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Arena - Songs from the Lions Cage CD (album) cover

SONGS FROM THE LIONS CAGE

Arena

 

Neo-Prog

3.84 | 489 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

toroddfuglesteg
4 stars An excellent debut album.

Arena hit the scene like a piece of rock with this album. Established by an ex Marillion member and it shows. Arena is in that area or even perhaps a lot more symphonic than neo prog.

Arena does not really add anything new to me. Neither does this album. Tonnes of keyboards, courtesy of Clive Nolan, long and good guitar solos, a good vocalist + bass and drums. The setup is standard.

There are some really long suites here. That too is pretty standard back then and these days too. But where this album really stands out is in the quality and great songs stake. The unknown X factor which mostly is down to everyone's subjective opinion. This album is great from start to finish. But it is best when the fifteen minutes long Solomon comes in. A great, symphonic piece of music with a fantastic choir, tangents and guitars. I am hooked. But in reallity, I was hooked many minutes before Solomon too. By songs like Out Of The Wilderness and Valley Of The Kings too.

Yes, Arena has not re-invented the wheel here. But they does their stuff better than most bands on this album. An album fit for any fans of melodic, symphonic neo prog. Hence my rather sudden conversion into a fan of this album and the band.

4.5 stars

toroddfuglesteg | 4/5 |

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