STILL THE WATERS

Some weeks ago I received the songs from "Still the Waters" from Robert Brown and immediately added it to Symphonic because this is the place where the release belongs, but decided not to rate it in that moment because my first impression wasn't good and didn't wanted to be unfair, so waited a bit but due to a change of hard disk, lost some music including this album.

Some days ago bought the download and listened it carefully, this made my impression change, not enough to say it's a great album, but enough to recognize it's at least an average one.

Some determined issues affected my rating:

In first place the recording is horrendous, sounds artificial and amateurish, this is not EPIGNOSIS fault, but if an album doesn't sound well, we have a first problem.

In second place the arrangements are not in the level of the music, too many silent spaces that make it sound like incoherent musical passages united randomly one after the other instead of being a fluid recording, and at last a personal fact, I don't like Christian Prog at all (I'm a Christian, but I believe music must be free, not an instrument of evangelism).

The title song opens the album with an interesting intro, but the sound is empty, the drums sound weak, an acoustic guitar leads to the vocals that are pretty decent, but the recording is awful, it's hard to explain, but seems like Robert Brown is not playing enough instruments, the keys are interesting but the arrangements need more strength.

"A Pearl in a Field" reminds me of 666 by APHRODITE'S CHILD, specially in the use of keyboards, but again that empty sound really annoys me, the voice is weaker than in the previous track, the idea is good but Robert needs more time to develop them because the track is so repetitive that bores a bit.

At last "Move" presents us a stronger and more complete sound, well at least at the intro, the good news are that the vocals are stronger and the guitar is interesting, but in my opinion, Robert needs to add more instruments, because that annoying empty sound remains.

"An Everlasting Kingdom" starts with a beautiful instrumental intro that leads to the body of the song after some sound effects, but again falls in the same problem as most tracks, too predictable, the changes are not dramatic enough, plus the plain sound that we mentioned before.

When I saw the length of "No Shadow of Turning", I expected more ideas, and honestly Robert tries, but it's not enough, the sound is still too predictable for my taste, to the point that the 19 minutes seems endless, except for the delightful keyboards, good but not great song.

The sad thing is that Robert W Brown Jr, is a capable musician for what I listen, but I believe he needs to recruit other musicians to complement him and a second vocalist, being that his voice is good, but doesn't have the strength to be the only frontman.

The perfect rating for me would be 2.5 stars (as for any average album), but this is not allowed by the system, so I had to choose between 2 or 3 stars.

Being that I rated albums like ELP's debut and "Going for the One" by YES with 3 stars and even when "Still the Waters" i not in this level of quality I believe there's something good that we must encourage, so I'll go with three stars..

Will follow EPIGNOSIS next releases with interest because I find good ideas and musical skills that will develop with time.