Devin Townsend Band – Synchestra (2006)

May 20, 2024

Synchestra was the Devin album that came out around the time I properly became aware of his wider output as a musician (rather than just SYL). At the time, this thing just could not compare to SYL’s Alien and I immediately consigned it to the bin. With more adult ears, I can appreciate about half of this, and the other half unfortunately drags the album down in a soup of breathy synths and meandering guitars. As with any solo DT from this period onwards especially, it seems quality control is out the door, and every single last morsel and idea gets packed into each album, which can be overwhelming – not because it’s too much or too technical or too abstract – but well, because it’s boring.

Several individual songs of excellent quality and the gorgeous production job both save this thing from sinking (or is that synching hur hur hur) to the bottom of the shit pile, but repeat listens from me in the future are probably unlikely.