IF

I listened to this album in it's entirety today, alone and undistracted on one of my spare free hours. What can I say, it's indeed so very much like Yes, with a pinch of Genesis, some obscure synth sauce making it juicy, played perfectly straight till the last note. Still I can't but help but like it nevertheless. It's lot better than some of their other work, but first let me tell you in what order I got to know this band. Note that I didn't follow their albums chronologically.

First album I bought was Chronometree which I absolutely adore to this very day (even the weird vocalist) I personally consider this one of the best of GH albums I own, it's quirky nd I don't know what it is I like about it. Then I got a hand on Perelandra which wasn't for me really, I felt that the album dragged along with no real ''Bang'' to it. Next one in my possession was ''Three cheers for the broken hearted'' which made me oh so sad, I found it poppy and bland and the female vocals really annoyed me. Then I came across ''Journey of the Dunadan'', I like Tolkien, I liked GH, so nothing wrong there (although I must admit that it's clearly a debut album, promising more to come). Then I got to The Middle Earth Album......erm, I think I played it once, the last track I ripped to my MP3 Player....says enough....ewwww! Lex Rex was somewhat of a letdown for me, no return to the conceptalbum Chronometree proved to be, the female vocalists annoyed me still, especially the clearly computer racked parts! But the guys of GH redeemed hemselves completewly when I bought ''Shadowlands'' which became the numer two GH album for me that ranked in the top 10 play list of that year, and I still feel it's a fine, somewhat rougher and more daring effort on GH's behalf in playing virtuoso Prog with epic long songs, and guess what, the female voices don't bother me on this one because somehow they fit. (I still don't like computer tracked voices, there's no excuse for any artist to ever use this technique aside from the fact that you can't sing propperly without singing off key, period) Last in line for me was ''If'' just this week in 2010......and yeah, I like it, I like it a lot. I have to be honest when I say that I do think that this band plays too tight sometimes, but that's my opinion. This album has it's share of rigid moments, when it´s so tight that it almost feels unhuman. Nevertheless, the virtuosity of these guys IS impeccable, the Jon Anderson voice works for me since I am a huge Yes fan, although Jon Davison (my god, even the name sounds alike) clearly has to find the bends in his falsetto, in order to make it a little more exciting to listen to his superb voice......I wonder what would happen if Benoit Davis sang this one....oooh! Still, although it sounds as Yes it is no Yes, it's diet Yes, and then again it's neither really typically GH, so in that respect I must agree with one of the people reviewing this before me, guys of GH, when you are this good, then why copy another band that's so prolific and well known....you guys are capable of so, so much more.... do that and stick with it.

All in all, I review this as an excellent addition to any prog rock music collection, it's quality and easy listenable and worth you money and time. I like it and I'm sure it'll grow on me more after a listen or two, which I'm about to start now.