BANKS OF EDEN

First I have to reluctantly admit this is a well produced and musically well done work. This is the Swedish symphonic group The Flower Kings's eleventh studio album and it was released last year an featured the musicians Roine Stolt (guitar, voice), Hasse Fröberg (guitar, voice), Jonas Reingold (bass). Tomas Bodin (keyboards) and Felix Lehrmann (drums). The record contains five tracks of whom 33 minutes is the same composition (Numbers+Rising the Imperial) which starts and concludes the album. I hav'nt heard the bonus tracks, they could be good but I'm not so hardcore.

"Numbers" is a long and good symphonic work with winding keyboards and guitars. A lot of themes are repeated hear but it's not a problem and sometimes it's a really good track. The instruments are perfectly fused together. But I am not found of Stolt's voice, yes it's clear but to American, I prefer British English. "For the love of Gold" has a great intro that comes back som times but the vocal parts aren't so interesting. Swedish people hear a piece of the children televsion show "Bamse" (The World's strongest bear". "Pandemonium" also has a good intro and the play is skilled. "For those about to drown" is the record's best track with wonderful melody, good vocals and a interesting text which gets me thinking of Beatles' "Cry baby cry". It alse feels like som folk tendencies here. Last track "Rising the imperial" is a good closer with a theme we know from "Numbers". The last track is calm and harmonic.

In summary this is a talanted group which can make good symphonic rock and this record is very well produced and I am convinced many people will love it. But for me it feels repetitive and not especially progressive. Unfortunately this feels like a pale copy of better prog music from the 70s. This is not boring at all, and also good, but I have hard to relate to it. I rate this 3,5 and to calm my conscience I give this three stars. This is not as good as many records I have given four stars. Roine Stolt's band Kaipa sounded very unique in the seventies. This is better than nowadays' Kaipa but don't match the seventies' prog.