A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A UNIVERSAL WANDERER

A long way from their Pink Floyd inspired debut Road to Darkness, this is a full blown prog fest, following on from last years excellent From A Point of Existence, they have taken the multi layered track format and gone epic!!

So the story, as with every Gandalf's Fist album, there is a concept, this one being transmissions from a distant spaceship, a long way from home.

The intro is straight out of a blockbuster, Morgan Freeman style narration, setting the scene. This ends with a long metallic beeping, which leads into Nine Billion Names of God, creepy vocals, very dark and gloomy, then a layered and slightly alien sounding chorus. Instrumentals as always are amazing, a flute and great guitars. With a Sax solo in the middle, great track.

Next comes Stowaway to the Mushroom Planet, by far my favourite track on the album, it's immense, the chorus with female and male vocals combining is awesome, its catchy as hell, trust me you'll be singing this one for a while.

Next is an interlude, Somewhere beyond the stars, No male vocals on this, a classic piano ballad, beautiful vocals and a great little guitar riff in the middle, on any other album it would seem out of place, but Gandalf's fist always seem to put something a little different on their albums and it works great.

Orphans of the sky comes after this, again a creepy riff straight out of a horror movie, the track has a mix of great music and great vocals, again this is very catchy, it drifts into a Deep Purple style instrumental wander, before launching back into the chorus.

Back to Morgan Freeman, with more narration, Maze of Corridors is almost an homage to War of the Worlds, a mix of music and narration, it carries on the story, and links the album together, it ends with a great guitar riff, almost Iron Maiden.

A Universal Wanderer is a multi layered vocal almost metal track, there's elements of prog in here, yet Gandalf's fist are almost forging ahead with their own style, they're not trying to be anyone!!

This continues with the next track, Nexus a change of vocal styles, with a mix of male and female, beautiful female chorus, a failing of previous albums could have been said that the vocals were weak, not so on this album, I'm sure there are about 4 or 5 unique vocal styles. Nexus ends with a welcome return of the saxophone from Nine billion names of god.

North of the wall comes next, a simple guitar led tune, the shortest track on the album with almost folky elements to it. good stuff. With more Morgan Freeman narration.

Continuing the folky theme, is the Battle for Tanhauser gate, again a mix of Female and Male vocals, it's almost Led Zeppelin in style and has an epic guitar led outro.

Finally The wanderer goes South, is a classic Gandalf's Fist track, i.e. it's fairly mental, it starts with a flute solo and mixes a female vocal with a male chorus, it also has a reprise of Billion Names of God right at the end, rounding off a roller-coaster Prog Rock journey,

This album has everything, a mix of vocals, a mix of instruments and a fair bit of lunacy, which is central to any good Prog Rock album,

If you haven't heard of Gandalf's Fist, Now might be a good time to take notice.

Share this GANDALF'S FIST review

Social review comments () BETA

---

---

Review related links

• Send comments to Rushfan47
• Report this review (#1053157)
• Buy GANDALF'S FIST music online with PA partners
• Show all GANDALF'S FIST MP3/Stream
• Go to GANDALF'S FIST page for videos, full discography with ratings, reviews and much more
• Go to A Day in the Life of a Universal Wanderer page for more details, where to buy and ratings/reviews
• Search the Forum for GANDALF'S FIST related discussions