SAGAN OM RINGEN [AKA: MUSIC INSPIRED BY LORD OF THE RINGS]

The first time I heard about BO HANSSON'S "Lord of the Rings" and read the reviews, I had the misconception that this was the "Non Plus Ultra" example of early Swedish Symphonic, so when I heard it was really surprised, this album has almost no connection with Symphonic, as a fact is much closer to early PINK FLOYD than to YES, GENESIS or ANGLAGARD.

So if any listener wants to try this album, I recommend to search for a copy of "Live at Pompeii" and try it, because that's the closer you will get to the overall sound of "The Lord of the Rings".

Of course this is not a negative commentary, I love the album, but if you want to listen something, you need to have a clear idea about what you are going to have before you instead of being disappointed because lack of information.

Now, despite it's quality, the album has a serious problem, BO HANSSON was too ambitious, you can't make a conceptual album about a trilogy of epic proportions as The Lord of the Rings, with 12 songs of 3 or 4 minutes length as average, as HANSSON you would be only able to scratch the cover of the book. There's no time for a coherent development and for a real musical narration as you should expect from a conceptual album.

But, even when Psyche Prog is not the best style to suit the famous trilogy would be unfair to say that the sound is something less than excellent and more than adequate, "HANSSON" with his skills managed to adapt two styles that IMO were almost incompatible.

One of the reasons I didn't review this excellent album before is because it's based mostly in atmospheres, keyboards and guitar jamming, and being the songs so similar, it's very hard to make a track by track review as I usually do.

The music as I said before has a strong Psyche PINK FLOYD influence, the guitar jamming is much less aggressive than Gilmour's but honestly more delicate and elaborate.

The organ is another issue, sounds incredibly close to the sound of "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" but in other moments with a strong resemblance to 666 by "APHRODITE'S CHILD", something very positive, because the pompous Greek Orthodox Canonic influenced music suits perfectly with an album based in a book about the fight of good against evil with obvious religious background.

Before rating "The Lord of the Rings" I must mention the superb drumming work by "Rune Carlsson" whose perfect timing and dexterity with the cymbals is the spine over which the music is supported.

Not a masterpiece of Progressive Rock, but for sure an album that must be included in any Progressive Rock collection, so I will go with 4 solid stars.