Through ZeroE

The Artist

Elder began in the mid-2000s as a Massachusetts stoner metal outfit built around guitarist and vocalist Nick DiSalvo, but they've spent the last decade shedding that skin entirely. Records like Lore and Reflections of a Floating World pushed them into sprawling progressive territory, and by Omens and Innate Passage they'd become one of the most respected acts in modern heavy prog. Now based partly in Berlin, the band trades riff-worship for kaleidoscopic arrangements that draw on krautrock, post-rock, and 70s prog as much as anything metal. Their identity rests on long-form composition, warm analog textures, and DiSalvo's melodic instincts. Through Zero arrives as their latest evolution, leaning further into synthesis and atmosphere than any Elder record before it.

The Album

Through Zero was written and tracked across Elder's usual transatlantic workflow, with DiSalvo self-producing and the band continuing to expand their palette of vintage keyboards, mellotrons, and layered guitars. The six-track set trims some of the heaviness of earlier records in favor of shimmering, motorik grooves and cosmic synth textures, positioning it closer to prog and psych than to the metal scene they emerged from. Released on Stickman Records, it continues the band's steady march toward pure compositional ambition. Thematically the album orbits ideas of dissolution, reset, and passing through nothingness to find something new. It's an album about transformation, made by a band mid-transformation.

Listen For

Synth-forward arrangements. On "Sigil To Ruin," notice how vintage keyboards share the melodic lead with guitars rather than sitting underneath them. The synths often carry the main hook.

Motorik pulse. "Capture/Release" leans on a steady, krautrock-influenced groove that lets the band layer textures over a hypnotic foundation instead of building to conventional peaks.

Song structures that ignore verse-chorus logic. The title track "Through Zero" moves through distinct movements more like a suite than a song. Track where each section begins and ends.

Guitar tone shift from prior records. On "Strata," listen for how the guitars have moved away from thick fuzz toward cleaner, chiming textures that share space with the keys.

The closing track's arc. "Blighted Age" is tasked with tying the record together. Pay attention to how it references or resolves motifs heard earlier.