Naked Sun
Naked Sun

I remember that in the historic magazine HM there was a column curated by Maurizio De Paola titled "And Justice For All." In that column, a proper tribute was paid to those artists, and consequently to one of their albums, who, due to absolutely inexplicable events, didn't find success and were snubbed by listeners. Well, these Naked Sun would have deserved a page in HM because they debuted in 1991 for Noise (not just any label, mind you), but, excuse the French, no one gave them a chance. Why? The explanation was very simple: because they were ahead of their time.

In this sad world, sometimes being "ahead" is not always a good thing, especially when you are so far ahead that others end up not seeing you anymore.

The Naked Sun didn't achieve recognized success (only to be rehabilitated a few decades later) because they simply didn't have an audience: progressive rock lovers, who were the band's target audience, found them too hard, and besides, were they really progressive if they didn't have 40-minute suites? Metal listeners, another audience group, found them too complicated and not straightforward enough, and practically, the poor guys ended up playing and singing for grandma, mom, and dad.

And yet these were so far ahead that they were playing progressive metal when the genre had yet to be invented. And by progressive metal, I don't mean that hyper-technical metal that many want to pass off as progressive, but rather a perfect fusion between two schools of thought, way before "Images & Words" by you-know-who.

The starting point was Rush, because the Canadians represent a connecting link, but there were heavy dark influences from Van Der Graaf Generator and King Crimson era Red. An estranging, hallucinatory, and violent vocal by Max Vanderwolf that alternates with the sax to create alien and distant melodies, sometimes soft and whispered, then suddenly exploding into unheard-of violence. If Van Der Graaf had decided to play metal, they probably would have sounded like this.

When Noise went under, imagine if anyone remembered them. They returned a few years later with another album, Wonderdrug, and with a partially different lineup. As good as it was, the glory of the first magnificent album was far away, and by then, progressive metal had taken on a different meaning.

Today I'm in a gift-giving mood: on Amazon UK the first self-titled album is sold for less than 4 euros.

Get it.