Progarchives, the progressive rock ultimate discography
Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come - Journey CD (album) cover

JOURNEY

Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come

 

Psychedelic/Space Rock

4.11 | 136 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

friso
Prog Reviewer
2 stars Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come - Journey (1973)

Arthur Brown is a cult singer who became famous with heavy psychedelic and 'shocking' the 'Crazy world of Arthur Brown' album in 1968. With his low voice and high screams (like Ian Gillan of Deep Purple) and his extravagant style and appearance he and his band made one of best standing psych records of the sixties. After that, Brown has had a career that perhaps never wasn't as satisfying as how it started. With Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come he went to the space/electronic scene and came up with this band of not-too-talented musicians.

At first we are confronted with the simplicity of the bare drum-computer (played by Brown) intro that is as slow as it is boring. Luckily the (often overrated) spacey/electronic and mellotron sounds join in eventually and we get some acceptable vocals of Brown. The chord structures are the simplest possible and even the vocals aren't very developed. The guitars often sound out-of-pitch, which always is a serious issue for me (false notes can make me shiver). Still, the opening track 'Time Captives' is perhaps the most interesting track of the album. 'Triangles' has a more developed harmonical approach, but is under- produced and sounds as if the band doesn't know where it is heading. The second long track 'Gypsy' suffers some more from the enormous lack of flexibility in form, dynamics and style that arises from playing without drummers. The sudden change of rhythm into the up- tempo section then finally comes as a surprise, but even this sounds poor because of the copy-paste sound. On side two we get to listen to mainly the same signs of amateurism that makes me want to put off side one.

Now, as the second reviewer that allows himself to be very critical towards this otherwise enthusiastic received record of Arthur Brown I'm beginning to wonder what others see in it. Spacey atmospheres? The sheer fact it's Arthur Brown going in prog-realms? To have yet another space rock record with heavy use of mellotrons? Obscurity? I just can't see.

Conclusion. For me, the apparent lack of flexibility, skills, song-writing and production isn't easy put aside. Perhaps my brother, 'the philosopher' will write a more happy review (after he's gotten my once oh so exciting purchase). As for me, I couldn't recommend this even to fans of Arthur Brown, because that magic vibe around his character will only become less vibrant whilst listening to this amateurism. Two stars.

friso | 2/5 |

MEMBERS LOGIN ZONE

As a registered member (register here if not), you can post rating/reviews (& edit later), comments reviews and submit new albums.

You are not logged, please complete authentication before continuing (use forum credentials).

Forum user
Forum password

Share this ARTHUR BROWN'S KINGDOM COME review

Social review comments () BETA







Review related links

Copyright Prog Archives, All rights reserved. | Legal Notice | Privacy Policy | Advertise | RSS + syndications

Other sites in the MAC network: JazzMusicArchives.com — jazz music reviews and archives | MetalMusicArchives.com — metal music reviews and archives

Donate monthly and keep PA fast-loading and ad-free forever.