PARALLEL MINDS

When the album was released, the Greek Metal Hammer awarded it 10 out of 10 points. A friend of mine bought it and, naturally, I borrowed it from him to give it a listen. The first five songs minus And I Close My Eyes (that was the first side of the original pressing) ended up to a tape, the rest didn't appeal to me much. Years went by and thankfully all of the albums of Conception were re-issued and I got hold all of them. It was time, after all, to re-assess them. Now, I don't know if the aforementioned five songs (Water Confines, Roll the Fire, Silent Crying, Parallel Minds, Silver Shine) are better than the others or merely I have listened to them hundreds of times, but they are still my faourite ones. My Decision and The Promiser are also favourites of mine, Wolf's Lair is OK but I still don't get Soliloquy. Almost 30 years later I noticed the spectacular spectrum of Roy Khan's voice, the occasional tasty usage of odd-meter changes to breathe new interest into a song, the wonderful atmosphere that they keyboards provide (although they play nothing but pads), the technical playing of Tore Østby, the smart lyrics. The album sounds still fresh to my ears and has nothing to do with the cookie-cutter power metal albums they were coming out in droves. I don't know what happened in other countries, but Conception were on almost every metal fan's lips here in Greece. The future looked wonderful for the band, although the Greek author was exaggerating a bit.

Not an excellent addition to ANY prog rock music collection, but most fans of prog metal (or at least metal fans who prefer their metal a bit more adventurous) will find something interest to engage them for a long time.