Wolverine-Communication Lost

Candlelight Records
2011

Last time I checked in with Swedish act Wolverine they were still a progressive power metal band with some death metal leanings (mostly in the form of the back-ground vocals of drummer/vocalist Marcus Losbjer). Even their name conjures up images of either that vicious compact killing machine of an animal or one of my favorite X-Men characters (if I'm not mistaken it's the X-Man character that Wolverine are named after). So that being the case and all when this promo showed up in my e-mail I was expecting something with bite. I hadn't heard the group's 2006 release "Still" so this caught me off guard. The transformation that Wolverine apparently started on earlier albums seems to be complete. This is less the work of a metal band and more the creative output of a heavy rock band. While Wolverine at this point will not really register with traditional heavy metal fans let me tell you that this is some beautiful and skillfully crafted progressive rock. Vocalist Stefan Zell has really come into his own on Communication Lost. And the music is majestic and very mature. The songs are complex in nature with various different layers helping the album to have this massive sound. Everything from the guitars to the keyboard/piano parts to the rhythmic percussion give Communication Lost this sweeping filling. This one was a real pleasant surprise and just shows that a band can change styles and improve over time. Highly recommended.