DISCORDANT DREAMS

A fine debit album from the rather wonderful Touchstone.

I had never heard of them until The Cambridge Rock Festival and I was blown away with how professional they sounded.

I of course bought their CD after the gig, and they must have impressed everyone as they sold out the supply they bought!!!

So after the setting of the scene with Intro all atmospherics and unclear vocals the band kick in with the powerfull opening riff to Discordent Dreams, which contains some heavy guitar but a nice subtle keyboard during the vocals.

Curious Angel and See The Light follow with an emphasis on catchy vocals underlined by some seriously good guitar and keyboards.

Being Hannah follows and is the first highlight , great vocals and a killer guitar solo.

Shadow keeps the album moving along and is follows by the rather beautiful Ocean Down.

These are followed by Black Tide - Touchstone in all their glory from the slow start, again with great vocal melodies, to the bass leading the band to the perfect instrumental break full of keyboards and guitars.

Dignity slows proceedings down but being touchstone this is soon enlivened with a superb guitar solo and the final keyboard play out.

Which leads us to The Beggars Song the albums highlight and a full 11 minutes of changing times and excellent playing leading to the typical anthemic finish.

Overall if you like Prog with pop sensibility this album will be a very good purchase.

They may not push back the boundaried but they play good well structured songs and they play it with passion, emotion and talent.

New album just about to be recorded so thats one to look forward to.

Touchstone is a young progressive rock band from Great Britain releasing their first studio album in 2007 named Discordant dreams. I was very pleasent surprised about this first album of this fantastic new band, great ideas, some excellent vocal arrangements and above all not a single piece is boring or unpleasent. Taken influences from neo prog in places but keeping that crossover feel and symphonic aproach all the time Touchstone really knew how to make a great debut iin progressive rock scene. Absolutly excellent are the alternation between the female voice with the male voice, very worm and right to the heart are the vocal arrangements, well done. The instrumental passages are elaborated and very good, from mellow parts to more rougher in places Discordanr dreams is a total winner for me. See The Light or The Beggar's Song are perfect ex of sheer briliancy of this young band. Powerfull guitar work , awesome keyboards arrangements and excellent vocal parts. What else I need more when I want to talk about a band from new generation who has great skills and inventive pieces. I will give easy 4 stas for this debute, one of the album who needs a wider recognition from progressive rock listners, they are really good. Similar with Mostley Autumn, but less folky and at some point with Magenta but less neo prog more towards eclectic music. Recommended.

A very nice band from the UK that plays some very melodic prog rock. I really enjoyed their album because they we able to mix so many different influences and still come up with something already of their own. So much that is hard to compare them to anyone else nowadays. Their music is quite simple (if you´re considering that in progressive rock terms only, of course), yet VERY effective and very professional: strong guitars (sometimes bordering the metal edge), tasteful keyboards passages, a very good rhythm section. The tracks are quite varied and most of the time a bit AOR flavored (not much, which I liked a lot). Nothing too groundbreaking, but extremely well done. The vocals are also very good although I still think the band would win a lot if they had put Kim Seviour to sing lead more (she mostly harmonizes, even if she has a beautiful voice). It is not that Rob Cottingham´s vocal performance is bad. In fact, he does it very well (he is also the keyboards man), but Kim´s voice is clearly more powerful and beautiful.

Excellent production, which helped to enhance their powerful perfomance and very good songwriting skills.

A nice surprise from the UK. Highly energetic and full of great melodies. Very promising. Rating is something between 3 and four stars. Not really essential, but far more than just good. I´ll give 3,5 for this debut. If you´re into this style, you should check this out. You won´t regret it.

I bought this album in anticipation of seeing Touchstone live at CalProg. I wanted to get to know the artists that were playing, so I figured this was a good starting point. I felt they gave a wonderful performance at CalProg and their personality as a band shone through. But, I'll admit that I can't quite connect with "Discordant Dreams." I'm not sure what the problem is. The music is just kind of, average, to my ears. By no means is it bad, I just find nothing truly special about it.

This album is not really very proggy to my ears overall. There are definitely moments where the prog shines through. But, overall it sounds very AOR and Classic Rock. But, there are moments where it sounds almost like Neo-Prog to my ears. Each song is upbeat for the most part and features some great mixing of vocals between a prominent male and female voice. The guitar stands out as the more dominant instrument of the band, but there are also moments where the keyboard player is able to shine. The drums and bass are very solid throughout, creating a real strong backbeat for the music. All of these elements seem to suggest I should like this album, but there is something lacking I can't quite put my finger on.

Part of the problem, I think, is that the songs don't sound very distinct to me. They all kind of blend together and it makes listening to the album a little bit tiring. I perhaps wanted a bit more originality. But, I do think there is some real potential with this group. There are some catchy melodies, some really good playing, and a definitely interesting vibe. Like I said, I felt these songs came more to life live, but don't really stick out to me on the album. But, songs like the title track, "See The Light", and most significantly, "The Beggar's Song" really show some definite potential. In fact, "The Beggar's Song" stands out as pretty excellent. If they can make an entire album of songs of that caliber, they could definitely have a winner on their hands. But, for me, this isn't quite a winner.

