RIVERSIDE

Polish band Riverside released their debut album 'Out of Myself' in late 2003, one of the very intriguing musical gems from the period of the early 2000s. This first taste of the band provides a fascinatingly soothing mixture of atmospheric rock with progressive elements and occasional metal leanings, all engulfed in a very melancholic, dark and even desperate atmosphere, sitting quite well what bands like Porcupine Tree, Marillion, or Pain of Salvation had been doing at the time. A great offering with plenty of memorable and intense tracks, 'Out of Myself' showcases an even wider range of influences, one of which has to be the more urban-style music of the 1990s, for example, as similar sounds are intelligently embedded all throughout the record. And this comes as no surprise, as band leader Mariusz Duda had been interested in Radiohead, Massive Attack and Dead Can Dance, all very appealing and inventive acts for their times.

Armed with such an array of influences as well as with a desire to put out a work that is impactful and memorable, one could see Riverside's debut album as one of the very brilliant atmospheric rock albums of the early 2000s, also displaying a tendency for a very lush heavy sound, as the band juggles between heavy and light quite engagingly. The record fits very well the overall dark and heavy musical zeitgeist, especially for what concerns progressive music, and the examples are many, including the albums released by the bands mentioned previously. Standout tracks are the 12-minute opening song 'The Same River', a great piece that sets a beautiful tone for the entire catalogue of Riverside, in my opinion, the heavier title track as well as the two parts of the 'Reality Dream' suite are quite satisfying, while the more cathartic pieces like 'Loose Heart' or 'OK' could hardly be overlooked. A splendid debut album, deservedly one of the most celebrated ones from 2003/04!

The sudden and painful death of guitarist Piotr Grudzinski in 2016 plunged Riverside into a bleak and uncertain outlook for the future. And with the thick feeling of that loss dominating the band's core, the Poles-turned-trio decided to develop a heartfelt musical mourning in honour of the absent companion with 'Wasteland' (2018), their seventh album.

'Wasteland' is a transitive hinge in Riverside's career, whose defeatist theme finds a representative correlate in its musical structure, saturated by atmospheres of deep distress driven by the introspective and melancholic voice of Mariusz Duda, as in the intimate "The Day After" with the a capella singing of the band's leader and the shuddering closing violin of guest Michal Jelonek, or in the plaintive 'Guardian Angel', a beautiful melody guided by Duda's acoustic guitars and Michal Lapaj's keyboards, or in the moving intensity of the hypnotic mid-tempo 'Lament' dramatised by its suffocating riffs (probably the best track on the album), or also in the desolate 'River Down Below' and the heartbreaking guitar solo by fellow guest Maciej Meller.

And although this gloom is a constant throughout the album, the band also reserves a space for not disconnecting from their hardened primal vein with the vertiginous 'Acid Rain' and the impulsive 'Vale of Tears', as well as for experimentation with the instrumental 'The Struggle for Survival' with similarities to Steven Wilson's more acidic Porcupine Tree, and with the westernised and synthesised 'Wasteland'.

Finally, 'The Night Before', the affable melody that Michal Lapag's naked piano builds, is the base for Duda to return with his voice to the mournful character of the beginning, and give an expected and disheartened closure to the album.

A new stage was beginning for the band, trying to readjust in the unexpected and challenging scenario that destiny had prepared for them, and 'Wasteland', without reaching the brilliance of the first works, is a very good new beginning.

3.5/4 stars

The debut album in 2004 of the Polish prog metal band Riverside is unparalleled. It's the talk of the town in the entire prog community and if you didn't get it; you can take it from me indiscriminately. Everything is right about the album. "Out of Myself" is full of lyrical melodies, intense atmospheres, controlled power and virtuoso efficiency. How beautiful music can be. Not too exuberant reviewer, Riverside has a kind of modesty in its expressions. Actually, you don't want to compare the band to anything, but that doesn't change the fact that you hear music on the cutting edge of Porcupine Tree and a dark Pink Floyd.

The album opens overwhelmingly with the epic The Same River that sweeps you of your feet in its first seven instrumental minutes with delicious guitar playing by Piotr Grudzinski. The drums of that other Piotr sound nice and loose with some dragging rolls or breaks, while the virtuoso bass guitar of Mariusz Duda takes you to another beautiful level. Meanwhile, the predominantly chord-like keys of Jacek Melnicki build up the tension and then move on to a vocal block of almost five minutes. The song ends with a glorious guitar melody that sounds so incredibly monumental that you start to wonder how long the band can keep up this level.

