Through Zero by Elder, a 2026 album.
The Elder are an American progressive/heavy psychedelic rock band formed in 2005 in Boston, Massachusetts, and now based in Berlin, Germany. In twenty years of activity, their sound has shifted from heavy, classic stoner/doom metal to a progressive, psychedelic and instrumentally complex rock style, making them a benchmark in the worldwide underground scene. This record confirms it.
The name of the band Elder, which means “elder,” “tribal sage,” or “clan chief” in English, was coined by frontman Nick DiSalvo during his early high-school years, inspired by his studies and reading on the history of the Mongol Empire.
The heart of the band is frontman Nick DiSalvo, who handles guitar, vocals and keyboards.
The current lineup consists of:
• Nick DiSalvo – Vocals, guitar, keyboards
• Jack Donovan – Bass
• Michael Risberg – Guitar, keyboards
• Georg Edert – Drums
Initially a power trio formed by DiSalvo, Donovan and first drummer Matt Couto, Elder debuted with a split album together with Queen Elephantine in 2006 and with their first self-titled album, “Elder,” in 2008. Their real underground breakthrough came in 2011 with “Dead Roots Stirring,” a record that blends Black Sabbath’s heavy riffs with long melodic sections.
With “Lore” (2015) and “Reflections of a Floating World” (2017), Elder left behind the stoner-metal clichés. The songs became longer, more complex and packed with time changes, incorporating elements of krautrock and space rock. Nick DiSalvo moved to Berlin and the band expanded to a four-piece with the arrival of Michael Risberg and, later, drummer Georg Edert. This new European phase led to the release of “Omens” (2020) and “Innate Passage” (2022), albums marked by synthesizers, keyboards and dreamlike atmospheres.
Through Zero marks an important milestone for the band, celebrating twenty years of activity.
The title is a technical term in audio engineering. As frontman Nick DiSalvo explained, it refers to a frequency’s ability to pass through the zero point and continue into the negative.
For this album, Elder’s line-up remained unchanged from the previous work, Innate Passage from 2022, showing great stability and cohesion. The now tight-knit quartet comes across as a solid, compact unit. No guests appear on vocals or the main instruments.
A “zero point” that represents a midway stop in an invisible journey. This is how the band interprets it, as a symbol that reality is not a straight line and that beginning and end are only labels we place on ourselves. The lyrics and atmospheres of the record reflect this idea, exploring universal and sometimes conflicting themes such as life, death, frustration, powerlessness, fear and hope. All these feelings are seen as part of the same path, or continuous signal.
The album is an evolution that takes the band’s sound further away from the heavy metal of the early works to embrace a more layered, electronic sound, recalling progressive and psychedelic rock. Unlike previous records, dominated by guitars, in this album vintage-flavored analog synths, Rhodes piano and electronic pads are no longer simple supporting elements, but become the backbone of tracks like “Capture/Release” and the title track, creating spatial atmospheres that evoke German Krautrock and Space Rock.
The songs are long, with four of the six tracks running over nine minutes, and they reject the classic “verse-chorus” structure. Elder build their compositions through post-rock dynamics, starting from minimal, soft introductions and then stacking tension until they reach monumental sonic explosions. The time changes are frequent, complex and geometric, typical traits of math rock and classic ’70s prog.
The guitar work of Nick DiSalvo and Michael Risberg almost completely leaves behind the darkness of doom metal to focus on clean, evocative melodic interweavings, psychedelic solos rich in effects (delay, phaser) and distorted (“fuzzy”) walls of sound that still always keep a sunny, epic, dreamlike openness.
DiSalvo’s voice is used extremely sparingly: it is never aggressive, but blends into the mix almost as if it were another musical instrument. The vocal lines are drenched in reverb, ethereal and distant, letting the instrumental music convey most of the emotions.
Through Zero is a fantastic album, without a single flaw. Still, three songs stand out as real gems:
Capture/Release is one of the best tracks overall, both simple and with intricate progressive structures, blending space rock and stoner rock with surprisingly catchy, engaging vocal lines for the band’s genre. The synths are essential, creating an adventurous atmosphere perfect for live shows.
Strata is the most imposing, majestic and complex track on the record, running to almost 11 minutes of outstanding compositional skill. It starts with a calm, delicate prog-style introduction, then explodes into a wall of guitars, tight riffs and constant time changes that leave you speechless.
Sight Unseen, my favorite instrumental piece, with a more intimate, warm and almost improvised approach and a hypnotic, peaceful, meditative flow, based on krautrock repetition and a slow, careful post-rock-style build.
An album that manages to be both refined and powerful. An essential album.
My Version
Label: Stickman Records (3) – Psychobabble 142
Format: Vinyl, LP
Vinyl, LP, Single Sided, Etched
All media, Album, translucent neon orange
Country: Europe
Released: 2026
Tracklist
A1 Sigil To Ruin 10:33
A2 Capture/Release 8:47
B1 Through Zero 9:06
B2 Strata 11:24
C1 Sight Unseen 8:58
C2 Blighted Age 5:48
Lineup
Bass Guitar – Jack Donovan
Drums, Percussion – Georg Edert
Guitar, Electric Piano [Rhodes], Slide Guitar – Michael Risberg
Guitar, Vocals, Synthesizer [Synthesizers] – Nicholas DiSalvo
