Definitely a band at the forefront of their style, fusing Meshuggah-style heaviness with an inspired take on time signature insanity and occasional moments of ambient chord work or light ballads, the new album feels fresh and new. While drawing a lot of comparisons Thorendel and co, Textures definitely feel a bit more multi-dimensional, no doubt attracting fans of bipolar clean-and-heavy artists like Opeth in droves.

OzProg's own Michael Gagen recently spoke with Bart Hennephof, guitarist with the Netherlands based group about their history, new bassist and startling new album Silhouettes.

"We are very proud of the last album," Hennephof begins. "As with the others, we didn't want to stop until we really thought it was finished, and so we did. It is always a struggle to get to where you want, but in the end it pays off."

Having always been proudly self-produced, Textures main man Jochem Jacobs has always directed the band to handle every element of the recording process themselves. Textures evolution from the dark sounds of Polars, through the highly polished Drawing Circles and now onto the stark and mature current album is obvious. When asked whether Texture's are employing any album-by-album reinventions, Hennephof replies:

"We definitely experimented more with sound on this one. Jochem has gained a lot of experience with his studio Split Second Sound the last few years, and also gained a lot of professional gear to record with. That, together with a good planning over almost three months, resulted in us having some time to experiment with different guitars, guitars amps, mic-setups, and just overall sound-experimenting we didn't have on the previous albums, simply because the lack of time. We recorded in the same rooms as we did on Drawing Circles, but the approach and final processing/mixing were done quite different.

"We wanted to go for a BIG, rawer, but layered and texturised sound now, in contrast with the quite honest and clear production of Drawing Circles. Polars was completely unconventional, also in the production; we built the recording room ourselves, in our rehearsal room, and dragged everything we had into that room, and recorded like maniacs. Silhouettes is more adult, and dark, that was our goal as well."

As a recording, Silhouettes is definitely as daring as we've ever heard from Textures with more ambient sections than ever before and an even more bipolar sound, and while it very much sounds like a Textures record, it seems the band's writing style has matured slightly.

"Well, it mostly goes like as follows: we write the whole year through, in between tours and shows, at home and in the rehearsal room. There we just play with the grooves, and also with the structures a lot, and not so much with sound. So before we go into the studio, we have lots of demos of different songs, and the final sound is being created in the studio, which gives it the unity it needs, even if the songs differ much from each other. So it's only structure, melody and harmony we think about, before going into the studio.

"During the writing sessions it soon became clear that the mid-tempo parts were the strongest ideas we had, with trips to thrash and death-metal, but also to more ambient parts. From that moment we stopped writing the ultra loud parts/very soft parts, and that way we grew into the direction of the style of the album naturally.

"A lot of sections have seen many edits, some songs have had like 10 or 20 demos, with just changes in the structure. It varies a lot, until we are all satisfied with it. The demos come forth from different times, and sometimes different parts are combined together, to emphasize a special effect. So after everyone in the band has contributed their reasons why they want 'that section later in the song', or 'that part one bar shorter', then we get to the final structure of the songs, and that is where you begin to see the power of the first idea it all began with."

While singer/guitarist and producer Jochem is definitely at the helm of Textures' sound in the studio, Hennephof himself is clearly well versed on the studio process, especially to record an artist as multilayered as Textures.

"[The album took us] two and half months in total, one and half month recording, and one month mixing. Textures is a very hard band to mix, we have six instruments plus decorations in the layers that you all want to be heard. Though, we think this album is more raw, and Drawing Circles is more polished, [Sillhouettes] is a clear and steady mix. The guitars took quite long to record, lots of picking parts, and layered synth-like guitar sounds that you don't hear the first time, but if you would mute them, you would miss them. We always tend to search for that special touch in the sound of a song, to make it more mysterious. Such as the beginning of "Awake", which are guitar lines on top of each other, creating a synth-like sequence."

To my way of thinking, Textures are at the forefront of the modern heavy metal sound, taking the musicianship from the classic tech metal albums like Destroy Erase Improve and the classy grooves of Korn and the nu-metal movement and combining it with their own unique take on the heavy genres. When asked what music inspires the band Hennephof surprises with a list of artists we mightn't have expected, in between a few we definitely saw coming.

"I don't think you have to listen to modern music to invent new music, I do think listening to a lot of different genres helps in opening the musical horizon to search for new music. Of course everything is already done you might say, but still, there are so many variations possible, mixing soul with metal for example, or R'n'B (laughs). It seems impossible, but Eric uses some melodies and techniques that find their roots in soul, it's cool to experiment with that in the music. But some modern acts that inspire us very much are Pat Metheny, Boards of Canada, Aphex Twin, Tipper, Massive Attack, Peter Gabriel, Bjork, The Mars Volta, 30 Seconds to Mars, you name it. We listen to this kind of stuff more than to metal, actually. But metal acts; Katatonia, Necrophagist, Oceansize, Strapping Young Lad, Dredg, Gojira, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum."

2008 sees new bassist Remko Tielemans joining the Textures juggernaut. Member lineups can cause more than a few problems for a band about to enter the studio, but thankfully due to the way Textures write music, his timing couldn't have been better.

"He just came at the right time, at the right place. He could learn the new songs right away, and record them right away as well (laughs). After that, he learned the old stuff for the live shows. Right now, we are practicing some very old stuff (the song "Polars" all in one time) for some upcoming special shows, so Remko is still busy with our fucked-up riffs (laughs), but we are as well...'

In terms of live performance, Textures reputation precedes them. Recently sharing the stage with Opeth and Arch Enemy among many more, judging by internet reactions, their live show leaves no stone unturned, offering brutality for the moshers, technicality to impress the prog-heads and a few softer cleaner sections to let people catch their breath.

"Energy, that's what it's all about. We are very hyped-up on stage, forcing the crowd to move with us in the heavy parts, giving them some peace in the slower parts, to build the tension up again to heavy climaxes.

"The Arch Enemy tours we did were incredible, just crazy metallers digging our music as well; full-packed steaming venues that go wild are a daily view on the Arch Enemy shows. And the bigger festivals we played have showed us big crowds we could serve a lot more in the future. Playing those festivals along other big names and meeting the bands in person means a lot to us; and it's just happening more and more."

As much as I hated to ask, as a long time Textures fan, living along way away from the Netherlands, I had to take the opportunity to ask the band if we'd ever see them hit our shores for some shows.

"I hate to answer we have no definite plans yet, but some good options are there, and the possibilities are getting bigger and bigger, lots of hands reach out for us from the other side of the globe, we just have to get there as fast as possible!"

On the back of Silhouettes, Hennephof reveals Textures plans for the immediate future.

"Playing, playing, and a bit of writing in between for the fourth album (laughs). We already have some new ideas, we just want to go ON! But this summer we will play in Holland on the biggest alternative festival there, and do a lot of shows in summer in Germany, France, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Denmark, Sweden and Norway."

To check out Textures visit their official website at www.texturesband.com and their official MySpace at www.myspace.com/textures. Textures new album Silhouettes is now available Australia wide through Stomp Records.