PROMISED LAND

This is my first review on PA and I thought I would choose an album that I knew on a pretty deep level. I purchased this still feeling flush with the excitement of Operation: Mindcrime and impressed, but not blown away, by Empire. This is a long way from a METAL album and I wonder if I would have given it a chance if I was not already impressed by Queensryche's prior material, since I was still in a period of life where I wanted most music I heard to be HEAVY.

Great Tracks: Promised Land, Someone Else, One More Time, Lady Jane, Damaged

Good Tracks: I Am I, Disconnected, My Global Mind, 9:28am (not really a track; it sets the atmosphere for the rest of the songs)

Weaker Tracks: Out of Mind, Bridge

I'm not the best to evaluate how 'progressive' an album is. I tend to go for intelligent music, with reasonable complexity, thoughtful lyrics, some heaviness (or a lot of heaviness!) and emotionally dynamic. If most of these elements are present, I'm probably going to like it. Promised Land has all these elements. What stand out most for me are the beauty in the songs that accompanies a dark emotional tone. Geoff's vocals may be at their peak here and drive the emotional tone of the songs. The lyrics really stuck with me on many of the tracks, where I found myself identifying strongly on an emotional level. That said, the 'proggiest' tracks are probably Promised Land and Someone Else

From Disconnected, I loved the slightly tongue in cheek:

Maybe all I need beside my pills and the surgery is a new metaphor for reality.

And the title track, hinting at the failure of the "American Dream" and its emptiness

Watching the sand fall, listening for the knock upon my door, and waiting...for Promised Land. Standing neck deep in life, my ring of brass lay rusting on the floor.Is this all? Because it's not what I expected.

I could include so many more lyrical gems. Songs cover psychic pain, mental illness, hopes and dreams (and disappointment with same) and relationships. They feel loosely connected, from one person's grasping to understand where they fit in the world. Worth a listen, to both the words and the lyrics.