THE BORDER OF AWARENESS

Arne Schafer the singer / guitarist for VERSUS X goes solo and calls his project APOGEE. He composes, arranges and performs all the songs on his own. Yes he is a multi- instrumentalist. The drums are programmed, and the mellotron are samples. His vocals remind me a little of Andy Tillison's.

"The Border of Awareness" starts off sounding like a 60's Psychedelic tune for the first 2 minutes with reserved vocals and acoustic guitar. The song then changes to a full sound with some great keyboard work and mellotron too. "Falling Up The Stairs" opens with spacey synths as some beautiful guitar melodies come in reminding me of Fripp at times. Lots of tempo changes in this song, too many to go through this song step by step.The guitar, keys and mellotron are all fantastic ! "In The Dark" opens with acoustic guitar and soft vocals. The keyboard melody is great and so are the waves of mellotron. There is some intricate guitar playing that goes on and on. Nice.

"Hide & Seek" opens with odd sounding keys before acoustic guitar and vocals take over. They are eventually joined by drums and guitar. Some amazing guitar 5 minutes in. "Circumstance" is an atmospheric song with lots of mellotron. It is by far the shortest song on the album at just over 4 minutes in length. "The Range Of Matter" is almost 24 minutes long and it's a ride. The intro is haunting as synths and Gilmour like guitar solos come in. Fragile vocals follow as this song changes moods often. Lots of atmospheric passages. A tasteful guitar solo 13 minutes in. Lots of guitar later as well.

I like this album although it's a little too long in my opinion.

Thanks to my dear friend BW. that he told me about Apogee. Listened right after Syshiphos, one can't resist to compare these two. This one, or other one, ermmm... this one is worse. Not so much, but it crosses imaginary line between 4-|+|-5 stars.

I don't see so strong composition here, catchy melodies, instruments handled so well. It's probably because of this is his first album, but who knows. Maybe there are other, weird reasons. Maybe I'm just tired after first one, but that shouldn't be problem. Few guitar solos, clear vocals, in general same things as in Syshipos are here, but I don't like it so much. Maybe it's silly, but I see it in that way.

Apogee is a solo project of Versus X-guitarist Arne Schäfer,a dedicated Classic Prog fan.While playing in various bands and eventually finding his Ithaca on Versus X,Arne was composing and recording his own material on a two-track tape.Meeting the guys on Musea through his regular band,Arne sent them his self-produced material and so Apogee was born.Musea decided to release Apogee's first solo output under the title ''The Border of Awareness'' in 1995,a year after Versus X self-titled debut, containing material Arne wrote between 1989 and 1994.

The German musician (and professional chemist) handles all bass,guitars and keyboards,sings and uses drum samples on this album,which contains four long numbers of Classic Prog-influenced music along with a short one.While I will pass by Arne's voice,which is decent but a bit accented,I won't do the same with the more than fine musicianship.The tracks are full of great guitar work,grandiose keyboard passages,sudden breaks,mellow moments and atmospheric passages to fullfill every prog fan's dream.Influences are diverse but definitely through the Classic Prog era: GENESIS, YES, KING CRIMSON, VAN DER GRAAF GENERATOR, PINK FLOYD and the list goes on.And while Arne is a more than talented guitarist as we know them from Versus X,he surprisingly prooves to be an excellent keyboardist as well.I do not know his exact equipment but I can detect sounds from organ,moog synths and church organ among the common digital synths used,which make his work trully varied. Orchestral passages, spacey synths, organ solos, even electronic soundscapes are some of the great instrumental parts you can listen to ''The Border of Awareness''.And Arne achieved to keep a good balance between the vocal-based parts and the dramatic instrumental music on this.

While ''The Border of Awareness'' will never find itself among the personal and original releases of progressive rock,it is certainly a great album, defining the meaning of progressive rock and offering long cuts of impressive and intricate music.Strongly recommended...3.5 stars.