Electric Sun Defence – Estuary
Release Date: 8th May 2026
Label: Road To Masochist
Bandcamp
Genre: Progressive Post-Metal
FFO: Mastodon, Baroness, Psychonaut.
Review By: John Newlands
Electric Sun Defence are a Scottish duo consisting of Pete Colquhoun on drums and Joe Cormack on…well, pretty much everything else you hear on the LP. Rising from the ashes of their previous band, The Massacre Cave, the pair return with a new project that feels somewhat familiar but also refreshingly evolved and with the traditional metal elements toned down. In my opinion, an improvement.
Estuary, the band’s debut, sits pretty comfortably in the realm of progressive post‑metal. Although not a concept album, the band describe its lyrical themes as “a metaphor for inevitability: the idea that all effort, motion, and resistance ultimately move toward the same end. Life isn’t framed as a clean, purposeful river, but as something far less controlled.” It’s an evocative setting for the record, and the music reflects that sense of turbulence and the inevitability of life and all it holds.
Across 10 tracks and roughly 50 minutes, the album never drags, it’s well‑paced, dynamic, and full of shifting textures and tempos, and I’ve had no issues spinning it back to back. Something that stands out to me, and is a little unusual, is the number of notable influences I hear in this release and how confidently the guys manage to incorporate these ideas without ever sounding exactly like copycats these bands.
The heaviest influence is probably earlier Mastodon, however there are shades of Tool, Baroness, and Psychonaut, with lighter touches of Icon/Draconian Times‑era Paradise Lost and even early Metallica – I’m thinking the more prog sections of Puppets or RtL and less of thrash metal, dotted throughout the entire release. Track 7, Choke Leper, weirdly throws in unexpected flashes of The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd. There’s even a hint of Rivers of Nihil’s use of melody in The Work in some of the mellower passages of Estuary.
That’s hardly a bad list of influences to pull from, however, as much fun it is to notice influences, it would be even better to develop a distinctive signature standalone sound that is only Electric Sun Defence. Perhaps something that we would see developing in a sophomore release. That is not to say that Electric Sun Defence do not have their own sound, it is there – heavy yet melodic, atmospheric yet grounded, I’d just rather not always be comparing them to something else.
Production across the board is fantastic, with a clear distinction between the instruments: guitars are present and heavy, lush and textural in the mellower moments, the drums are snappy and punchy, and the vocal delivery is clear and confident across both clean and harsh styles. It also leaves me genuinely intrigued to hear how the duo manage to recreate such a bold, full sound in a live setting, there really is a lot of depth and complexity here for just two people.
All in all, Estuary is an absolute belter of a debut. I’ve listened to it back‑to‑back several times now, and it only gets better with each spin.
It’s also worth commenting that it’s exciting to see more underground Scottish metal bands gaining traction. With acts like Codespeaker, Cwfen, Void Of Light, Gout, and of course DVNE already turning heads, Electric Sun Defence feel like another strong addition to a scene that deserves far more attention.
(4.5 / 5)
