TALES FROM TOPOGRAPHIC OCEANS

To most of the people The Ritual is the best track of this album...I disagree. Side one is far more better.both tracks are very much listenable,they both have the peak of the song in the right place-at the very end :) a lot of fragments are repeated-some people find that boring and unnecessery,but those are the ones that don't understand classical way of composition.It has it's meaning and psychological effect,I assure you...Side two is questionable-the Ancient is totally weird (for me ,at least). I don't listen to it anymore,it makes me nervous... If I really have to,I skip to Leaves of green- a nice acoustic elfish part of the song-a total contrast to the first part! And The Ritual...well...it's ok,but whole that dark magic stuff in the midlle...what for?! it could have been a nice ballad-single..I can't see it in a range of an epic...Hey,but that's me.Who am I to argue Yes...Nous sommes du Soleil...:) THE GOOD: The whole first side,the leaves of green,fantastic cover by Roger Dean,the idea of Jon Anderson,the playing from every member in the band THE BAD: The noise of the Ancient,the noise of the Ritual,global result of Anderson's idea,AND what's most important-the fact that this album displeased mr. Rick Wakeman and made him leave the band(for the first time:)) CONCLUSION:Anderson made up all that lyrics,so the band had to put it in music,the result-4 (questionable) epics...hm --If I had the chance to put Tales together, it would look something like this: 1. Revealing science of god (the same song) 2. Leaves of green (edited) 3. High the memory (the same song) 4. Nous sommes du soleil (edited) --this way,it has two epics and nice (edited) ballads between them...it would be much more listenable,and it would sell better.hehe 4 stars-excellent addition to any prog music collection...(I would give it 5 stars,just because of those who hate Tales,but in this edition...it's not really a masterpiece) Farewell,farewell...