In the subsequent short title track they show you they can. Although the atmosphere is a lot grimmer, it is unmistakably the Riverside and nothing indicates that the show is over. That's not going to happen either, the band continues to fascinate until the end.

"Out Of Myself" has two quiet songs, I Believe and In Two Minds. They receive nice support from the acoustic guitar played by Mariusz Duda. I really like the melodic vocal line of In Two Minds, it sounds warm and deep. Duda makes a strong impression vocally anyway over the entire album. Sometimes his surreptitious singing is somewhat reminiscent of the way Tim Bowness (No-Man) sings, sometimes absolutely not, then it's more David Gilmour or something like that.

Speaking of the vocals: the album has a beautiful instrumental diptych, called Reality Dream. Especially the first part is of phenomenal proportions. Here the band frolics with neo-prog given the voluptuous keyboard and guitar moments. In this way, the song gets a blissful look towards Pendragon halfway through. The strength of this composition is that the typical Riverside characteristics are nowhere far away, as is very clear in the guitar-oriented second part.

The album also contains the rippling Loose Heart and the two sizzling closing songs The Curtain Falls and OK. Yet listening to this album since February 21, 2016 is no longer the same. On that date, guitarist Piotr Grudzinski died unexpectedly in his sleep of a cardiac arrest. It will always hurt to hear him play.

Orginally posted on www.progenrock.com

Riverside has become quite the household name in the prog rock community ever since their second record of Second Life Syndrome. While they may not be as big as Opeth, Dream Theater, Mastodon, and TOOL, Riverside had proved themselves as a pretty grand metal group from Poland. However, in recent years, I have felt they had become less of the giants they seemed to be in their heyday of the 2000s through mid 2010s, with their last really stellar release being Love, Fear and the Time Machine. Ever since, it has seemed they are playing a safety game, which has continued to their latest of ID.Entity, an album I thought was very disappointing. In fact, I can pinpoint where Riverside started to become less thrilling with their 2018 album of Wasteland.

This would be the first record without long time member Piotr Grudziński, who had been on guitar ever since their debut of Out Of Myself, before his tragic death in 2016. Before getting Maciej Meller of Quidam for ID.Entity, lead vocalist Mariusz Duda took up the mantle as lead guitarist for Wasteland.

While I may not find this album to be the best, I can see quite a number of good things on here. For one, I do enjoy the more mellower tracks of Guardian Angel, Lament, and River Down Below. While I may not think they reach the heights of Time Machine, I still really enjoy them, especially Lament. The more prog metal stuff like Acid Rain, Vale Of Tears, The Struggle for Survival, and the title track also do a good job. Mariusz ain't a bad guitarist by any stretch, creating very nice, and very moody strums and solos that have quite a lot of weight.

I also dig the production. I know some might find it a tad less grand in comparison to Second Life Syndrome or Anno Domini High Definition, but I think Wasteland does have some great mixing, especially within the more longer tracks.

However, speaking of such, I feel as though the tracks never really have all the right strengths for me to really love them. I do like them, but at the same time a lot of them feel weak in retrospect. After Love, Fear and the Time Machine, I was expecting the band to go into an opposite direction from their contemporaries of Porcupine Tree, going into a more contemporary prog limelight, moving away from prog metal, though I can respect Duda for not wanting Riverside to sound like Lunatic Soul. Even then, though, I feel like Wasteland should've been a great opportunity to expand the horizons, creating songs that were both a mix of the mellower contemporary stuff, with the hard edged prog metal. In a way, we did get that with Lament, but none of the tracks really explore such an idea. Either they are mellow and atmospheric art rock numbers, or they are heavy prog metal. The division kind of confuses and disappoints me, as it seemed like the perfect direction the band should've taken, especially with the longer tracks. Heck, I'd say it feels weird for their sound in general, as even before Time Machine, with their heavier, more prog metal oriented records they still managed to spice things up by getting more mellower at times. Look at the title track for Second Life Syndrome or Hybrid Times for example.

