OUT OF MYSELF

This Polish progressive metal band has released an amazing debut album in late 2003/early 2004. It is indeed, as the sticker on the front of the cd says, "a mixture of PORCUPINE TREE, PINK FLOYD and ANATHEMA". I think they missed out on forgetting to mention OPETH, but that is just my own opinion...

The CD starts with muted radio sounds, before the twelve minutes lasting epic opener The same River really takes of, wandering through spacey synthesizer spheres accompanied by some very subtle guitar licks and bass lines. This song is mostly instrumental and can somehow been described as bringing tribute to the British psychedelic/space rock band PINK FLOYD, but not sounding like a copy of them at all! Perhaps this is the sound of a modern day Pink Floyd? The song features some very weird effected/sampled vocal lines. The song features many changes in direction. It has a space rock side to it as well as a (progressive) metal side. After about seven (!) minutes in the vocals start. These vocals are very warm and gentle. The best part of the song I think is the last couple of minutes. It features a very melancholic part with some nice laidback guitar work, which is followed by an amazing one minute long guitar solo, which ends the song. This song is worth buying the album by itself!

What I noticed right from the start is that this album is well produced. I have never heard all the individual instruments this clear before on ANY CD. Even the bass guitar is well present, in a pleasant way. Normally this instrument is hardly noticeable; here it is featured as a 'leading' instrument on itself.

Track 2 Out of myself features a variety of vocals. The warm voice is omnipresent and again nice to listen to, but even the rare scream that comes to attention is enjoyable. It totally fits the song. The synthesizer is worth a special mention here. It makes some techno-like sounds throughout the whole song! It gives the song this little extra touch and it worked out for me. It is a highly unusual sound for this type of music. The instrumental metal parts between the sung verses are extremely well done!

The next song is called I believe. It starts with the sound of a bunch of people talking before the acoustic guitar comes in to play. This song is very mellow and relaxing. A lovely ballad that has the same kind of atmosphere as any of the songs on OPETH's 2003 album "Damnation". The vocals are very warm and gentle. A lovely ballad and I just know anyone will instantly like it.

The first one of two instrumentals is called Reality Dream. The song starts with the ticking of a clock and some weird synthesizers. Than the metal begins. Aggressive guitars begin to play assisted by a very spacey synthesizer solo. The bass is very well present on this song (throughout the whole album actually) and it's very well played. About halfway through there's this nice guitar solo. This is one of the album's highlights. All the band members are present and are showing the listener how good they are (not in a DREAM THEATER way, thus meaning they're NOT playing more than four different melodies on EACH of the instruments at the SAME time, just to show off, they simply, well. ARE brilliant musicians).

Loose Heart was the first song I ever heard by Riverside. I heard it through the ProgArchives.com website and instantly loved it. It is a very well thought out musical idea. The first ¾ of the song consists of sophisticated mainstream-orientated pop/rock with warm synthesizer sounds. Not aggressive by far, until the last minute then the metal part comes in, with shouting by the vocalist. The vocals on this track are very nice and gentle even the screaming is fitting the song. It's a very well thought out part of the song. The song features some nice guitar solos.

A drum solo kicks of the start of the album's second instrumental song, Reality Dream II. The song contains samples of a telephone. I could easily copy-past the description of Reality Dream I for this one, because they're both well-played instrumentals, the only major difference being that part II is a bit quieter than part I.

In two Minds starts with effected vocals, accompanied by a relative simple, but good acoustic guitar. The chorus is very nice and shows again what kind of variety of vocals this album features. The electric guitar is again well present and gives us a very nice solo halfway through the song.

The song starts with some laidback sounds, until the electric guitar begins to shine. This is the intro to The Curtain falls, probably the best intro on the whole album... I absolutely love it. The song features some nice solos by each instrument. The vocals sound a lot like OPETH's Mikael Äkerfelt's. That is definitely a major compliment. The instrumental parts in this song are pretty heavy but still maintain that laidback feeling I had while listening throughout the whole album.

The closing track OK is very laidback. It's a very melancholic and dark ballad. The drum is very cool and groovy but not fast or heavy at all. This song is like the opposite of all the other tracks on the album. It features a trombone, which is a very nice addition to the whole package. The vocals are very nice to listen to and can calm a man down. The chorus is very nice and dark. There could not be a better way to close the album, than with this marvellous track.

Overall I would not consider this album to be progressive metal, for the same reasons that make PORCUPINE TREE no progressive metal. The album has its heavier parts, but the atmospheric space rock side is more present and the majority of the album is mellow and softer.

This album was in my top 3 of 2004 releases and I can really recommend it to all of you that like: Pink Floyd, Porcupine Tree and Opeth.

(I might even have detected a couple of PAIN OF SALVATION influences throughout the whole album.)

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