing heaviness would have provided some welcome variety. Guitarist David Bonney’s sound and tone show his debt to Tool’s Adam Jones, although his squawking breakdown in Opus brings RATM’s Tom Morello to mind. As they walk that line between alternative and progressive metal, bands like Isurus will always find their main challenge to be how to follow in the footsteps of Keenan and company without forever standing in their shadow. They’re not quite out of the darkness yet.
