BY ROYAL DECREE

You know, it's true that this band doesn't get the love they deserve. This album came out in March, and artist Kevin Sloan is back on album artwork duty. I have listened to this album numerous times, and this album never fails to be one of the best this band has released. The artwork is typical of Kevin Sloan but just as gorgeous as always. The production and clarity of this album is impressive. It's evident that this was recorded in a big studio. The format of this album is balanced, with plenty of great material on both discs, making for an effortless listening experience. The tone of this album is reminiscent of their previous works, including Stardust We Are, Retropolis, and Unfold The Future. With this balance of old and new components to the sound of this well-structured album, it's clear that this album is deserving of a higher rating than their previous two albums. The album comes as a digipack, digital download, or vinyl for varied formats for different listeners who want different listening experiences. This album also features the lineup of the previous two albums while welcoming back old members, Michael Stolt and Hasse Brunniuson. The album features guest musicians Jonas Lindberg on bass (Jonas Lindberg and the Other Side), Rob Townsend on Saxophones (Steve Hackett), Aliaksandr Yasinski on Accordion, and Jannica Lund on Backing Vocals. When comparing, Waiting For Miracles and Islands to this album, it breaks out of that safety that Roine and the rest of the band forced themselves into. I can break down the "safety" of both Waiting and Islands into one word, typical. Waiting For Miracles was way more typical Flower Kings than Islands was, but By Royal Decree was very different from both albums. With the new release, you get less predictable sounds and songwriting from the band, mixed with good production, well-honed technique, and a warm atmospheric tone throughout the record. Opening with The Great Pretender was a good choice. For me, it took a while to love the track, but it grew after hearing it over and over. Ending the first CD with Revolution was also an intelligent decision, giving callbacks from the entire first disc and closing it off. I would've preferred it if the whole album ended with Revolution, but that's fine. To open the second disc, you get Time The Great Healer, similar in structure and emotion to The Great Pretender. Both tracks share similar themes but are distinctively different, so it doesn't seem like a copy track or reprise. At the end of the second disc, we have Funeral Pyres, a nice-sounding, warm track that seems like it could've been on Desolation Rose. All of these tracks have moments of brilliance, but the two tracks that stand out the most to me are A Million Stars and World Gone Crazy. Both songs are almost complete opposites; World Gone Crazy is a bombastic and fast song with solos, complex harmonic arrangements, and plenty of dynamics. A Million Stars is calm and slow, has gorgeous soft harmonies, and a tame atmosphere. This combating dynamic between both songs amplifies the purity of this double album. The same can be said of The Darkness in You and The Soldier opposite, but their combating themes work to make this album very dynamic. This album has unpredictable songs, such as Blinded, We Can Make It Work, and Moth. Blinded almost have a Steely Dan kind of jazz-rock tonality to Roine's guitar chords and tone of the guitar. We Can Make it Work is reminiscent of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. And lastly, Moth is a total return to form, returning to the era of Stardust We Are. Of course, there are also your typical Flower Kings tracks, like The Big Funk and Open Your Heart. However, even with these standard-sounding songs, they fit like puzzle pieces in this very different-sounding album. The remaining tracks I am yet to discuss are Peacock On Parade, Letter, Evolution, Silent Ways, and Shrine. All of these fit the typical sound of The Flower Kings and yet don't at the same time. Peacock On Parade is a warm but complicated piece with plenty of dynamics, vocal harmonies, and complex instrumental arrangements. Letter is a short, quirky, weird little vocal track with bizarre instrumental passages, very atypical of this band, yet genius. Evolution is a big instrumental song with very well-written arrangements by Roine and Zach. Silent Ways is a song in which Hasse takes over lead vocals and has an easy time with them. This song is also gentle and recalls a bunch of those aspects of "Islands" in that it has that same innocence and gentleness. Shrine is an instrumental, one-minute, pleasant piano piece by Zach Kamins; enough said. So overall, I have zero complaints; objectively speaking, this album is a masterpiece in the band's discography. I suppose the only thing keeping it at the bottom of the top three is... it's just not FlowerPower or Stardust We Are. However, it is a fantastic album by The Flower Kings, and with many remasters on the way, it's hard not to get excited.

