ECLECTIC PROG

I was first introduced to this album by someone who was not really a fan of progressive rock at all. They were big into 80s and 90s alt rock dinosaurs like Dinosaur Jr., Butthole Surfers, and The Flaming Lips. But for whatever reason they had this album as part of their collection and held it in high regard.

So being something of an obsessive King Crimson fan and wanting to impress this other person I began listening to this album. This was nearly a decade ago now, and I'm still not sure what to think.

It does stand out as being one of the most unique albums in the King Crimson discography. Its really hard to find anything else in their catalog that even sounds kind of like this.

Basically this consists of three musicians with some new toys to play with. Trey Gunn with his recently acquired Warr Guitar, Adrain Belew and his V Drums (which had just arrived prior to recording), and Mr. Fribble with his ever expanding collection of effects units and pedals to run his guitar through. The latest and most advanced in late-90s musical instrument technology.

So the three Crimsos gather together and hit record, and these are they results.

Being an album that consists almost entirely of improv (with some vague compositional ideas scattered throughout) it can't really be judged on the same merits as a traditional written and composed album. It is spontaneous music-making by a group of musicians who are basically professionals at it. Probably the most intriguing thing about the music is it is sometimes hard to tell exactly who is playing what. Was that sound I just heard a V-Drum sample, a Frippertronic, or a Warr Guitar worked through some pedals? These sort of things can only be dissected on repeated listens, and even then there's always something new to discover.

The improvisations were always the most interesting part of a King Crimson show anyway, this album is one of the few occasions where the audience gets to experience a candid improv session in a private setting, without the pressures of a live audience and pesky flash photography.

This is what progressive rock is all about. Put on some big headphones, pick out a particular instrument, and listen to all the amazing things going on, the various intricacies and quirks of the musicianship. You know you're a prog! It's time to listen like one.

To be honest, for as much as I like this album, I don't really love how it begins. The first couple of minutes of "Loch Lomond," after the great guitar and keyboard sounds that kick it off, are built around a stiff and leaden old-man hard rock riff, and if the entire track had been built around this things might have been problematic. Fortunately, this riff eventually takes its place as a mere supporting element of the track, popping out intermittently from a Scottish-tinged acoustic ballad, full of nice melody and arrangement twists. Following this mixed bag of an opener, we enter an extended stretch that has to rank up there with Hackett's best. "The Phoenix Flown" is a two-minute instrumental with Hackett doing his minimalist-yet-fluid electric guitar thing as well as ever, "Wanderlust" is a nice 45-second acoustic interlude, and then we come to the main attractions of the album. "'Til These Eyes" is an AMAZING acoustic ballad; the build from the verses into the "'Til these eyes have seen enough" parts, ending with "'Til these eyes have seen love," strikes me as pop perfection. I don't like to break out "if you don't like such-and-such track then I can't understand you and your musical taste" comments very often, but if you don't like "'Til These Eyes" then I can't understand you and your musical taste.

"Prairie Angel" (which features writing credits from Steve Howe and old GTR drummer Jonathan Mover) and "A Place Called Freedom" are indexed as separate tracks, but they're really two parts of the same piece, and I can't imagine listening to one without the other. "Prairie Angel" starts with a nearly perfect (to my ears) set of slowly unfolding and rising guitar lines, before bursting into an AWESOME set of bluesy guitar riffs (eventually featuring Steve on harmonica), which in turn segue into "A Place Called Freedom." I don't especially care for the chorus/title (I've always had a weird instinctual allergy to tracks with the word "freedom" in the title, with some exceptions), though it makes for a nice climax every time it pops up, but the rest of track is amazing. The way the track effortlessly moves between the folksy/country-ish acoustic-guitar-driven verses, the breaks after the chorus (with a slow guitar line over an underpinning acoustic guitar part that brings to mind "Carpet Crawlers" in a good way), and the main ideas of "Prairie Angel" leaves me wanting to hear the track (and its predecessor) over and over, and the extended outro only makes this urge stronger. It's a shame such a great pair of tracks ended up on an album so (relatively) few people will ever hear; I guarantee that if U2 had done this track (which wouldn't be fully out of the realm of possibility) it would be universally beloved.

