This is how instrumental wizardry should be played. Polarization’s technical virtuosity, in the vein of Animals As Leaders and Chimp Spanner, exists as the means to an end, rather than being the end itself.
For all the coruscating rhythms and dancing lead work, for all the complexity, to which you can sit back and be impressed by how difficult and clever the music is, the lasting impression is how entertained you are. A broadly cheerful mood, driven by crunching riffs and textured by melodic soloing fills Chasing The Light with personality, plastering a grin on your face at how much the band are clearly enjoying themselves, and how completely they communicate it.
Further, they’ve clearly realised the need to turn this into memorable songs, and learned how to achieve it – a feat doubly laudable given it took Animals As Leaders and Chimp Spanner until their second releases to pull off that trick, and this is Polarization’s debut. Individual, accomplished and tremendous fun.