5 stars / essential: a masterpiece of progressive rock music.

As many of you all may know, The Flower Kings are one of my favorite, if not my absolute favorite modern progressive rock acts. To me their work is top tier in many respects. From the beautiful and space like Stardust We Are, to the happy and fun filled Banks of Eden. I fully believe they can capture many essences of what makes Prog of today so fun to dive into for both young and old fans. Their music isn't perfect mind you, but they do have a great and consistent track record of great if not good albums. Their albums usually have great flows, great crescendos, amazing vocal work from Roine Stolt, and aspics that truly make them retro Prog legends.

With all that, I was obviously excited for their 2022 album release, By Royal Decree. After the album was released on streaming services, I was excited for what was to come from the album. Gotta say, I was quite surprised the first time hearing it.

The album definitely feels a lot different than most of the band's catalog. It's a lot less symphonic and takes a bit more of a rock sound and something a tad bit related to something like a Crossover Prog or a Eclectic Prog album. The starting track, The Great Pretender, introduces this new sound pretty nicely. Each song afterwards complements these less symphonic sounds and it feels like the band is less of an orchestra and more of a actual band. I don't mind this, though I won't deny that I do not have some sadness of the missing complexities of the act they had for most of their career.

However this album definitely has a new charm, being the complexities of these songs. I am not saying complex as in song structure, but complex as in lyrically and artistically. A lot of these songs are from the cutting room floor and they have some pretty conspicuous lyrics and ideas of the mind, soul, war, and many things that can be good head scratchers.

Though this album definitely has it's fair share of problems. This album is definitely a album with back problems. While the first few and last few songs are pretty excellent and makes me feel good, I will not deny the few middle songs are kinda forgettable. Not bad just kinda boring and or forgettable. The vocals are also a tiny bit wonky. I know Roine is a bit older, with him being in his 60s, I do feel like a lot of the times he misses the mark on the lot of the songs here, songs like The Darkness in You and Time The Great Healer especially.

If I could, I'd have Roine do a retake on the lot of these songs just so they don't sound a bit rusty.

So was this a good album? Yeah, I'd say it was pretty good, though it doesn't have what I need out of a Flower Kings album. It's definitely a grower album for me, I like what it pulls, but I might have to find a bit of a taste for the type of music that is found on this album. Not a bad album at all, but definitely not as good as I'd hope it'd be.

So, just to be up front here, I am pretty new to the TFK train and have been making an effort to take the entire catalog all in. Given that there are some 15 studio albums, many of them 75 to 90 minutes and even longer, this has been a somewhat monumental task. I have taken all of them in order at least once to get a sense of the band's progression, and have listened to most of them more than once. I have also spent quite a bit of time reading the reviews for the albums as well, and wow what a mixed bag. Rightly so, this band garners considerable respect from the prog community, and yet there is a lot of love/hate responses to their ongoing evolution, which to me seems a bit fanatical. Admittedly, TFK does a lot of experimentation with different styles so not every song, or every album in its entirety, is going to appeal to everyone but overall in my opinion the diversity and evolution is a big part of their appeal.

For the record, I really enjoy well constructed epics and TFK has plenty of them, but the last three albums have deviated from this pattern pretty substantially. They have instead been constructed of mostly shorter songs, although still fairly lengthy in comparison to standard radio fare, and this seems to be a source of disappointment for many long time fans of the band. However, within this framework there is much room for experimentation and diversity. Admittedly, some of it is quite prog oriented, but other pieces not so much, and yet there is generally enough complexity to compensate for this.