The band definitely feel very lost here. While I do not want to blame this on the death of Grudziński, as it feels wrong too, I think in a way his sad passing does play a part. I feel it's like a Syd Barrett leaving Pink Floyd situation. Both Riverside and Pink Floyd lost one of their founding guitarists, with Syd leaving due to drug abuse, and Piotr passing away, causing both bands to try and figure out what they could do from here. Unlike both though, where Pink Floyd decided to do things all weird and crazy with More and Ummagumma, Riverside sat within their own bubble, unmoving like a statue. Though in a world of prog, with nothing but movement, their statue was chipped away, further and further, creating two underwhelming albums, both playing a game of safety in numbers, with ID.Entity being probably their worst record in their catalog in my opinion.

I do hope Riverside can manage to find themselves out of this rubble and find their own Atom Heart Mothers, or Meddle, or Obscured By Clouds. They have made stellar music in the past, especially Duda's other projects, so I know they have it in them. That being said, Wasteland is still a pretty rough album, and while there are things to like on here, such things can still feel quite middle of the road, especially for Riverside standards.

Best track: Lament

Worst track: The Day After

Away from the sonorities of great metal intensity and closer to an intimate and peaceful aesthetic, and even with some insinuations to the accessible tendencies of eighties and nineties pop, Riverside publishes 'Love, Fear, and the Time Machine', their sixth album. A work that has frontman Mariusz Duda as the main protagonist, both for the versatility with which he manipulates his vocal register, taking it from melancholic phrases to whispers that invite complicity, and for his contribution to the melodies accompanied by his inseparable bass.

Using the concepts of love, fear and their connections with the past and the future as leitmotifs, the Poles develop clean and unsaturated atmospheres, with several points of intersection with respect to Steven Wilson's Porcupine Tree, such as the melancholic 'Lost (Why Should I Be Frightened By a Hat? )", which from Michal Lapaj's initial Hammond adds nuances up to Piotr Grudzinski's brief and heartfelt solo, the restful and naked "Afloat" with the almost invisible Hammond and Duda's arpeggiated acoustic guitars, combined with some more accessible pieces such as the expeditious "#Addicted" and the new wave airs of "Discard your Fear".

In an album that rarely pushes the accelerator, the highlights come from the longer tracks: the excellent instrumentation of the plaintive 'Saturate Me' with a good guitar riff by Grudzinski and Lapaj's keyboard curtain, and the nostalgic 'Towards The Blue Horizon' with its incisive arpeggiated beginning, Duda's confessional sobs and an intensity that goes back and forth between acoustic developments and dramatic mental landscapes. One of the album's best.

The final section rounds out the overall concept, with the hopeful, unplugged 'Time Travellers' and the uplifting 'Found (The Unexpected Flaw Of Searching)', a clear counterpoint and optimistic reference to the opening 'Lost (Why Should I Be Frightened By A Hat?)'.

Although it misses a greater participation of the riffs and solos of the excellent guitarist that was Grudzinski, relegated to the benefit of more glacial and less harsh melodies, 'Love, Fear, and the Time Machine' comes out ahead because of the solvency shown by the band in the exploration of new paths.

3.5/4 stars.

I give this band a lot of credit for making an album all about their recently departed guitarist Piotr Grudzinski. How difficult this must have been, especially for Duda who writes the lyrics and sings them. This record is bursting with emotion. Even the song titles, but especially the opener and closer which are just so meaningful. It opens with "The Day After"(Piotr's passing) and the closer "The Night Before"(his passing). I have not felt emotion like this since THE PINEAPPLE THIEF's "Little Man" and to a lesser extent GREEN CARNATION's "Journey To The End Of The Night". Both dealing with the death of a child.

This feels like a record that needed to be made and really it's a one-off in the sense they are a trio not replacing Piotr yet because the three remaining members need to do this together. Yes they brought in three guests with two adding guitar on some tracks and one adding violin on a few songs. Duda's vocals are rough at times, a different style for him but only when he's singing in a reserved manner. These guys are in mourning. Travis Smith nails the art work and we get nine tracks worth 51 minutes.

I do feel this is a four star effort, I mean they really hit some highs here but it's also inconsistent in my opinion. Also it's just too sad for me to even want to play it again. "Little Man" at least had those uplifting moments while "Journey To The End Of The Night" is about as dark an album as I have heard. No light, no hope but they would follow that up with "Light Of Day, Day Of Darkness" an incredible record. Those two are like ying and yang.

