Angerer
One-man Vienna-based experimental progressive metal project helmed by David Angerer, whose 2026 album Palingenaeon plays like 'a film score at a party' -- neoclassical/symphonic prog metal stitched together with circus music, absurdist black comedy, and a loose concept about botched reincarnation. Extremely new and thinly documented outside a handful of prog/metal press write-ups.
SCORE PROFILE
Accent numbers counted towards the index. Hover an axis — or hold it on a phone — for what it means.
WHY THOSE SCORES
- Jazzy 3 — Described as 'Progressive Metal met a film score at a party,' explicitly incorporating jazz and circus-music elements (progrockjournal.com).
- Technical 6 — Tagged neoclassical/progressive metal with 'abyssal prog structures' (angerer.bandcamp.com).
- Theatrical 4 — A conceptual, ritualistic album built around surreal 'botched reincarnation' scenarios, absurdist track titles ('Shaolin Combat Pigeons,' 'Nyarlathostep on Me, Daddy'), and circus-music/film-score staging (angerer.bandcamp.com; progrockjournal.com).
- Ambient 2 — Neoclassical/symphonic tagging and an 'abyssal' atmosphere per Bandcamp genre tags (angerer.bandcamp.com).
MEMBERS
- David Angererall instruments, vocals
- Pipi Gogerlfeatured vocals (track 1)
FURTHER LISTENING
Nearest score profiles in the atlas.
- UnaffiliatedEI 15Edge of RealityTechnicalTheatricalJazzy
Edge of Reality is a Nashville art-metal quintet whose 2019 album In Static packs jazz-inflected saxophone, carnival theatrics, and djent-adjacent riffing into a maximalist, constantly shifting progressive-metal frame. Reviewers place them alongside Native Construct, Thank You Scientist and Haken: dense, technically ambitious, occasionally overstuffed songwriting paired with a comedic, narrative-driven concept. Guitarist Joey Frevola also plays in UK prog act KYROS and LA's An Endless Sporadic, though neither is part of the EMMA atlas.
- UnaffiliatedEI 10Oh.TechnicalTheatrical
Oh. is the solo moniker of Greek multi-instrumentalist, composer, and director Olivia Hadjiioannou, who writes, performs, records, and mixes every part of her music herself. Her instrumental progressive-metal EP Metallia (self-released, July 2018) is a six-part concept work built from layered electric/acoustic guitars, violin, keyboards, and shifting time signatures; its 'Red Lion' music video won Best Music Video at multiple festivals, including the French Riviera Film Festival in Cannes.
- Bay Area / SGMEI 9Giant RobotTechnicalTheatrical
Giant Robot was the short-lived mid-1990s trio built around guitarist Buckethead, drummer Bryan 'Brain' Mantia, and keyboardist/producer Pete Scaturro, releasing one self-titled album on the Japanese NTT label in 1996 before Brain's departure broke up the group. The record is a virtuosic, sample-strewn instrumental record splicing film dialogue into dense guitar shredding, with absurdist song titles signaling its jam-session, prank-prone character. It sits adjacent to Buckethead's vast solo catalog but stands as its own band credit -- distinct from the same-titled 1994 Sony Japan Buckethead SOLO album that shares its name and caused the scout's identity confusion.
- Norwegian avant-blackEI 8WindsTechnicalTheatrical
Winds are a Norwegian neoclassical progressive-metal band formed in 1998, trading black-metal ferocity for classically-informed composition, clean vocals and duelling piano and guitar. Drummer Jan Axel 'Hellhammer' Blomberg — best known from Mayhem — anchors the group alongside guitarist Carl August Tidemann and pianist Andy Winter across Of Entity and Mind (2001) and Reflections of the I (2002). The result is one of the scene's most overtly 'classical' side-projects, far from its members' extreme-metal roots.
- UnaffiliatedEI 10Mattias IA EklundhTechnicalTheatricalJazzy
Mattias 'IA' Eklundh is a Swedish guitarist, vocalist, and the founder of Gothenburg progressive/avant-garde metal band Freak Kitchen (1992-present), whose sound mixes heavy metal with gypsy-jazz-adjacent influences and absurdist humor. He is also a solo 'Freak Guitar' artist released on Steve Vai's Favored Nations label and named Frank Zappa as one of his two biggest musical influences, though no direct collaboration with Zappa, Mats/Morgan, or the Zorn/Secret Chiefs 3 circle was found.
- UnaffiliatedEI 17ArchangelTechnicalTheatricalJazzy
Archangel is an avant-garde/electronic metal band from Venice, Italy, formed in 1994, notable for a groove-metal-rooted early sound that evolved into a symphonic, industrial, and electronically-inflected style incorporating elements as varied as saxophone passages within metal arrangements. Their 1996/97 debut 'In Tears the Angel Falls...' is often cited as a landmark avant-garde metal record and the band has been credited by some (including their own promotion) as the first metal act to tune entirely to the Golden Mean-derived 432 Hz standard. They continued releasing conceptually ambitious albums through 2010's 'The Story of My Immor(t)al Life', with core member Vam Kama Ocean Archangel (vocals/keyboards) present since formation.
- UnaffiliatedEI 4Deli CreepssatelliteTechnical
Deli Creeps is guitarist Buckethead's formative avant-garde/funk-metal band, formed in Claremont/San Francisco in the early 1990s and built around Maximum Bob's manic vocals and Buckethead's already-virtuosic, genre-hopping lead guitar. Their sole album, Dawn of the Deli Creeps (2005), compiles re-recorded demo-era material and functions as an origin document for Buckethead's later solo vocabulary — several of its riffs and songs were repurposed on his solo records. Mike Patton has praised the band, and it sits at the root of the Bay Area Buckethead/Praxis/Primus-adjacent avant-metal cluster.
- UnaffiliatedEI 14Kokumaromilk (こくまろみるく)TechnicalTheatricalJazzy
こくまろみるく (Kokumaromilk) is a Japanese avant-garde outfit that dresses power and symphonic metal foundations in noise interludes, jazz-pop detours, and a vocalist who swings between saccharine-cute and unhinged within the same song. Reviewers place it alongside Sigh and Gonin-Ish in Japan's weird-metal lineage, praising its whiplash genre-shifts. Documentation outside Metal Archives is thin, so several details (full lineup, precise formation year) remain unconfirmed.
- UnaffiliatedEI 13HeadkaseTechnicalTheatricalJazzy
Headkase were an Australian avant-garde metal band from Brisbane (2001-2014) built around a genuine circus stage show — masks, face paint and carnival theatrics — layered over a genre-blending sound mixing metal with jazz, techno, salsa and swing. Frequently billed as 'Brisbane's own Mr. Bungle,' their sole full-length was 'The Worm County Circus' (2009); they disbanded in 2014.
- ZornEI 15Titan to TachyonsTechnicalJazzyTheatrical
Titan to Tachyons is a New York instrumental quartet led by guitarist Sally Gates, built around a two-bassist frontline (Trevor Dunn and Matt Hollenberg) with drummer Kenny Grohowski, fusing free-jazz improv, prog counterpoint, and metal violence into sci-fi-themed instrumentals. Their 2022 album Vonals was released on John Zorn's Tzadik label (following 2020's Cactides on Nefarious Industries), and the polyrhythmic, two-bass arrangement gives the compositions an unusually dense, contrapuntal low end. Every member's other credits (Mr. Bungle, Fantômas, Tomahawk, Secret Chiefs 3, Cleric, Imperial Triumphant) wire this band into the Zorn/downtown-jazz and Patton-adjacent avant-metal orbit.