TWILIGHT

Genesis clone and clown. Saw them live in Verviers before they shortened their name , and I only enjoyed the Genesis covers as I felt uncomfortable listening to genesis-would-be-songs that are not bad but debatable on the plagiarism/imposture issue

Here is a relatively new Italian prog band 'wittlin' through the moods and sounds of early GENESIS. "Twilight" is a very solid release and I think works very well. Their lead singer certainly has a very strong voice and I would categorize it some where in the Peter GABRIEL camp. Their guitarist is fabulous and adds a very strong element in the music with some nice extended jams. At times the music wonders in and out of song structure but if you can follow it is a nice journey......after all that is what Progressive Rock is all about. "Twilight" is very well recorded and offers great speaker seperation and wide sound dynamics for your home stereo system. Songs are nice and long and shift moods and structure throughout keeping the listener in an active mood.

One would swear vocalist SIMONE ROSETTI was PETER GABRIEL reincarnate, and the NIGHT WATCH's music is so much like that of early GENESIS one wonders if the band would ever have existed without the old masters. Plagiarism, however, never sounded so good and surely the guys can't be condoned for pulling it off so successfully. This being said, "Twilight" contains some highly original material in the purest prog tradition.

"My Ivory Soul" is an aggressive, powerful opener in 7/8 reminiscent of early GENESIS at their darkest (shades of "Supper's Ready" come to mind). "The Fisherman" is a highly dramatic piece with a memorable theme, alternating between aggressive and slow passages with prominent guitar work and keyboards reminiscent of "One for the Vine". "Tomorrow Happened" with its syncopated intro is a bit more crimsonesque yet still manages to incorporate a fair amount of symphnonic elements. "The Black Cage" with its slippery chord changes, prominent drums and dramatic dénouement is simply genial and is sure to bring on the goosebumps. "A Game With Shifting Mirrors" is a dazzling array of musical themes and crazy time changes that will delight anyone into KING CRIMSON. The album closes with the dreamy "Flower of Innoncence", a piece that ends with some beatlesque guitars that trail off into the distance. The prominent percussion, excellent guitar work and highly dramatic vocals throughout the album put "Twilight" in a category of its own, despite its obvious nod to 70's prog. It's a tight little Italian piece with an excellent production, a gem you can't afford to let pass you by.

This album represents a good example of how the band that has taken the musical format of progressive rock hero, GENESIS (and a bit of KING CRIMSON), can still perform its best despite some critics about cloning to early GENESIS music. For me personally, I have no problem at all with the initiative of copying the format of elder band (s) as far as they don't take the musical segments directly. I even have to thank the band because I like this kind of music, still. In this album, I could not identify any effort by the band that leads to plagiarism. This album has successfully filled me with musical needs in the vein of Gabriel-era GENESIS and early KING CRIMSON. This might be GENESIS would look like if GABRIEL did not leave the band. It might be. The vocalist, SIMONE ROSSETTI, has a vocal quality on par excellent with PETER GABRIEL. It's a very close voice. It's no harm at all if even ROSSETTI really tried to emulate GABRIEL's singing style and fit with the music. He wrote all lyrics of this album while the music was composed by its guitarist FRANCESCO ZAGO.

I would not go over track by track but the opening track MY IVORY SOULS indicates the symphonic nature of the band and its close structure and format with early GENESIS. When I observe in details, the sound and style of guitar is reminiscent of early K CRIMSON, played in an ambient nuances. Opened with Hackettian guitar fills, the music suddenly enters with great drumming and Frippian guitar work. When vocal enters the scene, it's a perfect Gabriel singing style and quality. The Fripp guitar sound is really stunning and I enjoy it very much. The song is accessible for most of us especially if we like GENESIS. The music suddenly turns to be quiet with a humming ROSETTI's voice. When the music starts to rise again, I can sense the vocal style of GABRIEL singing the I KNOW WHAT I LIKE song. Overall, this song has a very strong composition and structure, excellent musicianship. And, it's really enjoyable.

