Prong: X – No Absolutes

It’s Prong – and that’s good enough.

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You always know what to expect from Prong: fury, but refined with an overhanging intelligence and unconfined musicianship. But it all comes back to that unrequited anger.

While other bands of a similar age lose their edge, Prong are restless. You can hear this on songs such as No Absolutes, Ultimate Authority and In Spite Of Hindrances.

Led by vocalist/guitarist Tommy Victor, the trio find ways of combining hardcore and thrash, with hints of nu metal – the last especially on With Dignity – bringing to mind the best of Prong’s past. However, they also avoid sounding like they’re merely masticating previously chewed riffs. This is obvious on Do Nothing, when the pace is slowed and the emphasis is on quiet contemplation.

X – No Absolutes is the sound of Prong feeling comfortable in 2016; still underground and recognisable as the band who snapped our fingers and necks, but also adding essential modern detail.

Malcolm Dome
Malcolm Dome

Malcolm Dome had an illustrious and celebrated career which stretched back to working for Record Mirror magazine in the late 70s and Metal Fury in the early 80s before joining Kerrang! at its launch in 1981. His first book, Encyclopedia Metallica, published in 1981, may have been the inspiration for the name of a certain band formed that same year. Dome is also credited with inventing the term "thrash metal" while writing about the Anthrax song Metal Thrashing Mad in 1984. With the launch of Classic Rock magazine in 1998 he became involved with that title, sister magazine Metal Hammer, and was a contributor to Prog magazine since its inception in 2009. He died in 2021.