SERPENTS IN CAMOUFLAGE

In the early Nineties I joined the acclaimed but late Dutch progrock paper SI Magazine. This album was the first release from their label SI Music that I was allowed to review.

The first track "Stab in the back" (7 minutes, one of the shortest tracks!) features pleasant and melodic symphonic rock with Peter Gabriel-like vocals, keyboards in the vein of Tony Banks and Mark Kelly (especially the quick synthesizer runs) and guitarplay with strong echoes from Steve Hackett, Mike Holmes and Steve Rothery. I enjoyed the music but in my opinion the vocals are a bit too omnipresent. This is also the case in the next three songs "Liquid kings", "Harmless criminal" and "The gathering": lots of fine guitars and keyboards, unfortunately because of the extensive lyrics too often my attention slips away. But the following "Dance of the unicorn is a strong and varied track featuring delicate flute and ecxellent guitarwork with hints from Mike Holmes. The final composition (on my SI Music version, this CD was later re-released with bonus-tracks by the UK label Cyclops) is their best one with a great buiild-up and a splendid 'grand finale'. The music strongly evokes Genesis (keyboards) and early Marillion (compelling climates) but the propulsive and moving guitarplay is in the vein of again Mike Holmes.

If you want to dream away on the good old days from Genesis and Marillion and you are not too critical, this is a very pleasant album that sounds like "Selling England for a jester's tear!"