BABYLON

In my opinion Babylon is one of the better US prog bands, on a similar lever to bands such as Chakra, Happy the Man, Mithrandir, Relayer, and Starcastle. Like many of these bands, Babylon's similarity to Yes is strong (however this could always be chalked up to the question of "Do most prog rock bands sound like Yes? Or does Yes sound like most prog bands?"), although some instrumental element and thematic elements seem more akin to Peter Gabriel era Genesis. The vocal elements are very heavily stylized, a bit to stylized for my taste, but I could understand how one could enjoy them. The lyrics are often over the top and ironic, such as "Dreamfish" in which humanity is overrun by vengeful fish who seek retribution for humanity cooking and eating them. The rhythmic qualities of this album are all over the place, with many time signature and tempo changes, it's almost to an absurd degree and I love it. Love the keyboards, quite fond of the ARP Omni, although there are occasional moments were the guitar and synth combo may get a bit overwhelming for some, I personally enjoy it, and I think that effect was the bands intention. Not quite the perfect album but really good, 4.4/5.