To make a fairly broad generalisation, contemporary progressive rock falls into one of two fundamental brackets: that which is predominantly built around expansive soundscapes and which often veers into math-rock and post-rock territories, and that which attempts to be all things, often more or less simultaneous. I’d venture that the former may be the more obvious but ultimately more listenable of the strains, while the latter may be truer to the spirit of prog but often ends up an ostentatious mess of ideas without any clear sense of identity or direction.
This, unfortunately, falls into the second of these categories. And bloody hell, it is ostentatious. Overblown doesn’t cut it: they make Muse seem positively low-key. But then, their keyboard player is one Adam Wakeman – son of Rick. Sure they can play, and they’re exploding with ideas. The trouble is, less than half of them are good, and they insist on packing seven songs’ worth of bits and bobs into each track. The result is an album’s worth of Bohemian Rhapsodies as performed by a 21st century Yes.
|
Headspace Online
|
