Vokonis - Transitions

Band:	Vokonis
Album:	Transitions
Style:	Progressive rock, Stoner metal
Release date:	October 25, 2024
A review by:	musclassia

01. Deadname
02. Phantom Carriage
03. Pink Fang
04. Chrysalis
05. Arrival
06. Transitions

The aptly titled Transitions represents wholesale change for Vokonis on a number of fronts; however, the band is still musically recognizable as the one that graced us with Odyssey three years ago.

Less than 18 months after the release of Odyssey, both bassist Jonte Johansson and drummer Peter Ottoson had left Vokonis, although the former, who departed for health reasons, contributed to the writing process for the album’s successor. The sole remaining member Simona Ohlsson, who was joined by Oscar Johannesson and Sven Lindsten (and later by second guitarist Hedvig Modig, who seemingly arrived too late to feature on this new album), underwent her own personal transition, as reflected in the artwork and lyrics of Transitions. In spite of this roster shake-up and accompanying journey of personal discovery, Transitions (which is also the band’s debut on Majestic Mountain Records) maintains the fusion of stoner metal and progressive rock that has defined the sound of Vokonis to date.

One area in which this overhaul of members can be clearly heard is in the vocals of this new album. When I reviewed Odyssey, I noted three contrasting vocal styles: harsh roars, hazy cleans, and Troy Sanders-esque barks. This time around, the vocals alternate between a harsher style and cleaner tones that aren’t recognizable as either of the non-extreme styles on Odyssey. The growls are very functional; the cleaner vocals are somewhat less so, fluctuating between a moderate level of competence and some rougher takes, the latter of which can be especially heard during the likes of “Deadname” and “Pink Fang”.

Having enjoyed the vocals and trade-offs between different approaches on Odyssey, I do find Transitions to be a notable downgrade on that front, and a point of distraction in a few unfortunate moments. On the flip side, Vokonis no longer inspire quite such unavoidable comparisons to Mastodon with the Sanders-style approach absent; having said that, the more rambunctious and technical stoner metal songs here do still bear plenty of that band’s mark. Like its predecessor, Transitions features a mix of shorter, harder songs alongside lengthier tracks that delve more deeply into the band’s prog rock influences, although the balance has shifted slightly towards the former this time around.

The record is very much a story of two halves, with four shorter cuts followed by two tracks crossing the 10-minute mark, with each half roughly equivalent in length. Kicking off that opening run is “Deadname”, and what it may struggle with on the vocal front, it delivers with dizzying Mastodon-esque lead guitar parts, languid stoner rock riffs, and a lush guitar solo. There are some cleaner tones in the mix, particularly during the chorus; this is expanded upon in the second half of “Phantom Carriage”, an initially rampant brawler that takes a sharp turn around the midway mark into a really pleasantly shimmering clean sequence for the solo.

The following two rockers, “Pink Fang” and “Chrysalis”, both offer some more of what is among the more enjoyable stoner metal fare I’ve heard so far in a fairly quiet year for the genre, whether with the Baroness-inspired chorus of the former, or the deliciously thick, stomping and chugtastic bridge of the latter. “Chrysalis” stacks up favourably to any of the shorter tracks on Odyssey; however, for that album, I did find myself gravitating a bit more towards the longer, proggier tracks (as I am very prone to do), and this also remains the case on Transitions.

The first of these is “Arrival”, and the slower, more expansive tone of its opening moments already makes evident that the band have shifted gears. From there, the song serves up some nice bouncy riffs, yet more satisfying guitar leads and solos, and also some well-executed vocal harmonies during the chorus that maybe could have been integrated successfully elsewhere during the less polished vocal parts. The journey that “Arrival” takes listeners on is easily the highlight of Transitions for me; the title track also has its fair share of standout moments, most notably when it advances out of a mid-song lull to move into a really smooth and pleasant jamlike solo passage. That being said, that mid-song lull is a bit questionable; nearly 3 minutes of very quiet and fairly aimless bass tones does rather curtail the momentum built in the preceding few minutes of the song.

As a complete package, I feel Transitions falls just shy of what the band accomplished on Odyssey. Nevertheless, this is a very different group of musicians to the one that recorded that album, and they have come out the other side of this period of volatility in good health, releasing one of the better efforts in the genre in 2024.

Rating breakdown