FORSAKEN INNOCENCE

DRIFTING SUN is an interesting band that's drifted around for quite a while now. Ironically formed in England but consists of Frenchmen and Americans who happened to meet in London and channel their musical mojo into a collective cauldron of creativity. The band has actually had two renditions, the original short stink in the 90s and then after a long hiatus returned in 2015 and has been on the nonstop neo-prog express ever since. After a two year break DRIFTING SUN has returned with its seventh studio album FORSAKEN INNOCENCE which proves to be one of the band's best efforts yet.

While the lineup of DRIFTING SUN has "drifted" over the years, keyboardist and leader Pat Sanders has consistently reinvented the band with each rotating cast of musicians and with FORSAKEN INNOCENCE finds the current lineup of John Kosmidis (vocals, keyboards), Mathieu Spaeter (guitars), John Jowitt of Rain on bass, ZIO's Jimmy Pallagrosi on drums and a special appearance from Gandalf Fist's Ben Bell who provides a Hammond keyboard solo on "Dementium." Add to that a couple extra guest musicians adding more guitars and violin and FORSAKEN INNOCENCE turns out to be a true treat of a musical experience.

FORSAKEN INNOCENCE truly delivers everything that's great lurking about in the neo-prog universe. While it's a given that this is the more pop hook friendly section of the prog universe, sometimes neo-prog can be too cheesy for its own good or just not melodically pleasing which is the whole point! Sanders crafts his melodic piano rolls into fully fueled compositions that offer the mellower side of the subgenre in the vein of albums like Marillion's "Misplaced Childhood" that craft soft sensual balladry styled hooks with emotive lyrical delivers. The album opens with the feisty "King Of The Country" which offers some of the 21st century neo-prog tendencies of adding heavy rock guitar riffs however while many neo-prog bands tend to offer an all or nothing approach to this inclusion, DRIFTING SUN picks and chooses its tones, timbres and compositional fortitude wisely thus making this a diverse sounding album.

For the entire album's hour plus run, each track is fortified with strong catchy hooks and almost folky fueled musical scales that offer a bit of traditional sounds that are buried within the easily accessibility of the tunes. Alternating between emotive piano runs and heavier rock passages, DRIFTING SUN does a stellar job in mixing the expected neo-prog attributes of heavy multi-layered keyboard contrapuntal melodies with both sweeping atmospheric guitar soloing as well power chord chugs. The highlights include the opening "King Of The Country" as well as the 2-part title track that together swallows up nearly 25 minutes of the album's running time. The lengthy double whammy effortlessly transitions from countless emotive slower parts to thundering semi-metal bombast with swarms of synth layers and knotty progressive rock time signature workouts.

All in all, DRIFTING SUN has crafted an outstanding roller coaster ride of a neo-prog album with ridiculously competent musicianship testing the limits of the subgenre's accepted boundaries. The band seamlessly transitions from soft lush airy pastoral segments to raucous rock and metal at the drop of a hat. The lengthier tracks where the band is allowed to improvise over the beautifully crafted melodies are where this band shines but even John Kosmidis' vocals bring a dark undertone to the whole thing and much like the album cover art sounds like a dark depressing album that is illuminated by the colorful melodies and brilliant craftsmanship. Definitely not a cheesy neo-prog album by any means. More adventurous and daring than anything Arena, IQ or Pendragon have done. Most like Magenta at its finest feisty moments. A true surprise for sure and i hope this particular lineup sticks around to craft a followup. This will certainly be in my top 10 prog list for 2021.