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Anekdoten - A Time of Day CD (album) cover

A TIME OF DAY

Anekdoten

 

Heavy Prog

3.95 | 442 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

Sean Trane
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
4 stars Few groups take as much time between albums while still managing to release them at regular intervals. Just Tool seems to be able to be more parsimonious. While Anekdoten's last two studio albums had not raised that much enthusiasm from fans, the first being vacuous and thin, the second foraying in the wrong direction, this was IMHO, Anekdoten's fifth is breath of fresh air. With an artwork (in a digipack) hinting at Vemod's paganism and mystery, the return of Anna-Sofi's cello, a wider array of keyboards and even some occasional flute (by guest Bergsten), indeed giving the whole album an impetus that was absent since the late 90's. I must say that for me, this was their last chance before I gave up if another poor album it was.

After an enthralling lead-off track Great Unknown (the usual Anekdoten realm track plus a great flute), comes one of the most unusual but extremely successful track 30 Pieces starting out like an 80's pop track (Nordin's drumming will keep this characteristic for much of the 7-min+ track) and slowly evolving to become a wild four minutes instrumental interplay passage where the superb flute takes the lion's share of the spotlight; Very refreshing and a great start to this album!

King Of Oblivion (with its shared verses between Jan and Niklas) and A Sky About To Rain (with a slower and ambient ending that's overstaying slightly its welcome) fail to maintain the superb level of the first two, but both would've been highlights on the previous Gravity. The short instrumental Every Step I Take (with a post rock feeling especially the guitar part), Stardust And Sand (a very acoustic ballad that reminds War Is over from the previous album, but in better), the gloomy and furious In For A Ride (with its great inter-verse lunacy bits) and Prince Of The Ocean (slow, lengthy and haunting) are ending the album on the same level than it started.

While not quite of the level of their now-mythic debut or its violent follow-up, this album is indeed a return to form, forgetting the emptiness of From Within and easily outdoing Gravity. Having maybe found a start to their new direction without losing their souls, Anekdoten is one of the better bands from that second 90's prog wave

Sean Trane | 4/5 |

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