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Roine Stolt - Wall Street Voodoo CD (album) cover

WALL STREET VOODOO

Roine Stolt

 

Symphonic Prog

3.56 | 155 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

The Quiet One
Prog Reviewer
3 stars Back in the World of Blues

Roine's latest solo offering, Wall Street Voodoo, is no less than a fantastic return to the 70's classic rock style, where blues and hard rock are the prime exponents. This is something that Roine hadn't attempted for a entire album till this moment, however notable The Flower Kings songs like Paradox Hotel and Life Will Kill You are indicators of how the style of this album is, nothing alike their Prog-oriented stuff even if the songs in here are moderately long.

The line-up, like any line-up where Roine has been, is no less than highly efficient and capable of backing up what Roine has written for them to play. Mind you that having Neal Morse on board doesn't mean there'll be anything in the likes of either Spock's Beard, his solo stuff or Transatlantic. Wall Street Voodoo is a Roine Stolt original.

Roine's guitar is the main attraction, going through various tones and styles, yet all sounding very impressive like Mr. Flower King always manages to pull-off. The other attraction are the songs of course, but not a real attraction for Prog-fans, they're all either blues based or hard rock based songs which don't present odd time signatures nor flashy change of times, neither mind-blowing solos from any kind of instrument, neither there are epics, no, leave that for The Flower Kings. Wall Street Voodoo works as either a chilling rock album when you have experienced a Prog-overdose, or as a good rocking album to rock-out with. However with the already highlighted guitar by Roine you know this will not be any blues rock record, also keyboard players Neal, but specially Slim Pothead, have a lot to offer, using all vintage keyboards like the Hammond Organ and Mellotron all in a efficient and attractive way to sound the most 70's sounding as possible.

Delving a bit deeper about the songs, there's really no stand-out track since all of them are equally well composed, despite some might have catchier chorus' than others, or harder guitar riffs, but that's really something each listener will decide depending on their taste, unlike the objectiveness of the well written and played songs which cannot be questioned.

A solid effort that shows that Prog-artists can really pull-off other styles well, even if it's not outstanding. Wall Street Voodoo ends up being a nice crossover between Prog-alike-instruments and Blues/Hard Rock roots, which I recomended for 70's rock fans in general which like their rock focused on the guitar however with not predictable instrumentation. However if you're a Prog fan and looking for the best of Roine, either his own band The Flower Kings or his solo album, The Flower King, should be the ones to check out.

The Quiet One | 3/5 |

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