ABOUT TIME

I was such a lucky one to listen to this album. I came across it occasionally, and it struck me with its beauty, emotions and crafty melodies. Imagine a mix of classic MARILLION, GENESIS, IQ, PENDRAGON and PINK FLOYD hooks like ballad codas, rocky moments (frequent double bass drum!), catchy and memorable verses and choruses with thought-provoking lyrics, touching guitar solos and excellent keyboard work (from “Cinema Show”-like solos to background Mellotron/Hammond/synth layers). ALSO EDEN are brave enough to release “About Time” on their own, without any label’s help. Unfortunately this can work against the band – they’re really that much good and professional to be recognized among Top Retro-Proggers of today like MAGENTA or FLOWER KINGS. They are very much sincere in what they’re doing, and if you would like to get something classy like “The Masquerade Overture” (PENDRAGON), “Mirror of Insanity” (RED SAND) or “Moonshine” (COLLAGE), look for nobody else but ALSO EDEN folks (and their CD!). Extremely recommended without hesitation; 4,5 stars and high hopes for future works to come. Thank you so much for the music!!!

This is a UK band with roots in the Nineties but it lasted until 2006 before Also Eden released their debut CD entitled About Time, the title is almost a self-parody! The album contains five compositions, most songs have a running time between 8 and 12 minutes. Listening to Also Eden I am delighted about their pleasant sound and the flowing shifting moods and accellarations: from dreamy with piano and warm vocals or mid-tempo with howling guitar to compelling with sensitive guitar or bombastic eruptions with flashy synthesizer flights. The singer has a strong, quite distinctive voice with a melancholical undertone. As references I would like to mention IQ and Marillion but with a more modern sound. If you are up to neo-prog, this is a band to discover!

Huw Lloyd-Jones (vocals) and Ian Hodson (keys) are the main men behind the project called ALSO EDEN.Despite having their roots at the beginnings of the new millenium,ALSO EDEN exist as a normal band since 2005 with the addition of Ralvin Thomas on bass,Simon Rogers on guitars and Mark Hall on drums. The Cheltenam-based 5-member act performs live for the first time in July 2005 and starts recording their debut with new songs,but also some old material from late-90's.

''About time'' was privately released in 2006 and it is a very good example of modern progressive/art rock with strong vintage references.Five songs,mostly lengthy, compositions present a band with great talent,who like to care of every detail on their songs.''About time'' can be very lyrical and melodic,but also complicated and challenging at the same time.The vocals of Lloyd-Jones are definitely awesome with a deep expression and a bright color,surrounded by the melodic guitars of Rogers and the lightning synthesizers of Hodson.Influences come from old-GENESIS (listen to the delicate acoustic guitars and the fine moog solos),SPOCK'S BEARD and of course bands of 80's UK prog,mainly MARILLION (lots of atmospheric keys around),PALLAS (at the more dynamic moments) and PENDRAGON (combining melodic guitars with background synths),but the closest comparison would propably be STRANGEFISH.A great debut for this band,which certainly deserves your attention.Recommended to fans of progressive rock in general,who want to explore a fresh-sounding band with talent...3.5 stars is my exact rating for this pleasant work.

You will find something like Pink Floyd meets Pallas on the kind of music Also Eden is playing. Of course this might not satisfy what the Pink Floyd fans expect as the keyboard exploration, even though it has a lot, is something that Pink Floyd did in the past. But for sure it will satisfy the expectations of Pallas fans or, put it in broader perspective, neo-prog fans. Why? It has everything that neo-prog fans want: keyboard-drenched music with its ambient, moves the music in relatively slow tempo with nice vocal work.

Even though on melody aspect this album is lacking, the other aspects of musical composition, in my opinion, score average - nothing that's really excellent. there are changes of style throughout the album and some segments sound really good especially in its effort to create ambient. From track 2 "For Bumble" (13:21) the band tries to give musical break with silent segment demonstrating acoustic guitar to accompany vocal. The music flow in relatively slow manner. Harmonies created from all instruments are considered quite good. "The Enemy Within" (12:13) starts with short piano work and the music flows in a relatively slow mode.

Overall, this is an album suitable for neo-prog fans. It's a good one to have.

Peace on earth and mercy mild - GW

OOOhhhh!!! I love this record! For a 80´s neo prog freak like me, this is simply prog heaven! Also Eden´s debut was a big surprise for me. Although this album was released in 2006, it has all the elements that made neo prog so distinctive in that decade: dramatic vocals, lush (but not overwhelming) keyboards, Gilmour/Hackett-like guitars and, most of all, an excellent bunch of songs to boot. Those guys really love what they do and their performances are full of passion and conviction. It almost makes you forget that they are not that original.

If Huw Lloyd-Jones voice was not so particular, I´d believe this was Marillion reincarnated. The style is very much the same, with hints of old Genesis, IQ and Pallas all over it. And still their songwriting skills are so good it gives them a personal touch that make them stand out from so many Marillion copycats. the top notch, modern production also helps a lot here too (something almost all 80´s acts lacked, at least in the beginning). There are no fillers and all the songs are very strong, well crafted, grealy performed and the arrangements are tasteful. But the pinnacle of this CD is the last track, the very powerful Children Of the Night. It´s the kind of song that, once finished, it leaves a you with a desire for more of it. Lloyd-Jones is a very good singer that has a extremely good delivering of the words. The band is great too, and they are very much team players, with every musician taking his turn without getting in the way of the other. The result is a very tigh, flowing sound that makes you think the CD´s only flaw is its short time (49 minutes).