Anything after this stretch can't help but be a small letdown, but it's only a small one. "Between the Sunset and the Coconut Palms" is a nice atmospheric acoustic ballad about taking a boat into the horizon, and it's an effective low-key respite from the overpowering beauty of "Prairie Angel"/"A Place Called Freedom." "Waking to Life" is another of Steve's incorporations of ambiguously foreign music into his core style, and the combination of the catchy-as-hell verses (culminating in the great "and I've never seen your face before") hook and all of the frenetic instrumental parts a la "Last Train to Istanbul" make it every bit as fun as, say, "Last Train" or "A Doll That's Made in Japan." "Two Faces of Cairo" is an instrumental that Steve wrote while visiting the Sphinx, and while it's definitely a little directionless and primarily geared towards atmosphere, it's fine enough atmosphere for me.

"Looking for Fantasy" is another instance (see: "Camino Royale") of Steve writing a song where part of the song came from a dream (this time a dream where he heard Jimi Hendrix singing this melody), and it's yet another of Steve's nice atmospheric ballads, about looking for meaning in things that aren't really grounded in reality (best line: "In an open top car the Kennedys passed by/To this day she swears that Jack gave her the eye"). "Summer's Breath" is another nice acoustic snippet (probably no better than the average track on Bay of Kings or Momentum, but as I've always said, it's better to have these tracks surrounded by tracks of other styles), "Catwalk" is decent pounding mid-tempo blues (with Chris Squire on bass), and finally we come to the conclusion, "Turn This Island Earth." At first it seems like it's going to be something irritatingly faux-majestic in a queasy "Valley of the Kings" sort of way, which doesn't seem promising for a 12-minute track, but these parts turn out just to be an extended introduction, and for a while the rest of the track is decent enough. An atmospheric distorted vocal slowly fades in, the song takes shape, there's a synth part playing what had been the bluesy riff from "Prairie Angel" (interestingly, this track also has a Steve Howe/Jonathan Mover credit, so I have to assume the bluesy riff is the GTR leftover that prompted the credit), and eventually the bluesy riff becomes the center of an extended instrumental bit, before the song then basically becomes a dumping ground for various ideas (such as a snippet that could have been the center of a nice McCartney-ish ballad). Truth be told, on first listen I was almost ready to call this my favorite track, but now I consider it a relatively weak point, and enough to keep me from giving the album an even higher grade.

In addition to the standard release, there was also a 2-CD special edition version, and that's the one I have, so I'll briefly mention the contents. It's only about half an hour, and it's clearly not an essential addition to the album, but I like the disc for the most part. The first four tracks are part of an instrumental suite called "Four Winds," with the four parts naturally called "North," "South," "East" and "West," and while none of the parts show Hackett at his very best, they're nice for somebody who generally enjoys this era of his career. "Pieds En L'Air" is an odd inclusion, in that it's a strings-only cover of a song by an old Welsh composer who went by the pseudonym Peter Warlock; it's weird to have a track on a Steve Hackett album that doesn't involve Hackett at all, but I have to assume that the piece meant a lot to Steve, so I don't begrudge him throwing it on. "She Said Maybe" isn't an amazing guitar-driven instrumental, but it's a decent one; I wouldn't have minded having it on the main album. "Enter the Night" is a reworking of "Depth Charge"/"Riding the Colossus" to finally give it vocals, and honestly the track finally sounds finished; it was always a good instrumental, but here it feels like it finally reached its full low-key 80s-arena rock (if such a genre can be low-key) potential. "Eruption: Tommy" is an instrumental snippet from an old Focus (one of the lesser-known 70s prog bands) that depicted, sure enough, the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, and it fits in well with Steve's gifts as a guitarist. And finally, "The Reconditioned Nightmare" is slight reworking, in a live context, of "The Air-Conditioned Nightmare" (from Cured, remember that one?), and it's every bit as much goofy fun here as it was before.