While I clearly am not as qualified to review this band as many long time fans, being as I have enjoyed the recent release 'By Royal Decree', I am feeling up to the challenge of offering a new fan's perspective on this latest release. To start off the album cover is gorgeous and builds up anticipation for the music that it accompanies. This is a big plus for me as I have to say I really hate some of their album art, although the music in the albums is still great. So here is my take on music...

The Great Pretender: This is a great opening track that is diverse in musical ideas and tempos, and nice trading off of vocal duties. Enjoy the theatrical flavor of the hell and high water section of the song which is followed by a nice guitar solo, and then finishes with an enjoyable synth conclusion. A nice start! (9/10)

World Gone Crazy: Starts with a gradual build up, a quick riff or two, into a vocal section, at 3:30 breaks into a nother enjoyable synth section. Not overly prog, more rock, lyrics very apropos for our day. Ends with a repeat of the short opening riff. (7/10)

Blinded: Opens with somewhat eerie build up, becomes more upbeat, some semi jazzy guitar and instrumentation in a nice instrumental section in the middle. Around 5:30 builds back into the more ominous tone highlighting synths once again, ends with the jazzy flavor fading away. (8/10)

A Million Stars: A kind of spacey sounding ballad with lots of little tweaky synth sounds filtered through out, just a very pretty song. At 4:15 it sounds like the song is over, but changes to an even slower tempo and plays out to its conclusion. The first four minutes would make for a nice single. I always ponder if some portion of a prog album could be released to attract attention to widen the prog fan base; this could be it for this album. One of my favorite tracks on this album, but have to take a point away for the somewhat repetitive lyrics, but a small complaint really.... (9/10)

The Soldier: A pretty straight forward lyric oriented piece until it hits the 3:00 minute mark and a nice instrumental sections lifts it up, closes with more lyrics. Nice but nothing particularly new here (7/10)

The Darkness In You: I am a sucker for prog ballads and this is another good one. Has a nice slow musical atmosphere, nice backing harmonies to the primary vocals, nice closing blues guitar and piano. Another favorite for me (9/10)

We Can Make It Work: This one has a kind of Beatles vibe, 70's type sound, happy and upbeat. Quite a contrast to the previous track in mood and tempo. Short, fun, simple, and optimistic. Again, not particularly prog but enjoyable nonetheless (8/10)

Peacock on Parade: Related to the cover art? Perhaps. Starts with a nice instrumental build up. In fact, except for a very short lyrical interlude remains an instrumental throughout with musical duties shared by the various members of the band. Pleasant enough but nothing strikingly memorable either (7/10)

Revolution: This starts with a minstrel type vibe, upbeat and catchy, immediately draws you in. The vocal immediately makes me think of Jon Anderson in tone and style, especially at the outset of the vocals. This gradually fades away. Around the 4:00 mark, the Million Stars music and lyrics are reprized, but go up tempo and more dramatic. I really like this technique as it ties things together. It would have been quite doable to put the Million Stars track and this one together and had a nice suite, and a mini epic. Interesting that they did not choose to do this. (9/10)

Time the Great Healer: This one is for the first three minutes is very vocal oriented with a soft under side of straight forward musical accompaniment. After this it picks up with an array of synth and guitar, more unusual synth gyrations, and closes with repeat of the vocals over the more uptempo musicianship. Second half of the song saves this one, overall not bad. (8/10)

Letter: A very short prog pop type offering. Didn't particularly like this the first time I heard it but it has grown on me as a nice interlude. It may be just me but for some reason when I first heard this song, even though they are quite different from one another, it reminded me straight away of 'Don't Go' from the Yes album Magnification. In any event, I'll call it a keeper. (8/10)

Evolution: The first complete instrumental track. A mid tempo piece with nice synth and keyboard foundation with enjoyable bass and lead guitar over. (8/10)

Silent Ways: Starts slow and low, acoustic oriented ballad, nice vocal, around 3:00 starts to build up a bit in intensity, electric guitar eventually comes in. Again, not particularly prog, but I like it. (8/10)