Not much more to say about it. If you´re into neo prog this is a must have. If you like prog music in general and don´t mind much for originality, but do care for tastefulness and emotion, this is a good choice too. Personally , I´d give this album a 5 star rating without hesitation. However, as a reviewer om PA I don´t quite think this is really a masterpiece of prog music. So I guess 4 stars is more fitting here. Excellent addition to any prog music collection. Warning: highly addictive!

Also Eden's debut album presents an energetic and boisterous style of neo-prog reminiscent of a more forceful version of Arena's style from their first three albums (and of course there's a heavy sniff of early Marillion about proceedings). What the band lose in originality, they somewhat make up for in enthusiasm, with their high-energy playing and carefully judged compositions winning me over. They are far from being a lazy Marillion clone - vocalist Huw Lloyd-Jones, in particular, sings in his own distinctive (and really quite good) style as opposed to impersonating Fish - but they are quite clearly rooted in the classic neo-prog sound of the early 1980s. Fans of that particular style who cannot get enough of it might hear a lot that they like here - but a lot of it will be familiar enough to make them feel like they've heard it all before.

Review Nº 210

First of all, I must say that I heard to talk about Also Eden, for the first time, on this website. I also must say that, since the first moment that I've heard talk about this band I became very interested about it, especially after read their biography on Progarchives, a couple years ago. So, soon it was possible, I decided to buy their first debut studio album, 'About Time'. I also must say that this wasn't the first time that a thing like that happened to me. Unfortunately, this is a very common situation with many other progressive rock bands. Many of those bands are practically unknown for almost all of us, which is also this case. This is very unfair, but luckily, we have Progarchives to do its great job.

Also Eden is a very interesting but quite obscure neo-prog band from United Kingdom. In reality, this is almost an unknown group. The band's members said that their music is influenced by the traditional symphonic progressive rock bands, like Genesis, Yes and Flower Kings, by neo-prog bands like Marillion, IQ, Pendragon, Arena and Pallas and even by some other progressive rock bands with other styles of music like, for instance, Rush and Porcupine Tree. The group was formed in 2005, when vocalist Huw Lloyd-Jones and keyboardist/vocalist Ian Hodson, who had been working together up to that point, invited guitarist Simon Rogers to join them. With the addition of bassist Ralvin Thomas and drummer Mark Hall, the band's sound began to take evolve, culminating in this 2006 release, the album 'About Time'.

So, the line up of the band on 'About Time' is Huw Lloyd-Jones (vocals), Simon Rogers (guitars), Ian Hodson (keyboards), Ralvin Thomas (bass) and Mark Hall (drums). The music is all composed by Also Eden and the lyrics were all written by Huw Lloyd-Jones.

'About Time' is the debut studio album of Also Eden and was released in 2006. The album has five tracks. The first track 'Between The Lines' is a great song to open the album. It's a very powerful and vigorous song where we can clearly detect the influence of Genesis, Marillion, IQ and Arena, and also some slight influences from the progressive metal style. The sound is akin to some of the 80's progressive bands and Abel Ganz, in particular, come to my mind, while there are some traces of the early Marillion, towards the end. This is really a great track. The second track 'For Bumble' is a song that oscillates between calm and vigorous parts. It's a song with a beautiful beginning, with a very calm and nice acoustic guitar work, and again we can feel some influences from progressive metal sound. Near the end, there is a spectacular keyboard work that reminds me Tony Banks of the good old days in Genesis. This is probably, in my humble opinion, the best track on the album. The third track 'Pandora' is the smallest and calm song on the album, and probably, is the less spectacular, but it still is a very good track. It has an interesting start that reminds me the work of a clock. It's the more uniform song on the album with some good individual performances, which at times, reminds me Marillion. The piece is more centred on the lyrics and as a consequence the song seems somewhat flat. However, Hodson contributes with a reasonable guitar solo. The fourth track 'The Enemy Within' is a song with a piano opening that reminds me the beginning of an Anglagard's song, that fantastic Swedish progressive symphonic rock band of the 90's. It's a very nice, calm and uniform song, very melodious. The track has a spectacular final where again the influence of Genesis, in the Gabriel's era, is present. We can also hear the influence of David Gilmour's guitar on this track. Some shades of early IQ in a good way to wind up the track. This is another great track. The fifth track 'Children Of The Night' is a very powerful and vigorous track with great individual performances. It's a song more in the vein of 'Between The Lines' with a sound more in the rock style. This has another great vocal performance by Huw Lloyd-Jones, whose vocals are, in my humble opinion, very similar to the vocals of Alan Reed, the vocalist of Pallas. The band really shines on this song. It's a song very well arranged and the song has a rousing end to this surprising first album.

Conclusion: I must confess that I only know this band's album, until now, but I was very impressed with it. I bought 'About Time' some years ago and I became very excited with the quality of this album, when I listened to it for the first time. The rich textures of their music and the emotional lyrics about the real world, brings to us the great quality of Also Eden's songs, which has the result of bring more richness to our progressive world. Despite the influences mentioned by the band, on this album the main influences are Genesis, Pallas, IQ, Marillion and Arena, sometimes with a little touch of the progressive metal sound. However and despite all these influences, Also Eden has a very own and modern sound. Unfortunately, I think Also Eden is still an unknown band in the progressive rock world, and even on this site, we just need to see the small number of reviews and rates to conclude that. So, the last thing I can say is that 'About Time' is a fantastic debut album, and Also Eden is a band that deserves much more attention that it has had, until now.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)