A SENSE OF CHANGE

I don't understand why I have such a hard time enjoying this album. Everything about points to something I absolutely adore, yet every time I give it a go, I fill like I'm ramming a pill down my throat when I try not to press the stop button out of boredom and a general feeling of discomfort in my gut. The material in the album is often compared to Rush, and rightfully so. The distorted chorus-effect guitar and melodic bass scream almost too loudly the Rush influence. The drumming is really very fusion-ish in spirit, albeit on the technical side. Odd meter and meter changes abound throughout the album, reminding me of some later tech metal groups such as Blotted Science. These elements are some of my favorite elements that can be found in any music, period (as Rush is my favorite band and probably always will be), and they're all right here in this album. Which is exactly what puzzles me, this really should be one of my favorite albums of all time. I've listened to it several times in the attempt for it to "click," which usually happens around the fourth or fifth listen, but every time I come back to it it just leaves me cold.

I think the main reason for this is that, while I'm listening, I can't help but think through almost the entire album a few burning questions, "where exactly is this music going? Where do all of these notes, meter changes, and complicated structures lead to? What point and purpose are these musicians getting to with this madness?" Sadly, the answer to these questions always pops into my head as I listen to the album right now: nowhere. It's just a bunch of complicated quasi-Rush-rip-off composition with no real direction or meaning, to be brutally honest. Even the album as a whole has little cohesiveness to it, it seems like a bunch of tracks assorted to create an album with little thought on how the album as a whole would sound.

Though Rush certainly isn't the only influence for this band. The singing is much like that of Fates Warning, only this vocalist's tone bothers me even more, almost as if he has an orange stuck in the back of this mouth or something. He's a pretty good vocalist in all fairness as far as competence, but I just personally dislike his tone. Psychotic Waltz is another band that comes to mind as an influence, as some of the other reviewers have pointed out.

Though this album certainly has its good, in fact very pleasant moments, mainly when the band drops all of the complicated electric stuff and turns to acoustic instruments. The track Change of Seasons is really a wonderful track for this reason, especially the nice intro with the strings and acoustic guitar. I only wish there were more of these moments, as right after the track we go right back to the directionless Rush sounding material.

I can't stand it when I see reviewers give negative reviews on albums that seem so obviously masterpiece quality to me, but I suppose I've come to sympathize with them now, for this album seems to have collected many starry reviews. There is VERY little prog I ever encounter that I dislike, I can only think of three or four bands that I have many complaints about of the hundreds I've encountered on this site. I guess I might try some of this band's later material, from what I hear it's quite different from this, so I'll give them another shot. But as for this album, while I have much respect for the complexity of the writing and the strong Rush influence, I'm quite terribly disappointed with this album.

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