Classic Dutch Prog & Neo Prog

PHILHELMON      If Rembrandt represented the Golden Age of Dutch Art, then Philhelmon are yet another representation of the Golden Age of Dutch Prog, which we're lucky enough to be currently living through, so Enjoy It While It Lasts. 

PEDAL POINT    Every once in a while, an album comes along that sounds like nothing you've ever heard before, and this is it! Just file it under "Progressive".  You don't have to be of a religious disposition to enjoy this devotional album, but it certainly helps. If you hear shades of Focus in the music of Pedal Point, then you won't be surprised to learn this one-off album features none other than Thijs Van Leer. And just in case you wondered, "Dona Nobis Pacem" is Latin for "Give Us Peace" - something worth remembering the next time I listen to a Death Metal album, which isn't very often. 

PAT COOL      Cool Jazz from the Netherlands and it doesn't come much cooler than Pat Cool, with a remarkable basso profundo singer by the name of Gé Titulaer, who sounds like a bizarre cross between Tom Jones and Scott Walker - and I have No Regrets in making that comparison. All I know is I like it, like it, Yes I do, and I hope you do too. 

  1973: Pat Cool - Daybreak - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqAtEal0zMQ

ORPHEO     A Heavy Prog crew with Echoes of Ayreon and blessed with the beautiful siren-song call of Wendelin Visser who no doubt would've lured sailors to their doom in Past Days to Come. 

OCEANA COMPANY     A Dutch shipping company who are ploughing on full-steam ahead with a cargo-load of Heavy Prog. Hard hats and hi-vis jackets are required although ear defenders are optional. 

NOVOX       Not a brand of bath salts, but a band of instrumental neo-proggers from the land of tulips and windmills. 

NOVATIA      Here's a novelty worth Discovering... Novatia are a Crossover Prog band slipping into the groove somewhere between funky pop and prog-rock and sounding something like a Dutch Asia - if that makes any sense. 

NICE BEAVER      No sniggering.   This Eclectic Prog band are a very Nice Beaver indeed, with three albums jam-packed full of dramatic key changes and percussive power chords. Nice Beaver deliver everything you could ask for in a prog album - in spades! To paraphrase Roger Moore, when one is in Holland, one should delve deeply into its treasures, so why not indulge yourselves with some Nice Beaver. 

NAPALIS     Not the place where the tomatoes come from, but an obscure Jazz Fusion band from The Netherlands who are not quite so obscure any more.