KANSAS

This album is probably the most under appreciated of all of their works. I do not even begin to understand why some people say they were not prog until SoA. It does get off to a bit of a rocky start with two catchy but fairly typical (albeit good) southern rock songs and a ballad. After that, the birth of brilliance in the American prog scene. Belexes is a really nice hard rock tune with a really original sound and some really good and tight sounding musicianship. The production suffers here a little but I can't fault them for something they had no control over. Maybe not 100% prog, but definitely about 66% at least. Then we have Journey from Mariabronn. After hearing this song it quickly became one of my favorites. It's much more fast paced and frantic than later Kansas Opi and Walsh really cuts loose with those awesome vocals for the first time. The way the violin and synth play off each other is near perfection. Next is a really neat short track dominated by organ and group vocals, while having a really nice midwestern sound to it which foreshadows the prog/rock fusion that they would become so loathed/beloved for. Next is Apercu, another long track (slower this time) with a distinctive Asian flavor. Not as good as Mariabronn, but still pretty cool. This track then transforms into the Death of Mother Nature Suite. Some refer to this as the masterpiece of this album. I save that one for Mariabronn, but this is still a pretty awesome tree-hugging track with some really wicked guitar work by Livgren and Williams, as well as some very nice vocals by Steinhardt. So for a trackwise approach:

(3 + 3.5 + 2.5 + 4 + 5 + 4.5 + 4.5 + 4.5)/8=3.93

This album really was amazing for an American band in the midwest, and one on the Kirschner label no less. So the overall sound of the album to me is a 4.5.

Averaging 4.5 and 3.93 (or the subjective and the analytical), the total album score is rounded to 4.