It’s a great time to be a fan of post-metal music right now. With bands like Russian Circles, Junius and Australia’s We Lost The Sea providing high calibre additions to the genre, the continued progression of Philadelphia-based outfit Rosetta provides possibly one of the most exciting and thoroughly satisfying listens in the last decade. Quintessential Ephemera is their fifth studio record, coming to us a full ten years after the arrival of their thunderous two-disc debut The Galilean Satellites, and directly follows last year’s Flies to Flame EP and the score for the "Rosetta: Audio/Visual" documentary.

Strictly by definition, Quintessential Ephemera means "the most perfect example of a quality, that exists for only a short time," and across nine tracks, Rosetta manage to cultivate a listening experience that echoes this sentiment with utter conviction. Bookended by lush instrumentals, the record leaps through seven untitled songs, with a focus on haunting and pained screamed vocals, interspersed with melodic singing across verses and choruses. Where the band has flirted briefly with these on previous releases, they are now heavily weaved into the sonic design, thanks to the welcome addition of good friend and City of Ships guitarist/vocalist Erik Jernigan as a full time band member.

Quintessential Ephemera features colossal, epic, rumbling tracks that ebb and flow with an ethereal vastness and intricacy that has become a hallmark for the band, and finds them continuing to explore lyrical themes of religion, isolation, technology, emptiness and social consciousness. With the band free of their contract with Translation Loss Records, and releasing this as an independent, "name your price" option through their Bandcamp page, it would be almost criminal for you to not experience this record and pay Rosetta tribute for the privilege.