Muziekrecensies
Songs No One Will Hear is Arjen Anthony Lucassen’s new album. The concept: a catastrophic asteroid is racing towards Earth, which will be destroyed in five months. Everyone reacts in their own way: some panic, others party, or break down. Only a few remain calm in this chaotic situation. Mike Mills (Toehider) narrates the story. … Read more, available in English and Dutch
In its almost 30-year existence, Karibow has released quite a few (double) albums. Some of these are true one-man projects, as founder Oliver Rüsing is a singer and multi-instrumentalist. Moreover, he always wants to learn to play new instruments and likes to experiment with sounds.Fans of prog/melodic rock and AOR, among others, had to wait … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Riverside is a highly acclaimed prog rock band from Poland. Live, their music comes out even better than on their studio albums. Anyone who has seen Riverside live before, or has their previous live album, knows this is absolutely true. Several songs on this live CD come from their previous album ‘ID.Entity’The album starts with … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Andy Marshall is the driving spirit behind Saor. This band has been mixing atmospheric black metal with tender melodies for more than a decade. The newest album, ‘Amidst the Ruins’ intertwines the unpleasantness of modern times with Scottish heritage. The warriors of Saor call on listeners to wake up from their depthful dullness. ‘Amidst the … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Neal Morse & The Resonance’s new album is called ‘No Hill For A Climber’. Neal Morse made this album with local young talent. The album has five tracks, two of them are wonderfully long epics. The epic ‘Eternity In Your Eyes’ has seven parts. This one starts with classical elements. Many twists and turns follow, … Read more, available in English and Dutch
The Swedish progressive folk-fusion-rock band often has album titles that are difficult to pronounce. But the fifteenth album, ‘Sommargryningsljus’, is quite a tongue twister. A translation app tells me it means summer twilight. These eight songs tell the story of a nocturnal journey. The first two tracks are about twilight, the last two about dawn. … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Arjen Lucassen wrote the Ayreon album ‘01011001’ in 2007. Since he never intended to perform it live, he could make it as complicated as he wanted. He did so, not only in terms of complex arrangement, but also by the amount of vocalists/musicians. Ayreon’s live shows are rare, but always a great spectacle. So was … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Dutch prog metal band Armed Cloud will launch ‘Nimbus’, their fourth album, on 25 May. Nimbus comes from cumulonimbus, aka thunderclouds. This is the band’s darkest and heaviest album to date. The sound at the start of ‘Safety Word’ is a bit duller than expected. The metal could have “thundered” a bit more. Still, the … Read more, available in English and Dutch
The story behind the new rock opera ‘Hollingsworth Mansion’ is extraordinary: In 1808, the Hollingsworth family died because their stand-alone house burned down. After restoration, the property was residenced by several families. In 1931 the Welbourne family moved in. It should have been a beautiful new beginning…. To understand the story, it is important to … Read more, available in English and Dutch
Last year, Einar Solberg (frontman of Norwegian prog metal Leprous) launched his debut solo album titled ’16’. In February 2022, he made himself very vulnerable by giving an entirely solo live stream (with an audience). This was his reinterpretation of the Leprous album ‘The Congregation’ (2015). Fortunately, recordings were made of this, which resulted in … Read more, available in English and Dutch