Second track THE THEME is a short acoustic guitar fills that reminds me to the intro of BLOOD ON A ROOFTOPS or HORIZON of GENESIS. It flows to the third track FISHERMAN which has a very tasty melody. This track has really BLOWN me (the same case with first track) because the melody is pretty damn nice - shame on me that I feel like crying enjoying this beautifully crafted track (melody-wise) combined with Gabriel's singing style. What a memorable melody! It reminds me to GENESIS' track "The Lamia" of The Lamb album. Yes, there is piece when the guitar piece is very close to GENESIS Supper's Ready at minute 7:00 (approx). It's OK.

Well, I understand that people's musical tastes are different from one to another. Even those who are hard core fans of GENESIS Hackett era might not like that the kind of their music is being copied by new band. As I explained above that I have no problem at all with this, even I'm so thankful to THE NIGHT WATCH that has perfectly combined the music of GENESIS with KING CRIMSON as you might find it at track 6, A GAME WITH SHIFTING MIRRORS. It's the same case with CITIZEN CAIN (oh boy .. I love the band!). Copying musical format has also happened in hard rock genre like what happened with KINGDOM COME (80's band not the 70's) which received intense critics being a copy cat of LED ZEPPELIN. But, . I don't care. Music is derivative. I love KINGDOM COME. Their debut album is excellent! As for THE NIGH WATCH, this debut album is excellent and deserves 4/5 rating. Excellent. GW, Indonesia.

I purchased this cd after reading the reviews on this very site. As a Genesis fan of over thirty years standing, I am always interested in hearing bands that might put me in mind of the originals. Of course, I don't want a clone band, but any band that presents its own material in the style of Genesis would be a welcome addition to my collection. So what do I think of this one? Well...I like it! Yes, there is definitely an early Genesis feel to the music, but, at the same time, you can easily tell this is a totally different band. The music is well written and presented, and Simone Rossetti does manage to sound very close to Peter Gabriel. Interestingly, I took this cd to a mate of mine, who is also a Genesis fan, and played it for him. He thought the vocals were, in some places, closer to Fish. And I think he has a point. The music is nothing like Marillion, however. Each track has its merits. 'My Ivory Soul', 'The Theme', (a short instrumental) and 'The Fisherman' are especially close to the Genesis style, whilst the rest of the album drifts a little away from it. 'Tomorrow Happened' is a little different, and quite loose in parts. The Italian accent is more noticeable here, whilst on the earlier tracks it is negligable, (Except when Rossetti sings 'And The Feesherman returns back' with a strong accent!) but it doesn't detract from the music. 'The Black Cage' is an excellent track, whilst 'A Game With Shifting Mirrors' is a wilder, more Crimsonesque instrumental, which is very good too. The closer, the short 'Flower Of Innocence' is quite stark, and reminds me more of Genesis again. All through the album, it has to be said, the guitar is well utilised, and does indeed, at times, sound as if Mr Hackett were playing it. Keyboards are not so prominent, but they do have a Tony Banks feel occasionally, without being flamboyant. So, Genesis fans, would I recommend this? In a word, yes, although I could never, in all honesty, say 'close your eyes and you would swear it was your heroes', the music is redolent with that early 70's atmosphere, and you could, especially on the first three tracks, imagine Genesis playing these songs. I also have 'Vacuum' by The Watch, the band that Rossetti formed after this one, and, whilst that too is good, it is not up to the standard displayed here, either in songwriting, singing, or in Genesis-likeness. But I would say to fans, yes, buy this; it will help to somewhat fill the hole that the originals left back in 1977.

Reading over the reviews for this album, I'm surprised how much they are compared to Genesis. Actually, they are a complete copy of Marillion, especially in the vocals department. Simone Rosetti sounds more like Fish then anyone I've heard so far. Now all you need to do is throw on the track "The Theme" and listen towards the end. You'll hear an almost exact copy of the spoken word section on Marillion's "Forgotten Son". It's not until you get to track 6, "A Game with Shifting Mirrors" that you hear any originality. It's an instrumental song that starts out softy then explodes with a prog metal type riff then ends softy. I give them credit for trying to sound somewhat different. The last songs has a sound akin to their countrymen "Finisterre', a nice PFM- like pastoral song thats very pretty. This is a tough album to gauge. They do the Marillion stuff well, and they throw in some original stuff at the end. I'll round the album out in the center with a 3 star rating, (4 stars if you love anything Marillion-like).

