? [AKA: QUESTION MARK]

With a very Floydian style start with piano and guitar, Neal Morse opens this album with religion as the main topic, this is the consequence of his encounter with God. "Temple of The Living God" continues with an instrumental passage "a la Genesis" with a duet of keyboard and guitar, then a sax joins to complete the fusion. Mike Portnoy looks very solid in this song, but as the song goes by, it loses strength, and what started as an excellent job suddenly fades away.

Some kind of conceptual release, Neal Morse offers this album as a sacrifice for his Lord.

"Another World" continues immediately in a very happy mood following the symphonic school very marked on each of the projects of this American musician.

"Outside" is a very calmed and mellow song that kills the rhythm of the first three tracks.

Besides the songs get very monotone in what lyrics concern, this album has excellent instrumental fragments as in "Sweet Elation".

The fact of being God the only lyrical topic of the songs, the diversity that differences Morse from other musicians gets lost.

"In The Fire" starts as a very weak and grows up and gets stronger on each bar. It's an excellent effort. Mike Portnoy shows off in an excellent way to add variations on the drum kit with his bag of tricks as he calls it on each second of the album. The Gospel Style Choirs add something special to the song that couldn't have been finished in a better way.

"Solid As The Sun" starts with a bang, the bass work is very notable, but the lack of heaviness on Morse's Voice makes it lose power, the sax solo fits perfectly with the melody of the song and the Yes Style vocal arrangements add an special mix to this track.

Once again, the symphonic influences take place on this album in "Glory Of The Lord" that is an excellent introduction for "Outside Looking In", a ballad very in the Bryan Adams Style, that knocks out the album when it was rising, so once again it falls because of the lack of consistence.

Bringing continuity to the ballad, the strongest track of the album, "12" introduces itself with the first chorus of "Temple Of The God", adding an excellent Latin arrangement on the keyboards and the drums, and a great keyboard and guitar solo finishes the song.

"Entrance" slows down the ecstasy achieved on "12" with an excellent piano intro followed by the voice of Neal Morse. "Inside his presence" is like a church hymn, starts very quiet, and the song goes to its climatic point, but not in a progressive way, just like a normal ballad from any Rock Band, pretty much in the Bon Jovi Style.

And back to the main theme, "Temple of The Living God" announces the end since the beginning, a good instrumental part, you can imagine yourself in the church singing it at the end of the Priest Preech.

In conclusion, this album has an excellent instrumentation, for my taste the lyrics are too religious, but thinking of it as a concept album, I think it deserves a chance, I was pretty doubtful about the rating I should give, but after listening to it a couple of times during the review, I'm gonna give it 4 stars.

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