Devin Townsend – fully 30 records into an astonishing career – has now just raised the stakes, bringing us to a conclusion of a journey started 23 years ago, in the form of a new double album incorporating multimedia and a cross section of what he can present as an artist. A search for answers and the discovery of fruitful solutions, through the new project carefully called Devin Townsend Presents: Z². The master class in Spector-mad production and composition worthy of Cheap Trick in the ‘70s is essentially a follow-up to 2007’s Ziltoid The Omniscient – but on the hallowed heavy scale of epic-ness, the new record couldn’t be flung further afield. “With the old Ziltoid record,” muses Hevy Devy, “I wanted to make a point that I could do things for $500, you know, with a drum machine and one microphone and a Line6 pod. But now, listening back to that record, in many ways it sounds like a glorified demo. They say every seven years you cycle through a full change, and Z² (Ziltoid Squared) is the original idea magnified extensively.”