THE NIGHT WATCH wear their influences on their sleeves, as they sound like a combination of GENESIS and MARILLION.They only put out this one album before disbanding and their singer Simone Rossetti formed a new band called THE WATCH.There is quite a bit of sampled mellotron on this album, and the vocals are definitely a highlight.

"My Ivory Soul" opens with barely audible acoustic guitar that gives way to a full blown symphonic assault. Some great guitar and vocals follow, as well as waves of mellotron."The Theme" is a short instrumental of acoustic guitar and mellotron."The Fisherman" is my favourite song on this album.You can hear the waves and seagulls in the intro that give way to piano and vocals. Nice.The song becomes quite passionate as we again hear the seagulls. I feel like I have been taken me to the sea. Awesome ! Heavy drums and guitar come in before we hear the cries of the whales and acoustic guitar. More heavy drums and mellotron takes us to the end of this emotional journey.

"Tomorrow Happened" is led by theatrical vocals and synths. Vocals and piano take over 5 minutes in. We then hear what sounds like an atom bomb exploding."The Black Cage" slowly evolves.There is a lot of space in this one. Some good guitar work 7 minutes in."A Game With Shifting Mirrors" is an instrumental. The heavy drums and piano sound great. It all changes after 4 minutes as all we can hear is mellotron before reverting back to original soundscape."Flowers Of Innocence" features the sound of children playing throughout.Tender vocals and acoustic guitar open.There are some tempo and mood shifts in this one. Included are some good guitar melodies.

This is easy to recommend to MARILLION and GENESIS fans. 3.5 stars.

"The Night Watch" just play wonderful music fully reminiscent of the great Genesis era. Simone being of course a Gabriel emulator, which is fine with me. "The Night Watch" was his first project. He'll soon start an new one : "The Watch" which is pretty much a ... clone of "The Watch" (do you follow me ?).

I did see "The Watch" in Verviers last year and even if I loved their covers for "Can-Utility" and "Hogweed", the whole show was very good (even if the audience was scarce, unfortunately).

If ever one band matches the neo-prog description available on PA, "The Night Watch" (you can include "The Watch" as they are really one and single musical entity) is definitely amongst the medalists. Fully respectfull of their model, they deliver very pleasant music. Lyrics are frankly above average which is rather remarkable and deserves a mention.

If Genesis is one of the band you are praising (but is there any doubt that this luminous band is praised on PA ?) you should be charmed by the good work of "The Night Watch". Expressive vocals, great mellotron, complex rhythms...

Of course they are VERY similar to the ones you know but still, it is so nice to listen to these very nice songs of "The Night Watch". I can't think of a single weak number here. My faves being the opening song "My Ivory Soul" and "The Fisherman" but the best and most emotional one (just listen to the chorus) is "The Black Cage". Very, very good.

Four stars for this very good album. Of course you would need to be somewhat open-minded and accept some similarities with the ones we will always love. But this is my case. I just hope that there will be other prog freaks thinking as I do.

4.5 stars actually!

Nowadays known simply as THE WATCH,this incredible band was formed in 1993 in Milan under the influence of main man/singer/flutist Simone Rossetti.They had often problems regarding their line-up,but finally the band managed to release their first album ''Twilight'' in 1997,after which line-up and rehearsals problems continued,leading Rossetti to a total line-up lifting and to the renaming of THE NIGHT WATCH to the simpler THE WATCH.

Rossetti and his friends tried to catch the old'n'good GENESIS spirit of the Gabriel-era and transform it to the 90's without many changes...and they did it so well! Propably this band is as closest as it ever gets to 70's GENESIS,with Rossetti having a similar to PETER GABRIEL voice and the band performing this delicate Symphonic Rock of the 70's masters.What can anyone say about tracks like ''Ivory soul'',''The fisherman'' or the ''The Black cage''?...or you can pick any of the rest...you will be astonished!Top notch compoisitions with plenty of mellotron sounds, symphonic organs, crying guitars (just when MARILLION also come at mind) and a series of dramatic performances by Rossetti, making me think of PETER GABRIEL at his best.The stunning melodies are there, the lost-in-time GENESIS symphonic approach is there, the guitar/keyboard smooth interplays are also there, the soft mellotron sound just thrill me, one of the best singers/performers nowadays is present as well.As I'm in love with old GENESIS,I couldn't ask for more!The only negative point: total lack of originality of course... but I think those for whom old GENESIS are just a pleasant memory, won't have a problem with that

... and I bet Simone Rossetti was born to do this... recapturing the vintage spirit of PETER GABRIEL and his company.One of my top 10 releases of 1997!