Moth: A mournful sounding song, piano based, another ballad. At 2:45 there is a pause and the piece begins to come back and pick up some depth and gentle intensity and choir like vocals to close it out. (7/10)

The Big Funk: After the last two very calm ballads, this one starts slow but gradually builds up a bit with some good guitar and synth interplay. About halfway through the tempo picks up a bit more, but never fully takes off. (7/10)

Open Your Heart: A bit more uptempo ballad with some pleasant synth and keyboard under layment, a little restrained guitar interplay especially at the end, mostly vocal oriented. (7/10)

Shrine: A very short piano instrumental. What is there not to like about this? (8/10)

Funeral Pyres: Starts with some guitar with a bit of power in it. Been waiting for this after a sequence of more ballad type pieces. Lots of things going on this one with tempo and instrument changes, one of the more prog oriented efforts. Nice build up to the end. A decent closer for the album (9/10)

So what are my take aways for 'By Royal Decree'? First of all, this comes across as a very accessible effort with a satisfying degree of complexity and prog sensibilities. That being said, there are portions that are not particularly prog-centric, but still seem to fit anyway. All in all, while not rating any song as perfect 10 although some are very close, there is nothing bad in the entire 94 minutes of music. It's a lot to absorb but worth the effort.

I can see where long time fans of TFK will miss the longer epics and wilder experimentation of past albums, but this work certainly has its merits also. It can definitely expose the band to new listeners for sure as it wouldn't be a bad place to start their catalog. That being said, I would be the first to admit that it is not necessarily a direct representation of their past work, but what would be given its grand scope and volume?

Most prog oriented songs if you want to focus on those are 'the Great Pretender', 'Blinded', 'A Million Stars', 'Darkness in You', 'Revolution', 'Time the Great Healer', and 'Funeral Pyres'.

Log time fans given to their older style may not agree, but I am going with 4 star score, not for how it compares to their past work, but on its own merits, especially from a new fan's perspective.

The most recent installment and technically their fifteenth studio album(!), By Royal Decree is their fourth (including 2018's Manifesto of an Alchemist, under the seemingly backhanded name Roine Stolt's The Flower King), following the still-mysterious departure of the once-seemingly-quintessential--I still want to give him compliments galore--Tomas Bodin. Through and through, regardless of personnel, The Flower Kings are still wondrously capable monarchs, and kindly for continuing to share this mutual love with us [I guess I've been in my feels recently haha].

Opening up the album, "The Great Pretender" is a triumph. As with much in the Flower Kings catalog, this has classic Prog moments and modernity alike. Solid melodies and a composition which is so convincingly confident and daring, it's successfully moving. Big shock coming from these veteran Swedes /s. Killer synth solo toward the end, from Bodin's replacement, Zach Kamins. "World Gone Crazy", with Flower Kings' branded drama in title and sonics, is dark and tense; a tad Fusion-y, a tad spacy. Delicious stuff; forever impressed specifically with drummer Mirkko DeMaio; yet another insane synth solo to wrap this one up as well. Plenty to love.

"Blinded" has a classic, Dark Roine-penned theme. Awesome layers and satisfying buildup and release of tension throughout. Gotta unclench that jaw some time haha. There is some incredible saxophone soloing here, performed by a man I incidentally saw last night, Rob Townsend of Steve Hackett's band (incredible show, if you ever are granted the chance; I was truly blessed). Indeed "Blinded" could well have been something in Hackett's catalog, a plenty high praise. Modern Prog simply doesn't get much better than this! And then, we get a bit sentimental on "A Million Stars", don't we? Sonically reminds me of Styx or America [that sounds confusing now that I'm reading it back]? As a whole, impressive, though I'm not wild about the song, if you're trackin'.

