Djent — that subgenre born of low-tuned guitars and saw-toothed rhythms — long suffered from a reputation for mathematical coldness. TesseracT, an English outfit that emerged in the late 2000s, set about belying the cliché: for them, technique has never been more than a means in the service of emotion. War of Being, greeted by a laudatory press (an 86 average across seven reviews), offers its most accomplished demonstration.
Everything in this record works toward breadth. The angular rhythms, the genre’s hallmark, are wrapped in immense atmospheric layers; Daniel Tompkins’ voice, by turns caressing and torn, traces melodic lines of rare clarity. The press hails this balance: a progressive metal that thinks in volumes, textures, breathing spaces, and refuses to sacrifice the song to the feat.
Conceived as the musical facet of a larger project — a narrative universe the band unfolds elsewhere — War of Being assumes a conceptual ambition without ever losing itself in it. It is a generous, immersive record, cut out for headphone listening as much as for the big halls.
Verdict: 8.5. TesseracT confirm their status as a reference for a djent grown up: sensitive, spatial, deeply melodic.
