INVENTION OF KNOWLEDGE

Multiple times when listening to Flower Kings I felt: if only Jon Anderson would sing, he would greatly enhance the quality of the song... Finally my wish came true! Of course, to truly appreciate this piece and understand every bit of it, I had to give it at least 5 listens, which nowadays isn't an easy task considering how many other albums are thrown out at us in such a short time period! But it was worth every bit of it! So many wonderful parts were waiting to be discovered, even took me far enough to shed some tears in the end, which for me is the requirement to be able to give 5 stars to an album. I will leave the analysis of the songs to the professionals, I will just point out a couple of personal opinions: - In Yes songs, after lenghty instrumental parts the outburst of Jon Andersons voice always came as a revelation... maybe in this album it would've also raise the "tension" if there would be more instrumental parts (which were amazing all throughout the album!) - The 2 backing musicians: Daniel Gildenlow & Nad Sylvan could've brought a unique brilliance to the music if they would've been allowed to shine at least for a couple of seconds. - I would listen to a whole album of Roine Stolts amazing soundscape (maybe influenced by Stewe Howe himself?)... I'm hoping my wish would come true in the future. 4.5 stars rounded to 5, with respect to these monuments of Progressive Rock who offered me many pleasant hours spent listening to them!