Europe, as the old continent, contains a great deal of culture and a long history to help shape musicians and the work. Many in the United States move on obliviously with our lives while barely noticing some of the more well known bands from there. Izah is a group from the old continent that surely is under the radar of even the most avid listeners of music in the United States, which is shame because their EP, Finite Horizon / Crevice, is actually quite good and well worth hearing. Even though this record is just two tracks, the twenty plus minutes that it inhabits definitely leave an impression on those who do discover it.
"Finite Horizon" is an exercise in an interesting amalgam of the heavier end of music due to the song's arrangement running the gamut from the heavy and quieter moments of bands like Cult of Luna to the clean vocal and melodies of some metalcore acts, but wait there is more because there is definitely a prog rock section as well as a noisy metal section. It can be a bit schizophrenic sounding, and while the members' musical talent is obvious, the compositional skills could use less of the "everything but the kitchen sink" genre hopping. "Crevice" opens sounding much more metal with noise elements than the previous track, but in some ways it works much better than its predecessor as the song seems to have a more organic flow instead of feeling like a bunch of musical parts, but however Izah does it, "Crevice" benefits and comes off as the stronger of the two tracks mainly due to the transitions being more smooth and seamless.
With some better focus, this EP could be really strong. It takes the band a while to get there, but once Izah does (about a third of the way through "Finite Horizon"), the EP has a much more natural feel. For a first step Finite Horizon / Crevice is fairly good and shows a decent amount of promise, which bodes well for future material from the group. Izah offers this free at their website; so it does not cost you anything to check this out.
