Band:	Supuration
Album:	Hegemony
Style:	Avantgarde metal
Release date:	2008

01. Hegemony
02. March Of The Neovocyts
03. The Baleful Light
04. Death Dance
05. Recall
06. The Searing Desert
07. The Far Horizons
08. On The Burning Sand
09. Salinity
10. Sublime Sense
11. The Arrival
12. Dissolution

Three years after Imago, Hegemony is the new album by the French experimental metal band SUP (or S.U.P.).
A short summary for those of you who still don't know the band: SUP plays an unique kind of (atmospheric) metal, based mostly on cold atmospheres, with death metal (and also industrial) roots. Their music is near-exclusively mid-tempo, and they use electronics in the background to emphasize the mood. They also have a quite unique sound, which can be described as cold, downtuned and hypnotic.

Now, of course, the question is: How does this album compare to the rest of their discography?
Well, it's mostly 'more of the same', and that is good news for most SUP fans for sure. It is also a return to something a bit more extreme, with more harsh and/or dissonant riffs and breaks, and contrary to their previous album, the death growls are more important here. But, the experience gained with Imago on the clean vocal parts shines through, so that Hegemony is maybe their most dynamic album in terms of vocals use and contrasts.
'More of the same' also means that Hegemony is a concept album (ALL their albums are story-based). This time, we're in a post-apocalyptic and quite desertic world, and we follow one of the Neovocyts (some kind of post-humans). And this is why the music might sound a bit more 'warm' this time, eschewing the colder feeling of albums such as Chronophobia.

While good, this album has two little problems. First, it really seems that that they don't renew themselves as they did on each other album (compare, for example, Chronophobia to Angelus to Imago), and it's a bit disappointing. And next, I regret that this album has no real highlights; while the album is consistent from beginning to end, no song really shines through?
In the end, Hegemony, while not as groundbreaking as their previous ones (everyone tends to get accustomed to good stuff), is still really good and original. And I even think it can be a good one to enter the strange, dark, and often disorienting universe of SUP. So, give it a try, and welcome?