We come back to familiar big feelings Flower Kings on "The Soldier". Sweeping and beautiful (3.5/5.0, to be clear; less readied for your "prog rock music collection", but a fine song nonetheless). Unveiling more about ourselves than what I was ready to hear tonight /s, "The Darkness in You" is sweet in its melancholic intro. Before the second verse, it drops away, besides drums, and my mind went to Celine's ridiculously epic take on "All By Myself", yet there's nothing sweeping or epic to that degree here. Honestly, the first low-point on the record. "We Can Make It Work"? More like "We Can Make a Mid-00s Singer-Songwriter Hit Psychedelic Pop". Quirky Edwardian something-rather. I'm on the fence about it, but it is plenty well performed.

And finally we get a moment from the band that I am excited to proclaim, 'Now this is Flower Kings!': "Peacock on Parade". I still get excited about these things. I guess you could say it's working then [toothsome smile emoji]. This has a really great organ solo, so excellently performed, driven harder and seemingly faster with the rhythm section to boot. "Revolution" up next features some medieval-esque sounds. Charming and then booming. Another one forward-driving, despite the hard swing of the drums. Synth in the middle reminded me of Starcastle, yet this section is like Jazz-meets-Alt-meets-Melodic-Metal. In some sense, I think it had me wanting just a little bit more.

"Time the Great Healer"... I guess Roine's short stint recording with Jon Anderson rubbed off on the guy, huh? Emotive. The synth's airy timbre, impressive as all these thangs are today--before the compositional shift nearing minute 3--made me think of present-day Todd Rundgren keysmith Glasys [You should definitely take a moment to check out his insane videos on, in the very least, Instagram]. The experimental soloing and general soundscape, especially that of the bridge section, really saved this one for me. I was a bit skeptic at the start. "Letter" most immediately had me wondering if this was inspired, in part, by Frank Zappa (think Hot Rats or perhaps Uncle Meat). Quirky, exciting and eclectic, yet undeniably Art Pop. Pretty unorthodox for them, but I found it a real treat.

"Evolution"! Woah! Epic and classic! Recognizing here and now, since I've used the term 'epic' I think twice now, By Royal Decree quite surprisingly has no track over 8 minutes in length. Just one of the truly plenty-if-not-many reasons the album has been so approachable, this unsurprisingly (speaking as a fan of these Kings, this is a feat haha). We return to our 'feels' on "Silent Ways" (too pretty a track to make a fart joke? I'm not so sure...). Our first lead vox track in a while with the great Hasse Froberg, I welcome it always [Oh, wow, I haven't listened to "The Truth Will Set You Free" in a longer while...]. What I would think was the bridge has a lot of noggin-massagin', but I was definitely not in love with this track. Great ideas nonetheless.

"Moth" is... dark haha. And sad? Y'all into melancholia? Weird in the second half... Is this Danny Elfman? We about to hear this on the next Tim Burton film soundtrack? Sort of another out of character for the band, but good at what it does. "The Big Funk" begins with a... space Raga? Fantastic sound. The track features more Worldly sonic choices and instrumentation throughout. Again, triumphant, glorious, righteous feel. More Jon-Anderson-isms on "Open Your Heart"? Perhaps. Even on these sort of tracks, focused on emotion and their encouraging benedictions, they do find a way to stir interest. It's not boring, at least haha. In fact, like with the shifting and sliding into the outro, we get a tasty guitar solo from Roine.

Approaching the close, "Shrine" is a minute-long piano interlude, somewhat an intro to the final track, "Funeral Pyres" (perhaps weaker as both interlude and intro?). Roine's guitar is soulful and powerful on the latter track. The rhythm is slinky and loose, a bit of a foot-tapper. This is a Hasse vocals number. We get some mallet work, too! Around the midpoint, the rhythm shifts once more, into a bluesy, seemingly gospel-inspired section. Nice track overall, but not the most stellar closer in my opinion.

Happy to hear more from Stolt and Co, regardless, and of course I look forward to the next!

True Rate: 3.75/5.00

[Currently sitting in a newer cafe in my hometown I hadn't been to yet, and it's honestly as if a Target showroom spat up. Anyways, House Blend strikes again.] [This is now a day later, not at a Target-sponsored cafe, and god, I love this band.] [Editing this weeks later, as I can't help but do, I did in fact listen to their magnum opus, in my opinion, "The Truth Will Set You Free". Highly, highly recommend that classic.]

