INSURGENTES

Straight to the point: this is not the kind of album that I can sincerely recommend you to buy or enjoy through lending the CD from your friend. Am I too extreme to say that it's gonna be a waste of time listening to this album. While for my case, I purchased this CD through amazon with one major assumption (that turned out to be a great fallacy) that Steven Wilson is a pretty BIG name behind the masterpiece 'Fear of A Blank Planet' album of Porcupine Tree. Not only that, look at the supporting musicians with great names from progressive scene like Tony Levin, Jordan Rudess, Theo Travis and Wilson's Porcupine Tree mate Gavin Harrison. Those factors had successfully built a very solid rationale for me not think twice to click the item from a series of amazon recommendations for me. What happened then? It's a completely a waste of time! It did not take me enough spirit to have a second spin after I listened to the full album with great patience due to the pretty slow and intensely dark nuance the album tried to deliver. I then skipped the album by spinning other albums like Saga, Simon Says and couple of prog albums that I had at that time. I tried to spin again this album, occasionally, with my concerted effort to understand the subtleties of soundscapes where Mr Wilson had built his expertise in this arena. But still .. I could not lie to myself ?that this album is completely nothing in it! Soooo ...booooooring my friend ....

Do you still say that I have been generous in giving rating?

Let me tell you straight, The reason why I have been holding my thoughts about this album for more than three months .... it's because of Steven Wilson name! I pushed my boundaries very hard trying to understand what he means with this album but .. I am so sorry, I don't get it Mr Wilson. I was well intimidated by the fact that some of my colleague collaborators had put relatively good to excellent (in fact masterpiece!) ratings of this album. What's wrong with me then? Am I nut if I can not still understand the music? I have been struggling these days....should I give it a one star rating or two? What about three? No? definitely it's not a three star! So ..it's in between 1 to 2 stars, really. Am I mentally ready to say it as one star album? It's a thought provoking for

Well, ...as Fish did say in 'The Web' that ....'the decision has to be made', I have to take my standpoint as well....

Let me start with good things because you have been hearing bad things through the above phrases, haven't you? The soundscapes production of this album is excellent especially if you are audiophile, you will enjoy the mastery of Mr Wilson experimenting his sound thoughts through this album. There are interesting sound effects produced here in there throughout the songs delivered here. I also enjoy this because I feel like I am in the music room when I listen to the soundscapes. If you are familiar with Porcupine Tree, I think the root of this album is coming from Porcupine Tree style, it's 90% similar to any Porcupine Tree album with exception of 'In Absentia'. The rest, you can guess what it sounds like.

The bad things are on the composition which, in my humblest opinion, is very poor. It seems like Mr. Wilson had never thought it very hard on how creating such a robust composition. Well, when I say composition it's about the combination of multi dimensions like melody line, harmonies, complexity, change of style, and structural integrity. This album scores very low on complexity, change of style and melody. All tracks presented in this album are basically very simple and majority of them are repeats of chords that have made me feeling 'bored' with the music being played. I do not demand that complexity must be high, at least being moderate. Why? It's a prog music man .. if there is nothing as being complex, you must categorize it as pop music and nothing wrong with it. On change of style, this album has nothing in it. For each track there is no change of style or maybe very minimum. The way to understand this is that you can guess how the song will finish by knowing the intro because it's basically many repeats. On melody, actually it's not fair to say that there is no melody here with this album. Yes, there is, for example on the opening track 'Harmonie Korine'. But?it's not a solid melody. I especially feel depressed and pathetic listening to the concluding track that is the title track 'Insurgentes'. What Mr Wilson is trying to do anyhow?

In Conclusion...

I appreciate Mr Wilson's rebel to challenge the music industry codes nowadays as he meant with the word 'insurgentes' which is a Spannish word meaning 'rebellion'. If that is his true intention, I see this album as a composition with no direction and it sounds like a jamming of his own one-man band even though he has recruited big names in prog music like Tony Levin and the rest. He has failed to capitalize the full potentials of great prog musicians right here in this album. He can play the whole album without the help of those musicians. What for he was hiring Jordan Rudess playing such simple piano work? I don not understand. Is it for marketing gimmick? Let me tell you, Mr Wilson, at the end of the day, the music itself that counts!

And if this is the kind of rebel he has been trying to do in prog music, I am so sorry that I make my stand clearly here that I am NOT going to follow his direction. Full stop. I'd rather keep on proggin' with the like of The Tangent, The Flower Kings, Simon Says, Pain of Salvation and many great names in prog music.

Please do not feel offended as I express my honest opinion. Peace on earth and mercy mild - GW