AGAINST REASON

Over the past few weeks, you may have wondered to yourself, "Who's that band I can see in the 'Top 50 Artists' list on this website?" I'm here to tell you that band is Credo, whose latest album, 'Against Reason', is a wonderful mix of progressive rock and pop music. Since their last album, 'Rhetoric', it seems as if Credo have learned a thing or two about writing good songs, and as a result, there's far more of the stuff you want to hear on this album, like instrumentals and time signatures.

There are also some similarities with the last album. Lead singer Mark Colton still sounds so much like Marillion's Fish, that it's just uncanny! Unlike most progressive rock, rather than being camped in fantasy, the lyrics here all deal with contemporary issues, like the environment (Staring at the Sun), paedophilia (Cardinal Sin) and religious wars (Insane). All of these are tackled with a great deal of tact, but the words are still hard hitting. The songs all have a very poppy feel to them, but in an unashamedly progressive way. You'll still hear the three-verse, three-chorus structure, but it might be spread across 13 minutes!

Since 'Rhetoric', Credo have become extremely creative in their songwriting. While there was a certain 'sameness' to the tracks on 'Rhetoric', the songs are all very individual here. Instrumentals abound, where we can hear Tim Birrell's beautiful guitar sound, or Mike Varty's well thought out keyboards. One moment that never fails to make me smile is at 2:40 on the opening track Staring at the Sun, where the whole band cut out, to let Birrell play an incredibly catchy 7/8 theme. Staring at the Sun is undoubtedly the group's best song so far. Insane is another surprisingly good track, as it starts in 5/8, and just gets weirder from there. Ghosts Of Yesterday is a long track, but somehow manages to have a chorus that seems very similar to Robbie Williams' Advertising Space. The CD booklet is also very well thought out, as each song will have a famous quote to go with the lyrics.

If you're tired of airy-fairy fantasy prog lyrics, and feel like you need some more down to earth emotion, then you should really give this album a shot. Credo show no signs of stopping, and I can only imagine that their next album will be even better than this!

PS I'm still trying to work out what MCF in Conspiracy (MCF) means!

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