FLUID DRUID

Every once in a while, when I am exploring the more far-flung reaches of the progressive universe, I find an album that I had never heard of back in the day that sticks with me. Fluid is such an album. Somehow I find it memorable and keep coming back to it. Not necessarily because of it's progginess, but just because I think the music is good and tastefully executed for the most part.

The first thing that struck me about the album was the vocalist. He's good, but he sounds eerily like Dennis DeYoung of Styx. So eerily that it surprised me that Druid was recording before DeYoung really took over Styx's direction. That some of these tracks have the grand sweep of those operatic ballads DeYoung loved to crank out helps support the similarity.

Next I noticed the bass. Brewer is no Chris Squire from the same time period. He doesn't seek out complexity for complexity's sake, but what he does do is give Druid a very solid foundation on which to build, and those growling plodding notes he churns out penetrate through the music and really drive the instrumentals.

As for the keyboardist, he's well above average if not worshipful. Good but not great chops, and he gets some really nice varied sound textures out of his equipment. The same could be said of Dane's guitar although not with quite as much enthusiasm.

But it's the material that really distinguishes this album. These guys have transcended the material that they released on their first album. They fearlessly tread through the realms of both pop and prog, churning out the best parts of each as they play this series of songs. What results is a very good album that sticks in my mind, and given the high volume of varied music that I listen to, that is definitely a compliment. I strongly recommend this album to all prog fans. I feel you will find that it stacks up well against much more well known albums from the classic age of prog. 4 stars.