The Night Watch were a talented Italian band which are mainly known for drawing on Genesis - a lot of their compositions draw heavily from classic-period Genesis from their pastoral period, Simone Rossetti sounds uncannily like Peter Gabriel on vocals (with the occasional Fish moment), and Francesco Zago plays uncannily like Steve Hackett at times.

At the same time, their sound drifts just far away enough from classic Genesis to write them off as a mere clone; Giovanni Alessi's keyboard work is more reminiscent to my ears of Mark Kelly's in Marillion than Tony Banks' playing in Genesis, and occasionally the band as a whole breaks off into an intense instrumental section reminiscent of the darker moments of early King Crimson. Overall, in fact the album is somewhat darker and more hard rocking than anything produced by Genesis.

The Night Watch are mostly known these days for launching the prog career of Rossetti - with an entirely new line-up, he would go on to continue the band's legacy in The Watch. But at the same time, I think this lone album by the group makes its own special contribution to neo-prog and will go down well with symphonic fans eager to hear what happens when the massed rock armies of King Crimson go trampling through the pastoral landscapes of Genesis.

The Night Watch released one single album `Twilight' back in 1997, heavily influenced by the sounds of classic 70's Genesis, 80's Marillion and even a slight touch of Van der Graaf Generator. It's a pleasing mix of sedate acoustic passages, clean electric runs, some occasional grunts of heaviness, low-key synths and gentle washes of regal Mellotron (though not as much as you'd expect from this sort of album), with some intriguingly cryptic and surreal lyrics, all topped off a with pleasing crisp production. Of course, being a Neo release, it should come as no surprise to find that vocalist Simone Rossetti peppers his delivery with all sorts of Phil Collins/Peter Gabriel mannerisms, as well as the occasional Fish and Peter Hammill moments for good measure too. Nor is it a shock that he sings in English for this release either, as many of the Italian Neo bands do, but he must especially be commended for his superb pronunciation, always clear and very easy to understand, and constantly really quite charismatic and appealing.

There are plenty of lovely moments throughout the disc, a highlight especially being Giovanni Alessi's delicate piano and placid synths, even though the keyboards are mixed a little low. It's not that the guitars or other instruments overpower them, more that the band are perfectly restrained and dignified, never resorting to technical overkill or musically showing off to compete with each-other. There's charming and gentle acoustic pieces such as `The Theme', soothing and dreamy passages on `My Ivory Soul' , and the end of `A Game of Shifting Mirrors' delivers a grand extended instrumental climax. The powerful slow-builder `The Fisherman' alternates between reflective and passionate emotions, and especially listen out for the spikey and wildly unhinged harder brooding finale of `The Black Cage' (nice murmuring bass throughout too) that expertly channels both Fish-era Marillion and Van der Graaf Generator very successfully.

The demise of the band after this one album was not a total loss, as guitarist Francesco Zago ended up in eclectic bands such Not A Good Sign, as well as Yugen with drummer Diego Donadio, and of course Simone Rossetti now fronts The Watch, one of the finest and most popular Italian Neo bands still to this day.

What holds the album back slightly is that, although every track is nicely composed and sumptuously performed, there's never a truly classic amazing moment. But, housed in a meek and simple cardboard sleeve with striking cover artwork (it would look amazing on vinyl), `Twlight' by the Night Watch will appeal to fans who already enjoy the usual Neo Prog sound, lovers of Genesis from 1970-1977, and possibly Italian band P.F.M from their more Genesis influenced `Chocolate Kings' period that utilized Acqua Fragile singer Bernado Lanzetti. There's safe and comforting 70's styled progressive rock to be found here that's not much different to what the originators offered, but the sophistication and taste on display makes it no less worthy of your attention and time.

Three and a half stars.

(Special thanks to Archives member TheH for helping track down a copy, and to ZNR Records for supplying said copy!)