If there's one thing I've learned over the years - when in doubt, see what's happening in Italy or Japan musically. The former has always had a fun metal scene in general, but never to the point where you'd think they could compete with the big boyz of America or Germany. At least when it comes to thrash anyway.

Now me, as long as the melodies are fun I don't care that much about the heaviness of the thrash band in question, but Ancient Dome go above and beyond to blend a multitude of things I appreciate in metal. They have that classic Big Four drive, but they play in modalities that will remind you at times of Megadeth when they almost turned prog-metal or early Vicious Rumors. There's also a hint of USPM in stuff like 6-minute epic D.I.E. (Droids In Exile). Nothing here that will rewrite the landscape necessarily, but these pasta-eaters know that variety is the spice of life and nothing drags on more than its supposed to. As we learned with the story of Goldilocks, sometimes being neither too hot nor too cold is just the place you want to be when you want a headbanging tour of the cosmos.

When he isn't doing film scores or working with art houses, Mr. Helpling takes his guitar experience and does stellar music on his own that reaches into some very deep spaces. He's also one half of the duo that did The Crossing back in 2010, arguably the best ambient album of the last ten years or so. But as much as I love that particular album, this latest outing is impressive in another way alltogether: it's a true bonafide "solo" effort. Everything you hear on A Sea Without Memory was done using just one guitar through some programmed pedals and recorded live to 2-track with very little processing, which is surprising when you actually sit down and let this thing wash over you and realize how much "bigger" it sounds than you'd expect.

While there are separate "songs" here, this is really an album experience in the textbook sense and when taken as such you can appreciate it to a greater degree. Definitely not a traditional "guitarist" album nor typical in the ambient / new age schema, I've come back to this musical well fairly often throughout the year....and hopefully for many more to come

While I find it ironic in a sense that a guy who hates the term "progressive rock" so publicly has become the modern spokesperson for said genre, the praise is deserved to a certain point. Other than guys like Devin Townsend or the real obvious bands like Opeth and Dream Theater, Steven Wilson is among a select few that has developed a truly lucrative career in a style of music relegated to mostly curiosity status by the majority of people out there. Not unlike today's biggest pop stars, all he has to do his snap his fingers and he could sell out an arena.

But make no mistake, To The Bone is the first album he's done since the mid 00's with Porcupine Tree that I could see headlining a major tour. Not because its the "pop meets prog" taboo that the player haters made it out to be, but because its a proggy alternative rock album with a lot of good hooks and accessibility. The pop elements are secondary, but just as prominent as anything on Deadwing or In Absentia. This isn't new territory for Wilson, but I think he's got it down to a science.

And true to form, there's a lot of variation here: the title track has a hi-tech bounce / groove going on that hearkens back to Pink Floyd circa The Wall or maybe So by Peter Gabriel, and 'The Same Asylum As Before' could have easily been a Side B number on Radiohead's The Bends, Brit-pop guitar shreddage and all. And then there's the big single 'Permanating', which is the Baroque glory of Electric Light Orchestra by the way of New Radicals and all the better for it.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for your car is to put some air in the tires and get some new rims instead of going for something completely out there. To The Bone won't change any minds about the modern "prog" sound, but the great arrangements and hooks certainly don't disappoint.

Cheese this may be, but boy is it the best damn refined $50 block of gouda you'll hear this year. Tomi Malm is a producer / songwriter who has been very active in Finland, Norway and Sweden's commercial music scene for over a decade and has made some seriously good connections to some of the best session players from Los Angeles in the process. This is his first solo outing, but he's got legendary cats involved including Vinnie Colaiuta of Frank Zappa fame on drums, plus Eric Marienthal and Brandon Fields on sax.

