View PSYCHONAUT’s previously released video for “Interbeing”
HERE, the record’s title track
HERE and “All Your Gods Have Gone”
HERE.
Violate Consensus Reality is available on CD, LP, and digital formats at
THIS LOCATION.
“We distance ourselves from a system that is based on the idea that humanity is fundamentally bad and needs protection from itself in the form of a hierarchy,” notes guitarist/vocalist Stefan De Graef of PSYCHONAUT’s latest album. “By no longer subscribing to the notion that we are all separate beings in a separate world that is dead and pointless, we embrace the vision of a new civilization that is rooted in the idea that we are part of a living, sacred universe.”
Likening our present state of separation to “an island on oceans grown, designed to bear unpredictable wrath,” the band accompanies their denunciation by punishing riffs and heavily syncopated rhythms, grabbing you by your guts and taking you on a turbulent journey. Violate Consensus Reality engages the senses in a way that is quite rare for concept albums, it is raw and brutal, unlike the lofty concept albums of yore with their endlessly repeating motifs and needlessly complex song structures. It stands in a long tradition of activism in music, but it also deconstructs this tradition by taking its loud and admonishing tone and providing it with a thoughtful base rooted in philosophy and spirituality.
Violate Consensus is not for the faint hearted, concept-wise but also music-wise as it contains some of the most gnarly riffs and technical playing on any PSYCHONAUT output to date. The record constitutes a wild ride from the breakneck paced riffing of “A Pacifist’s Guide To Violence,” through the undulating neo-classical piano passages of “Hope” to the glorious finale of “Towards The Edge.” The mantric title track opens with the angelic voice of Stefanie Mannaerts (Brutus) and slowly builds up to erupt in an explosive sermon delivered by Colin H. van Eeckhout (Amenra, CHVE, Absent in Body), the appearance of both gifted musicians affirming PSYCHONAUT’s stature in the Belgian metal scene and beyond.
“At times, they end up in hypnotically progressive, technically inclined serpentine sections complete with seesawing, burning riffs. At others, they explode sludge into a million grooving fragments and find a broken, mourning fiddle in the debris left behind. Simultaneously, the contrast between these sections and atmospheres instills a sense of inherent, thrilling dynamism often missing from the genre.” – PopMatters
“Staggeringly beautiful, catastrophically heavy, and with a penchant for lifting your mood to the stars: PSYCHONAUT returns with the best metal of the year.” – Everything Is Noise
“PSYCHONAUT’s Unfold the God Man was one of the best albums of 2020, and two years later Violate Consensus Reality allows history to repeat itself. The band remain untouchable in their craft and immeasurable in potential. If this is PSYCHONAUT at their peak then so be it, but if the bar is set to be raised higher, no-one is ready.” – Distorted Sound
“Violate Consensus Reality has impressed. It offers a broader example of the band’s capabilities and musical depths than a one-track split could, (despite that track’s own range), and as such reveals Psychonaut in all of their rich, multifaceted glory.” – Wonderbox Metal
“This is an album with a subtle but definite directional consciousness. Starting (reasonably) straight and heading into darker and more striking territory as it progresses, by the time you’ve got as far as track six, ‘Interbeing,’ you surely cannot help being carried along and mesmerized by the narrative trajectory…” – Metal Digest
“Landscapes and soundscapes morph into an all-enveloping sludge…” – The Sleeping Shaman
PSYCHONAUT:
Stefan De Graef – guitar/vocals
Thomas Michiels – bass/vocals
Harm Peters – drums
