HYBRIS

Änglagård is one of the many Swedish bands that I knew nothing about before reading about them on Prog Archives. It's not that I'm bad at tracking my country's popular acts but rather the weird fact that bands like Änglagård, A.C.T, Pain Of Salvation and even the Flower Kings aren't as commonly recognized here as they seem to be outside of Sweden. Therefore my discovery of the band came almost a decade after they had already broken up, but to be honest, I doubt that I that listening to Änglagård at the age of 7 would have actually benefited me too much.

There is really no doubt that this release has great instrumental arrangements all throughout these four lengthy compositions. The melodic hooks are great and all the band members show a great passion in their performances. My only real complaint is targeted towards the lyrical context of these songs. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Lindman's vocal performance, instead it's the lyrics themselves that sound completely hideous to my ears. This is one of the few occasions where I actually wish that I wouldn't have know the spoken language since it really drags down the overall experience of this release for me. Having said that, I don't exactly consider the band's all instrumental followup album Epilog to be any better, but I'll leave the reasons undisclosed until my next review.

There's no denying that Hybris has won the heart of our prog community and I can definitely appreciate its appeal. Still, I wouldn't call myself a hardcore fan of this release or Änglagård in general. This album is simply an excellent addition to any prog rock music collection and I'll leave it at that.

***** star songs: Jordrök (11:10) Ifrån Klarhet Till Klarhet (8:04)

**** star songs: Vandringar I Vilsenhet (11:53) Kung Bore (12:57)