DOOMSDAY AFTERNOON

This Phideaux album receives impressive rounds of applause and lots of enthusiastic cheering, but while I generally like Phideaux's music, this one completely fails to impress me. Quite the contrary, it is one of those cases of wallpaper prog that makes me turn my back on the whole 'modern' prog thing.

Doomsday Afternoon continues the songwriter focus of the preceding Great Leap, but where that album at least rocked out a bit, we only get inoffensive folksy pop on this one. The album never reaches the level of musical competency and creative bliss that Phideaux's strongest album Chupacabras had. It's harmless background music, guaranteed not to cause a ripple in the campfire cosiness of your long winter evenings.

It takes almost half the album till the Floydian Thank You For The Evil does a first try to catch the listener's attention. It's a solid composition driven by acoustic guitars and bright keyboards. Nothing original but it sets down a great spacey mood. But that's it, what follows is another sequence of uninteresting ballads dressed up with orchestrated arrangements, buzzing synth clichés and sentimental pop vocals. Especially the female vocals are very formulaic and highly disappointing.

There's nothing really wrong with this album and that's exactly what is totally wrong with it. It's safe, tame and predictable. I want music to be adventurous, truthful and creative. But you won't find much of that behind the watered-down prog stance of this album.