This is the debut album of British band Touchstone, released back in 2006 and entitled "Discordant Dreams" , here, the band let us know their first steps and the road their music is taking, with a good mixture of crossover prog with some metal hints. So be prepared because here you will have more than an hour of good music.

The opener track is just an atmospheric "Intro" which only lasts a minute until it opens the gates to "Discordant Dreams". Here, we can listen to that metal like style which is constantly softened by the vocals and the calm rhythm. The chorus is pretty catchy and reminds me a bit of Mostly Autumn; here is where the crossover prog label suits. The last minutes have a more delicate sound with piano and bass.

"Curious Angel" has a nice sound with some catchy moments but never far from that metal tune that they always try to implement. "See the Light" starts with a delicate piano and after some seconds drums, bass and guitar join and produce a more intense sound. The keyboards produce a symphonic sound that in moments belongs to thay symph metal realm, though later the vocals make a mellow tune that becomes catchier and in moments, even popish.

"Being Hannah" has a better participation of the female voice, though is not the leader yet, here we can listen to her making larger chorus and attractive second voices, while the male is still the main one. The vocals are nicely adapted to the music, which isa basic 4/4 structure with nice constant drums, cool bass lines and a rockish touch. There is a cool instrumental passage after four minutes, where the guitar shows its skills. "Shadow" starts with nice keyboards and guitars, creating again that kind of symphonic metal sound but without losing the crossover touch. Here, the female voice is now the leader, so here we can actually listen to what I would say is the most successful Touchstone style.

"Wintercoast" is a short instrumental passage that leads to "Ocean Down" which is another short track. Here the music is much more ballad-esque with a delicate and beautiful female voice accompanied by a piano. "Blacktide" has a cool acoustic guitar structure that is complemented by drums and vocals. A minute later the music is more intense and developed, though the rhythm might be the same, we can appreciate more elements that bring a more attractive and challenging sound This is a very good track!

"Dignity" is an emotive track that starts with a delicate sound for the first two minutes, and later it becomes totally symphonic due to the use of keyboards, then a guitar riff appears and now we can listen to a solid and exciting song. There is a long guitar solo that keeps us mesmerized and with the same interest since the first moments; later it vanishes and the vocals return, creating that emotional sound that started the track.

"The Beggar's Song Part 1" is the last track and the longest one of the album, reaching the 11-minute mark. This may be the best song of the album, because it is very well structured, the composition is intelligent, with the precise changes in rhythm and mood, and with that cool blend of light and heavy prog. I love the instrumental keyboard fiesta that appears in the first minutes, and how later the sound changes and becomes catchier. Sometimes these changes harm the music, but in this particular song they help it. I would have loved Touchstone included more songs like this, so the album would have been a killer, but well, this was the debut and they here let us know their capacity and their will to get better and enter to this difficult progressive rock realm.

A good album, with excellent moments, but mostly with just ok tracks, that is why my final grade will be 3 stars.

Enjoy it!

Liz Clayden's stint with Touchstone wouldn't last more than two years.When the band was heading for a new, this time full-length album, after receiving some warm critics, Kim Seviour was decided to be her replacement.She joined the band less than two months prior to entering the studio, so her contribution to the album was not really significant.Same goes for the drummer's place, Simon Cook was replaced by Alasdair Melville.With prog veteran John Mitchel contributing a guitar solo on "Dignity", ''Discordant dreams'' came out independently in 2007.

The music had turned from an artistic Heavy Prog with stylistical variety to a more focused and strongly British-flavored Heavy/Neo Prog, Rob Cottingham & co. surface as a unique unit with a great composing talent and the new album is characterized by its pounding grooves, expressive and clean vocals to go along with superb songwriting and a crystalline production.The material in here reminds me a lot of IOEARTH, FREQUENCY DRIFT and JADIS with bits from the music of SATELLITE, fantastic tracks with the occasional organ and the standard synth waves, offering dramatic, emotional or powerful tunes, mostly covered by dynamic guitar moves and a good bunch of changing climates.Touchstone came up with series of beautiful tracks, the vocal parts are memorable and well-arranged and the instrumental content is largely groovy with many twists and turns.Very modern-sounding with atmospheric passages, lyrical depth and bombastic orchestrations.Some tracks are fairly rooted in the classic Neo Prog tradition with dark and romantic mood changes and alternating soundlevels, going from melodious themes to heavy musicianship.Whatever this style is, the group managed to deliver impressive and passionate performances all the way.

Lovely attempt on the heavier side of Prog/Art Rock, being British they also decided to throw in these charming Neo Prog values.Great work to say the least and highly recommended.