So I do have two tracks that stood out for me on this RIVERSIDE record. "Vale Of Tears" for one is just so interesting and I love when it turns heavy 3 minutes in. The next track "Guardian Angel" gives us some light at least early on but eventually I'm reaching for the kleenex. "The Struggle For Survival" is interesting in that it's a 9 1/2 minute instrumental and after 8 minutes I'm thinking PORCUPINE TREE. I feel like there is a ton of meaning in the lyrics for "River Down Below". The lyrics are so emotional on "Lament" and the violin offers that too late to end it.

I love the way the remaining three members honoured their guitarist here on "Wasteland". They certainly dealt with it head on. ONE SHOT decided to make a live album bringing back their original keyboardist but not replacing guitarist James Mac Gaw. A night of emotion no doubt for all in attendance. Keep in mind ONE SHOT is an all instrumental band. A solid 4 stars for album number 7.

"Memories in my Head" is an EP released after the highly successful "Anno Domini High Definition", which returns to Riverside's primordial roots marked by "Out of Myself" and "Second Life Syndrome", and with its more than thirty-two minutes it lacked little more than nothing to become a fully-fledged album. Three tracks were enough to build a short but intense proposal on the basis of atmospheric, dark, intriguing and futuristic scenarios, which combine progressive elements of seventies and eighties heroes, ethereal transitions and heavy chords of the roughest side of the genre.

The pieces are connected to each other by the common denominator of a long gone and missed time: from the disturbing beginning of "Goodbye Sweet Innocence", and its steady but unhurried pace, guided in its development by Mariusz Duda's melancholic voice and Michal Lapaj's protagonic and mysterious keyboards with Arabic airs at times, the raging and superlative "Living in the Past" that shows the overwhelming solvency the Poles are capable of, with mid-tempos dominated by the forcefulness that flows naturally from the distorted guitar riffs of the excellent Piotr Grudzinski, the hypnotic keyboards of Michal Lapaj and the sober accompaniment of the ever-fulfilling drummer Piotr Kozieradzki, in one of the best tracks in Riverside's discography, until the tragic "Forgotten Land", a description of the dramatic fate of a people condemned by their arrogance, where the opening bass lines recall Rush's "Cygnus X-1" and give way to a painful and heartbreaking lyrical narration by Duda accompanied by the whole band until its haunting end.

"Memories in my Head" is a great EP, which was only available at concerts and shortly after fortunately offered to the general public. A jewel in the discography of the band led by Duda.

Excellent.

4/4.5 stars

Riverside's acclaimed breakthrough into the progressive world with their astonishing "Out of Myself" was confirmed by the follow-up "Second Life Syndrome", which was even more highly rated than its predecessor. And so the expectations generated with the release of "Rapid Eye Movement", their third album and final chapter of the "Reality Dream" trilogy, were high. And as can happen when you expect so much, the final result may not end up shining as brightly as expected, and there is something of that with "Rapid Eye Movement".

An album that favours psychedelic atmospheres to recreate the deepest phases of sleep, enveloped by Michal Lapaj's keyboards and the impeccable lyrical intervention of Mariusz Duda, who displays a versatile vocal register that goes from whispers, Steven Wilson-style megaphony and some unburdened shrieks in communion with his bass; all this at the service of dark structures marked by the band's work as a whole over individual performances, and which, on the other hand, misses a more intense participation of the excellent guitarist Piotr Grudzinski, of great prominence in the previous albums.

From the auspicious instrumental opening of "Beyond The Eyelids" and its controlled aggression with nods to Dream Theater, the tracks follow one after the other hypnotically, with the industrialised sounds of the strange "02 Panic Room" and the fantastic final section marked by Lapaj's piano and Grudzinski's guitar arpeggios accompanying Duda's peaceful singing standing out, the progressive metal waves of "Parasomnia", the calmness transmitted by the withdrawn "Embryonic" with its beautiful acoustic melody, one of the band's best ballads, and the power of the hallucinatory "Cybernetic Pillow" that compiles in just under five minutes the harsh influences of Riverside.

