Artery — Newtopia

Bulgaria doesn’t have a very strong voice in the international metalscene. There is a scene that’s fighting hard to accomplish something but it isn’t easy in a country trying to find its way in the post-communistic democracy. When Zhivkov’s communist party fell, the members of Artery left Bulgaria to end up in Amsterdam, Holland via the Czech Republic.

The three Bulgarians and one American don’t limit themselves to genre and also work with many musicians from the Artery-family, not only dads and sisters but also friends and whoever fits the occasion. They played on various festivals and did supportgigs for Fishbone, Johnny Winter, Beth Orton but also Agnostic Front.

The band played many styles ranging from folk from the Balkans and Greece alongside metal and hardcore. The two opposites join eachother in Artery and the band plays a hybrid of the Greek roots of singer Yanko who brought the electric bouzouki into the band and the Bulgarian background of them all as well as funkmetal, hardcore and a touch of nu metal. Bands that pop to mind listening to Newtopia, Artery’s fourth self-released album, are Psychefunkapus (mainly Yanko’s voice) but also Incubus. After a Greek intro on bouzouki the album opens with the nu metal bounce of Anyway but later on the band quiets down for a song like Whisper. Rubber Moon kicks off with a ruchenitza (a dance in 7/8) and continues as a horo (6/8), this is where Bulgaria gets the loudest voice. Generally the songs are rather catchy and melodic. Rough voices and raps are here and there and heavy guitars are accompanied by the bouzouki and it all seems pretty natural except maybe the raps. But then again, name me one nu or funk metal band with a rapper that can compete with the big boys like Meth or Chef.

Although this CD doesn’t yet fulfil my vision of a “Meshuggov”-type band this is at least a nice alternative. There’s still room for improvement (like there ever isn’t) so: sympathetic band with a nice and quite enjoyable CD. I suspect liveshows are even better.