DEPARTURE

The Foundation

Symphonic Prog

3.61 | 37 ratings

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Hibou
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator

"Departure" is a mostly instrumental album, a slow cooker laden with smooth, melodious passages, wonderful cello, a few calm vocals reminiscent of Andy Latimer's and some dynamic drum play.

It opens with the unfortunate "Walking Down the Avenue", a bland little ditty, but the wonderful 12-minute "Crossing Lines" soon makes up for it. This track I would describe as a mix of CAMEL's "Skylines" and Anthony Phillips' "Greenhouse"; it features an lengthy drum section that sets into a groove over a constantly changing keyboard background, creating a truly hypnotic effect. The much too short "Migration Time" is a most moving cello interlude. "D-Day Dawn", my personal favourite, is a 3-piece suite: the 12-string and oboe intro eventually makes way to a spooky marching-drum section, then the track breaks into nightmarish keyboards reminiscent of Ant Phillips' own "Nightmare" (from the album "Sides") with hints of ELP; the whole thing then explodes into banksian fireworks for a grand finale. The 12-minute "Final Thoughts" is perhaps the track that best typifies the band's style. Again, it starts acoustically and develops ever so slowly, until you find yourself surrounded by a magnificent wall of sound where the feverish cello reigns supreme (a track that never fails to raise the hairs on the back of my neck).

"Red Roses", the first of the two bonus tracks, is most dispensable, imo: some silly little tune with an almost country-hoedown feel. The 16-minute long "Don't Wake Me Up", however, is yet another fine epic, similar in format to the others but with a flavour of its own. It has many interesting themes but the languid cello doing its thing over the synth and guitar interplay is simply sublime.

For a band with such diverse musical inclinations, I think they've managed to put quite a 'together' album, which I keep on playing with renewed pleasure every time. Not an essential album but five farily good tracks out of seven surely deserves 3 stars.

Hibou | 3/5 | 2004-5-3

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