As far as passion projects, this particular brand of jazz-pop is a dying breed but done fantastically well at times. Favorites include 'Favor', where Frank Ådahl takes his gospel honed pipes to some pretty eye-popping places, and the title track where former Chicago singer Jason Scheff comes in with a killer chorus that puts his old band to shame. The ballads don't stand out to me quite as much as the uptempo cuts do, but Warren Wiebe (R.I.P.) is featured on 'Show Me A Sign' and reminds you why Celine Dion and Whitney Houston named him as their favorite singer at one point. He's up there with Steve Wonder in sheer vocal character.

Overall, this is a great record to indulge in if you are looking for classy songwriting from an older era without needless pretensions.

As their black metal roots have receded over the last ten years or so, the unconventionality that have always differentiated Enslaved from their fellow countrymen who came into their own in the early 90's becomes more and more obvious witch each successive release, with E (at least for me) being the best they've done so far in regards to blending all their different tangents together into one sound. I've liked the last few (including In Times), but this one ups the ante in subtle ways.

Their closest counterpart in the metal world as far as overall trajectory is concerned is probably Opeth, but where I feel the latter band lost their way a bit by embracing their 70's prog roots above all other aspects of their sound, what Enslaved are doing on E actually sounds best when a Hammond organ, flute or saxophone suddenly rolls in over a tremulous riff storm (such as the bangin' 'Sacred Horse' or the billowing 'Hiindsiight'). Those out of left field slices of instrumentation complement the primordial atmosphere and give you more variety than your average metal fan likely bargained for, and that goes double for some of those wordless Norwegian vocal harmonies that occasionally show themselves between bouts of snarling.

Could this end up being in that rare company of black metal albums that could help introduce more people into the genre and still hold its own against the big boys? Only time will tell, but it has certainly been one of the highlights of 2017 for me.

Like many others in 2017, I have been awed and astounded at King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard's rapid (and highly quality) release schedule over the course of 2017. They're making a big splash, getting a lot of attention, and they deserve every bit of it. It's not like they are musically reinventing the wheel or anything: they sound a LOT like Motorpsycho, except with more of a Bob Welch-era Fleetwood Mac + 1970-71 Gentle Giant fixation. However, they do what they do so well that they can't help but stand out. Vocals, production, songwriting - everything's inventive, fresh sounding and very much on the money when it comes to execution. And at the end of the day, execution is the only thing that ultimately matters in an album.

Polygondwanaland is their 4th release this year, accompanied by a bold proclamation that it would forever be FREE in every sense of the word. Evidently, I could start up my own record label tomorrow, put this album on CD, and start making money off it without legal repercussions. Looking at the music industry today as a massive chessboard, its one helluva move to make as they continue to rise up in popularity.

Amidst all this rigamaroll, perhaps the least surprising thing about Polygondwanaland is that its arguably the best of the four albums they've released this year. The songs flow like a great suite on the back of Lucas Skinner's bouncy Rickenbacker basslines, undulating in a symphony of flutes, fuzz pedals and even what sounds like a Mellotron. Another standout is the skittering, almost Tool-esque 'Horology' near the tail-end of the runtime...well, Tool as interpreted by King Crimson in 1970 perhaps. Easy to love, hard to hate. Unless you hate fun or something.

Anyway, these guys are moving up in the world. Wayyy up. And I'm glad to be part of the ride at this point.

British trumpeter Yazz Ahmed has one helluva portfolio, including the likes of Radiohead, Swing Out Sister and Lee "Scratch" Perry, all respective royalty to different audiences outside of the traditional jazz world. So when she goes full hog with an Arabic scaled jazz-fusion extravaganza like La Saboteuse, you can't help but be awed at how meticulous and fluid her compositional approach can be. Her particular kinks lean towards the cinematic at times, reminding me of film noir in skittering numbers like 'The Lost Pearl' or throughout the Third Stream-esque swing that 'Organ Eternal' brings to the fore. This is an album that always feels as if its in real motion despite the variety of tracks at play here, and any jazz album that sounds like it has a pulse is certainly a point in it's favor.