NEVERMORE The Obsidian Conspiracy CD (2010)

Warrel Dane was one of the most distinctive voices in progressive thrash, and The Obsidian Conspiracy, released in 2010, turned out to be Nevermore's final studio album. That fact alone gives it a weight that goes beyond the music, but the music holds up on its own terms anyway.

Produced by Jeff Loomis alongside Dane and the band, this record leans harder into groove and atmosphere than some of their earlier work, drawing out the progressive and doom-adjacent tendencies that always lurked underneath the technical thrash framework. Tracks like Your Poison Throne and The Blue Marble and the New Soul show a band willing to slow down and let tension do the work. It's heavy metal that actually thinks, which is rarer than it should be. A solid pickup for anyone deep into the progressive and technical metal side of the dark aesthetic.

Format: CD. Full length studio album, 2010. Genre: Thrash, Power, Progressive, Groove Metal. Origin: USA.

Fans of: Forbidden, Testament, Iced Earth, Machine Head, Communic, Sanctuary.