This is the 15th album from veteran Progressive rock band The Flower Kings, and 3rd since their 2019 reformation with this current lineup. This is a double album, as each of their previous few have been as well, so it is quite expansive and contains a lot of music, 18 tracks of mostly shorter songs (thus, no long epics that they are somewhat known for) coming in at ~96 minutes of music. First, the album sounds great, and the musicianship and lush arrangements are superb throughout. The instrumental passages and sections within songs are the real highlight here, as they generally raise the level of the songs. Unfortunately, I have a bit of an issue with many of the songs themselves, particularly many of the verse and chorus sections, as they tend to be somewhat lackluster and just not very memorable. Overall, it's quite pleasant and enjoyable, but not much more than that. For me, most of the songs pass by without generating much enthusiasm, doesn't grab my attention, and just kind of fade into progressive background music. The album doesn't really take off until near the end of the first disc, with a great sequence of songs: 'We Can Make it Work' is a bright little pop ditty that is elevated by the unique instrumentation and wonderful arrangement (use of xylophone, various guitar fills, and vocals), followed by 'Peace on Parade', a great instrumental that shows what this band is capable of, too bad there are not more like this here, and then the disc closer 'Revolution', another album highlight. Disc 2 continues with hit and miss tracks, but includes several more highlights. So yes, overall, the album is quite good, and contains many great moments, but it is just not great overall. I do not think it measures up to their best work. There are several fine songs here, but also many just OK ones. Best tracks: 'Peacock on Parade', 'Revolution', 'Evolution', 'We Can Make It Work', 'The Big Funk', 'Funeral Pyre', 'A Million Stars'.

I don't think it is possible for Roine Stolt to release a bad album, no matter what band he is involved with, and here we have the fifteenth studio effort from the group who took their name from his incredible 1994 solo album, which I loved when it came out. It thrust the name of the ex-Kaipa guitarist right into the heart of the underground, and in these days of the internet it is hard to explain just how big an impact it had on the scene when it was released, back when all anyone had were a few fanzines and word of mouth. Since then, there have been various musicians through the group, and to be honest as long as Roine is there in control of it all that is all that matters.

But, one of the major issues he has always had is a refusal to self-edit as much as he should, and it is not unusual to release albums which are overlong and should have been cut back in size. At 94 minutes this is not their longest release, but that is still pretty lengthy and demands two CDs, and here they have used the opportunity to spread their wings and sit strongly within symphonic prog yet also bring in influences from other areas as well. It is an album which takes quite a bit of listening to, as it takes quite a bit of time to really get inside, even though it feels highly commercial and the musicianship is stunning. I did smile when I saw Rob Townsend guesting on sac (and his addition is inspired), given the last time I saw him was in his normal day job with Steve Hackett, who on the last tour had Jonas Reingold on bass. The first time I played it all the way through I kept looking to see when it was ending and how much longer it had to go until it finished, but the next time I just let myself fall into the music, with the result being the realisation that this is another very good album indeed. Not up to the standard of 'Waiting For Miracles' perhaps, but still very enjoyable for all progheads.

By Royal Decree follows the same general format as the preceding two Flower Kings albums, Waiting For Miracles and Islands - it's a two-CD release, but the running time is a shade over 90 minutes rather than being the sort of epic monster album the band used to put out in the 1990s, and the focus is on (by their standards) shorter pieces rather than epics. That doesn't mean it's less Flower Kings-y by any stretch of the imagination - it just means that the compositions are a bit tighter. Though Waiting For Miracles is still the best album of this clutch of three, By Royal Decree is still a solidly entertaining collection of work, leaning perhaps a bit more on the Yes-influenced side of their sound and a bit less on the quirky, Zappa-esque playfulness which crept in during Islands.