And this digging through the twists and turns of the mind has its final point with the extensive and very progressive "Ultimate Trip", whose first two thirds show the band very composed, mostly dominated by Lapaj's keyboards, Duda's bass and Piotr Kozieradzki's percussive support, to then be diluted in the last third in an instrumentation that languishes until its closing.

"Rapid Eye Movement" has the enormous responsibility of living up to its older brothers and, although at times it seems to fall short, it is a very good album from the Poles.

3.5/4 stars

After "Out of Myself", Riverside's surprising introduction where they showed a solvency and instrumental aplomb uncommon for a band that was just taking its first steps, the time had come to ratify that it had not been the fruit of a fleeting inspiration. "Second Life Syndrome", their second album and at the same time the second part of the three that make up their "Reality Dream" Trilogy (the story of a lonely man who fights with himself to overcome his inner demons and move forward), not only confirms the band's excellent form, but also consolidates them as one of the most auspicious appearances in the progressive scene of the 2000's. Led by Mariusz Duda, singer, bassist and main songwriter, Riverside brilliantly fuses elements and nuances of the hardest and darkest side of progressive rock (Dream Theater, Opeth, Tool, for example) with atmospheric digressions into the intergalactic oceans of the genre (Pink Floyd, Porcupine Tree).

Nothing seems to be left to chance, from the whispering start of the hypnotic "After", the songs follow one after the other instrumentally intense and piercing, with Duda's deep voice very versatile and demanding, even reaching guttural notes without problems as in the energized "Volte-Face" or in the very heavy and fierce "Artificial Smile", Piotr Grudziński's protagonist guitars, clean and sustained and with clear floydian influences, as in the superb and extensive "Second Life Syndrome" and its initial airs to the Gilmourian "Shine on... "(one of the best pieces of the album), and also rough and forceful as in the super progressive "Dance with the Shadow", and the excellent accompaniment of both keyboardist Michal Lapaj (incorporated after the departure of Jacek Melnicki) who builds spacey synthesized carpets for all the themes and contributes some beautiful piano notes in the peaceful and harmonic "Im Conceiving You", and the sober percussionist Piotr Kozieradzki to complete the fantastic sound wall of an unmissable album.

Beyond its progressive metal label, "Second Lyfe Syndrome" is a top album of the progressive genre of the last two decades, and positions the Polish band as one of the must-listen references for fans of the genre.

Superlative.

4,5 stars

3.5 stars. RIVERSIDE hit us with studio album number eight in 2023 after their longest break between albums and I'm sure the emotional toll of creating 2018's "Wasteland" was a part of this. Where do we go from here? This is a concept album about technology and how it affects us all in negative ways. I have said many times that I'm just not into concept albums and the lyrics here don't "cut it" overall for me. Why am I tired of this?

Right from the first spin I have been on the fence about this record. I remember how connected I felt with this band when I first got into Prog in the mid 00's. That FLOYD-like space contrasted with the heaviness and aggression, but then add a vocalist and guitarist who would become among my favourites so yes maybe I hold them to a higher standard but these guys have always delivered the goods. Until now. This is the first record of theirs I have not given 4 or more stars to.

There's so much good music here but I just find the album to be inconsistent. And for me this is a big drop-off from "Wasteland" their previous record. So a lot of my feelings have to do with comparing this to what they've done in the past and I feel it's left wanting. I do have a top three though and that begins with the opening track that got me excited the first time I heard it. I like the keys and heaviness early on then some electronics with bass and beats. Catchy as the guitar arrives and synths followed by vocals after 2 minutes. There's more passion on the chorus and some riffing later.

"Big Tech Brother" doesn't get off to the best start with those spoken words but then a fast bass line arrives as it builds. Steven Wilson comes to mind here as he did on the previous track "Landmine Blast". Awesome sound after 2 minutes with those powerful synths. I like when the heaviness returns at 5 minutes. "I'm Done With You" is my final top three and starts out great with the electronics and riffs. It settles with vocals and the only time we get some brief aggressive vocals is on this song. I like the heaviness of this one. I'm not into the closer "Self-Aware" like most seem to be but find it inconsistent like some of these other tracks. Great start to it though. I actually thought of THE TANGENT at one point later on. The longest one "The Place Where I Belong" also sits in that category but some amazing stuff on it. A fairly moving second half at times on that one.

So yeah sad to not be fully into this one even though it has it's highlights.