OVERGROUND MUSIC

This album is very impressive to me and even though this band is considered symphonic prog, I'd rather call this album as eclectic or avant-garde in nature. I have known After Crying for so long and have listened to some of their later albums. Only recently I got a chance to have this album and was impressed at first spin for two things: music composition and sonic production - all of them are excellent. Why do I stress on composition? It's merely due to the facts that the overall album do not sound to produce what is so called "catchy" melodies. Well, I know that this is very subjective. A friend of mine who has not been posed yet to prog commented that Genesis' "Firth of Fifth" is not catchy while to me it's so catchy.

Impressive debut album!

The good thing about this album is how dynamic each song in the album in terms of tempo as well as style changes. There are different time signatures in even the shortest segment of the music. The opening track "European Things (Hommage à Frank Zappa) « (8:27) demonstrates exactly what I mean. Observe how the time signatures change quite frequently throughout the song while the melody is sacrificed. However, with the lack of melody, you can enjoy the music with the harmonies among instruments and vocals produce throughout the song. As the title implies, this is definitely a Zappa music interpreted uniquely by the band. The use of string section and piano combined with energetic singing is wonderful. "Don't Betray Me" (3:02) is a mellow track with powerful vocal and piano as main rhythm section while trumpets accentuate the song. The ending part with cello / violins combined with trumpets is nice.

"Confess Your Beauty" (6:50) is probably a catchy song with nice piano work at the opening part followed by energetic singing. Again, the band demonstrates, despite this is a debut album, its maturity in music composition. The piano and string section combination plus piano solo and violin solo are all great. "Madrigal Love Part One" (2:14) shares similar vein with "Don't Betray Me", using piano and vocal as main component. ". ...to Black... "(5:05) according to my preference is a catchy song, sung beautifully by the lead vocalist. "Madrigal Love Part Two (Over Every Sea)" (3:00) brings the music into faster tempo with nice acapella followed by great piano work. "Madigral Love Part Free" (0:51) concludes the epic with piano and acoustic work followed with acapella in the vein of Gentle Giant. It flows wonderfully through great piano work to "Shining (...to the Powers of Fairyland)" (10:44) which features flute and female vocal. According to my book, this song is quite catchy in its melody line as well as the rhythm section by piano as well as string section. The solo section in the middle of the track using brass instruments followed by high register notes female vocal singing has made me rating this track with a true five-star.

Overall, this album is more avant-garde in nature than a symphonic one. Yes, I agree that the band uses many symphonic instruments like string section and piano but the way the music flows, it sounds to me more into eclectic type of music. One thing for sure this album is very intense with classical music components. So, if you love classical music, you might love this album as well. Four and half stars rating. Highly recommended. Keep on proggin' ..!

Peace on earth and mercy mild - GW (i-Rock! Music Community)