{"id":47623,"date":"2025-04-24T21:27:09","date_gmt":"2025-04-24T21:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/47623\/"},"modified":"2025-04-24T21:27:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T21:27:09","slug":"wisdom-fools-prophecy-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/47623\/","title":{"rendered":"Wisdom & Fools – Prophecy Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Liminal Dread Productions has been on a roll with releases in the past year. Some really took it home (Vanessa Funke<\/b>), while others (Weep<\/b>) didn\u2019t quite hit the mark. Now, they are back with the debut record from LA\u2019s newest thrash band, Wisdom & Fools<\/b>. As far as I can gather, this two-person outfit was a collaboration between vocalist\/guitarist Philip Vargas and bassist John Ramirez, who fronts the one-person progressive death outfit Parasite<\/b>. The only thing missing is a drummer. So, they bought a computer and did some shit. Prophecy is a brief record that tries to push the boundaries of thrash, technical thrash, and death. The result is a riff machine with harmonizing guitar leads and vocals in the vein of Pantera<\/b> and Throwdown<\/b>. It\u2019s an odd combination of elements that could be an absolute hit or a thrash fire behind Albertson\u2019s. Either way, its thirty-six-minute construction should at least get you through your morning coffee shits.<\/p>\n

My favorite part about the band\u2019s inception was their first release, a 2020 collab with Parasite<\/b> called St. Angry (A Loving Tribute to Metallica\u2019s St. Anger). Yep, you read that correctly. These four cover songs include \u201cDirty Window\u201d and \u201cSweet Amber,\u201d which absolutely no one asked for, especially considering that I prefer the unfiltered vocals of Papa Het to those of Vargas. After a couple of singles and an EP, Prophecy finally arrives as the band\u2019s official debut LP. With eight original tracks that don\u2019t include St. Anger covers, Wisdom & Fools<\/b> set out with their programmed drums to leave a mark on the Bay Area thrash scene. But will that mark be a notch on the Big 4 bludgeoning club or that skid mark I had to wash out of my speedo?<\/p>\n

\ufeffProphecy by Wisdom & Fools<\/a><\/p>\n

The first thing you notice from the opening number, \u201cEscaping Eden,\u201d is its guitar chops and the bass that pops and rumbles like old-school Sadus<\/b>. But after charging along with one of the better thrash licks on the album, the vocals kinda diminish the mood. The song becomes garbled with all the riff and mood changes, even if the death textures and stomping riff on the back end are nice touches. One of the best tracks on the album is \u201cThe Devil in a House of God.\u201d The screaming vocals and heavy riffs deliver the goods, alternating between thrash mixtures and interesting, swirling guitar leads. The song also includes melodic elements, \u201980s metal flourishes, and a headbangable interlude that\u2014for some demented reason of my own\u2014resembles the entrance song to WWE\u2019s Hardy Boyz.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

After the album comes out attacking, the back half introduces more melodic elements in back-to-back pieces, \u201cThorns\u201d and \u201cPerpetualis.\u201d While \u201cThorns\u201d is riddled with some interesting, old-school soloing and harmonizing guitar action, the song\u2019s foundation is completely forgettable. And, once again, the vocals don\u2019t help to bring this track up to the melodeath caliber it should be. Sadly, \u201cPerpetualis\u201d is an identical song to its predecessor. Repeating the verse, pre-chorus, and chorus sections for most of the track, the only interesting part is the harmonizing leads toward the end. Thankfully, the closer brings some semblance of justice to the previous tracks. \u201cHusk\u201d is a marching thrasher that dabbles in death-thrash territories before unveiling its own melodic tendencies. But the lush textures of the song\u2019s outro are not enough to save the lackluster songwriting of the two previous tracks.<\/p>\n

Prophecy is an enigma. While the performances are undoubtedly great\u2014especially those harmonizing leads and the gigantic bass presence\u2014the songwriting is lacking. Balancing between being a standard thrash band and a technical one, Prophecy achieves too much and too little at the same time. There are a lot of riffs on this platter, but they tend to blend rather than add memorable weight to the overall song. As stated before, the vocals also do little to contribute, and I find myself ignoring them to focus on the guitar and bass. All that to say, there is definitely something here that, with some restraint, could be great. Of all the songs, \u201cThe Devil in a House of God\u201d seems to know what it wants to do, but most of the album becomes predictable, as if the riffs are used to promote the impressive leads and soloing sections. I\u2019m not quite ready to write this band off, but this ain\u2019t the album I wanted.<\/p>\n

Rating:<\/strong> 2.0\/5.0
DR:<\/strong> 6 | Format Reviewed:<\/strong> WAV
Label:<\/strong> Liminal Dread Productions<\/a>
Websites:<\/strong> wisdomfools.bandcamp.com<\/a> | facebook.com\/wisdomandfools<\/a>
Releases Worldwide:<\/strong> April 25th, 2025<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Liminal Dread Productions has been on a roll with releases in the past year. Some really took it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3936],"tags":[25983,743,12295,10269,77,25984,19158,269,25985,25986,25987,6080,6082,25988,25989,25990,16,15,25991,25992,25993],"class_list":{"0":"post-47623","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-2-0","9":"tag-743","10":"tag-american-metal","11":"tag-apr25","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-liminial-dread-productions","14":"tag-metallica","15":"tag-music","16":"tag-pantera","17":"tag-parasite","18":"tag-prophecy","19":"tag-review","20":"tag-reviews","21":"tag-sadus","22":"tag-thrash-metal","23":"tag-throwdown","24":"tag-uk","25":"tag-united-kingdom","26":"tag-vanessa-funke","27":"tag-weep","28":"tag-wisdom-fools"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}