VOLUME TWO

Let's delve in, shall we? The track's opening, while rather hypnotizing, does over-stay its welcome a bit. At six-and-a-half minutes, it's something that you have to be in the mood for in order to fully enjoy or even tolerate. On subsequent listens of the track, the listener will want to skip the 6:24 mark where the body of the piece actually begins. The tune itself is an impressive collection of musical ideas, jumping all over the place from the airy first notes to over-the-top technical exercise-ness. While this in itself is not a bad thing, it does tend to seem slightly disjointed, as if Jim Haney put dozens of musical ideas back to back without a sense of overall cohesion. This doesn't leave much to grab on to as a listener, making the track feel very much like a jam that just so happens to have lots and lots of of syncopated unison parts. The musicianship it top notch, from the rock solid drumming from Don Taylor, Haney's awesome bass playing (he doesn't play lines, he just plays!), and Sean McDermott's fantastic guitar work which is highlighted in his five-plus minute solo. The piece is played incredibly tight, with no hesitation from any member. This is even more impressive due to the fact that all 29 minutes represent a single take! While the band does earn an incredible amount of audio street-cred for recording Volume 2 on analog tape, the music's fidelity is lacking. Apart from the bass guitar, the instruments have little definition. This is most audible in the drums which sit pretty far back in the mix, lost in the wash of cymbal crashes and hard hits on the hi hat. While I do understand the desire to keep something raw and pure in this age of over compression and the like, the tune does suffer from lack thereof. Overall, Volume 2 is an impressive body of work, as anything clocking in at 28:55 should be. However, it could be vastly improved by shaving off some minutes by tightening the arrangement. I'm excited to see where Perhaps goes, maybe and album with separate tracks? If the time between album one and two is anything to judge by, we'll know withing the next year. Rest assured, it's going to be a long but exciting one!

Well worth the listen.