DAVE LOMBARDO

The metal world is full to the brim with incredible drummers, but there can't be too many that fans would actually want to make a solo album. After all, nobody sensible likes a drum solo (unless it's by Neil Peart). In this as in so much else, Dave Lombardo stands apart. Few would dispute the legendary status he earned with his staggering performance on "Reign In Blood", but it's been Lombardo's post-SLAYER career that has made the prospect of a solo album an enticing one, rather than a potential horror.

Over the last 30 years, he has collaborated with a vast array of other artists and kept the beat with several enduring bands. His work alongside Mike Patton has been particularly well received — in both FANTOMAS, DEAD CROSS and a resurrected MR. BUNGLE — but while "Rites of Percussion" has certain atmospheric echoes of the mad, freeform records that the FAITH NO MORE frontman made early on in his solo career (1997's "Pranzo Oltranzista" springs to mind),&nbsp these instrumental, percussion-led pieces are instantly recognizable as Lombardo's work, albeit in an intriguing, new context.

The most impressive thing about "Rites of Percussion" is that despite being almost entirely built from Lombardo's drumming, it never feels like an empty display of technical prowess. Instead, a riveting tapestry of percussive ideas unfolds, sometimes with a hard-hitting beat to hammer a point home, but just as often focusing on the subtle tones and textures that emerge when rhythms collide and intertwine. "Intiatory Madness" delivers on its title, introducing the Lombardo sound-world and zipping across multiple tempos and moods in five minutes. It's part tribal hoedown, part infernal ritual, part Bonham-esque drum annihilation, with dissonant cymbal clangs and sudden bursts of ugly, primitive pounding. It's brilliant and bewildering. Thereafter, Lombardo rides the inspirational waves to an enigmatic variety of ambient locations. Rainforest clatter and maxed-out thuds propel "Separation from the State" along at a manic pace. "Inner Sanctum" builds from an ominous slow-burn to ghostly organ drones and a frantic, broken hardcore beat. "Journey of the Host" dares to be authentically funky, before spiraling up into the heavens in true space-rock fashion and returning with a skull full of jazz. The lack of non-percussion instruments makes the whole thing eminently more fascinating, too.

Having made the shrewd decision to limit "Rites of Percussion" to a brisk 34 minutes, Dave Lombardo has filled every moment of it with ingenuity and a tangible love for his profession. There are moments of elegance ("Maunder in Liminality" has a cool, cinematic feel) and moments of formless madness ("Interfearium" is nightmarish and unnerving). There is even a brief moment, midway through the closing "Animismo", where the great man plays something that might just have slotted into some old SLAYER song back in the day. Beyond that, those seeking full-steam thrashing should look elsewhere. These days, Dave Lombardo's musical vision appears to have few boundaries, and thrillingly so.