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Glass Hammer - Lex Rex CD (album) cover

LEX REX

Glass Hammer

 

Symphonic Prog

3.75 | 214 ratings

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apps79
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
4 stars Always inspired by Tolkien's writings, Glass Hammer decided to fully dedicate an album to the legendary writer, recording and releasing ''The middle Earth album'' in 2001, somewhat moving away from their progressive sensibilties for a more rural approach, a work that received mixed reviews.But they would soon recover, launching ''Lex Rex'' in 2002, a comeback to Prog Rock, now featuring some extra guitar work by Bjørn Lynne with a four-piece backing vocal group.

''Lex Rex'' finds Glass Hammer reaching their creative pinnacle, all these huge 70's influences and aesthetics have been nicely balanced, Schendel and Babb had musically matured and the result was a top 2002 album of full-blown Symphonic Rock with evident YES and E.L.P. influences.The vocal parts and production sound of course very American, they actually sound a bit close to MAGELLAN at moments, but the arrangements, jazzy guitar snippets and huge Classical influences in the piano parts are well within the STEVE HOWE/RICK WAKEMAN range.Now, the whole thing about Symphonic-oriented Prog is to find room and place elements like pomposity, complexity, grandieur and melody in equal doses and additionally mix all those properly to sound like technically efficient yet elaborate mini symphonies.That's what exactly Glass Hammer achieved with ''Lex Rex'', there's no particular element prevailing in the album and for the first time you feel there are no blank holes or fillers, even during the longest piece, while the shorter tunes have also a reason of existence.The band switches with unmet comfort between instrumental long plays with keyboard tricks and interactions to smoother performances with a lyrical depth and a strong sense of melody.Beautiful combination of layered synthesizers with big time Mellotron preludes and thrilling organs, some nice acoustic textures to be found next to the regular electric moves and well-arranged vocal harmonies, material with emotion and virtuosity, great piece of art.

''Lex Rex'' is also an attempt by the band to leave the dominant YES influences behind, they haven't fully achieved to do so, but at least this is their most original album to date, their style starts to become a little distinctive.Great reincarnation of Classic Prog values, no less than highly recommended.

apps79 | 4/5 |

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