IMMORTAL?

Lemme tell you, neo-prog is a struggle for me to get seriously invested in. Although I recognize Marillion's talent, I've lost interest in them as they're basically Peter Gabriel Genesis worshippers who got together and said, "What would Genesis sound like today is Gabriel didn't leave?" Truth is, I have to go back and re-evaluate much of the neo-prog I've given several shots, such as Magenta, Marillion and IQ. But first, I wanted to check out Arena's Immortal, considering its highly diversified genre-tagging on RYM. After this, I'll have to go back to Contagion, which I gave a 90/100 years ago.

I greatly favor albums that take many directions while maintaining a strong flow. This album kept me on my feet, thankfully. I suppose a part of me is already used to this more accessible form of prog, but there's a fine line between "accessible prog" and "flat-out pop rock pretending to be prog like Asia." Honestly, Marillion is close to the latter. THIS, however, is completely different. Immortal captures the full spirit of prog while maintaining that synthesizer-driven accessibility that makes the genre what it is. On top of that, this seems to be where they took a darker and more mature approach in general. I'd say the strongest example of the raw neo-prog sound is the fifth track, Climbing the Net, which shoves great synth melodies in your face. Previous tracks seemed to love diversifying. Much like King Crimson's Red (my favorite KC album), this starts out with a prog epic often tagged "metal," Chosen, and I was deeply impressed with its balance between proggy mutation and rock accessibility. Following that is a spirited acoustic rock song, a prog epic and then a darker and more electronic exercize in industrial, mystifying backing effects.

And then comes he 20-minute "Moviedrome." Now for a prog fan, a 20-minute epic shouldn't be daunting at all, but this is neo-prog we're talking about. Just how accessible could a 20-minute song be? I went into this one thinking that Arena had better pull the best ideas they've ever had out of their pants and get to work. For the most part, they did just that. This is where their visual lyricism comes into full force while the music uses its slow pacing and classic prog influence properly to keep the 20 minutes alive. After soaking all of that, it's only appropriate to end it all with a soft rock song.

I'd say this was a much stronger idea of what I was looking for in neo-prog. This blew the Marillion, IQ and Magenta albums I had heard before out of the water. This was just what I needed to restore my faith in an otherwise samey and overdone subgenre of prog.

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