So ok, it's not as polished as Spectral Mornings is, and while there was a brief time where I thought it might be my favorite Hackett album, that time has passed and won't return (the decline in my feelings towards "Turn This Island Earth" is the biggest reason). If that's the extent of criticism I can give, though, then I can't help but have a lot of good feelings towards this album. If you're somebody who only has Voyage and/or Acolyte, and you're looking for a place to start getting into Steve's later studio albums, this or Tunnel is the place to start.

This was probably the first album I ever heard that left me thinking, "I can tell this is awesome, but I'm not entirely sure why and probably need more time to digest it." This album rewards commitment in a way no other album ever can. Dark, oppressive, even cacophonous at times, it is a stout listen, but if its bombast doesn't scare you off, you will be treated to some of the most emotive and poetic songs in existence. Sure some say Peter Hammill's delivery is harsh and difficult to appreciate, but don't let his detractors dissuade you if you're still unfamiliar. This music begs for his hyper-emotive delivery, and nobody else could possibly make it come alive in the way he does. As one who actually does like his vocal style, I realize some may not share my view, but as stated before, this is a conclusion each listener must come to on their own. Even if he may not be your favorite vocalist, I believe in the context of these songs and their atmosphere, his singing can still be appreciated, especially as it fits so well with the poetic words he crafted.

The lyrics themselves are thought-provoking and insightful, and the music itself compliments their heavy messages perfectly. Each song's words resonate with me on a very strong level, giving the album a high degree of personal emotional significance. Lemmings adopts a viewpoint of one looking out over a mass of people lost and directionless, spinning a tale of caution to blindly following the crowd and suggesting the importance of those who stand apart encouraging the flock to find their own sense of identity and purpose in life. Man-Erg addresses the duality between good and evil, its razor- thin boundary, and the potential to become lost or overcome by our own internal power upon becoming aware of it if not responsible. Finally, A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers is an epic about alienation and identity crisis told from the perspective of a lonely lighthouse keeper. His feelings of internal anguish and misdirection stem from his isolation and the thought that while he may shine a light to guide and protect the ships he sees in the night, there is in fact nobody to guide him, no light for him to follow, and nobody to alleviate the burden of responsibility to those ships in the night who would become lost or destroyed if not for his guidance. He becomes consumed by his burdens, loneliness, and internal discontentment, causing him extreme instability and forces him to the brink of life and death as he contemplates suicide as a means of gaining a release from his existence, in which he cannot presently see the good he does by guiding those ships. His tale ends inconclusively, leaving the listener to decide whether or not he ends his life. The open- ended nature of the narrative's ending gives us a sense that while his challenges are great, his fate is not predetermined. We can all take a message of hopefulness from this, as we all face challenges in our own lives, and even though a way out might be tempting, the realization that we don't need to determine our self-worth or contentment by our current situation. A happier tomorrow follows the turbulence of the hard night as long as we do not succumb to the crushing depression we may feel when we face our internal instability and melancholy head-on. Regardless of who you are, where you've been, or what your calling in life may be, there's a powerful message here for many if you're able to appreciate the song's dark atmosphere, forceful delivery, and scathing emotional fervor. Anyone who has ever been in a position of responsibility over the fate and well-being of others at the expense of their own contentment, felt alienated by their duties, or became unhinged by the external and internal pressures of life will find a kinship to this man's tale. Although dense and bleak, it carries a strong emotional message that will surely reach anyone who can relate to this story.

As if the lyrics weren't enough of a true artistic conquest, the music itself is wildly inventive and highly unique. The level of performance is nothing short of masterful. They truly abandoned all inhibitions to embrace passages of controlled dissonance and intentional cacophony unlike any of their previous or subsequent releases. But in spite of the oppressive textures, dense instrumentation, and complex forms, melodies, and rhythms, it somehow all fits together with a sense of unity and focus. The only difference between innovation and novice excess is how well you justify your ideas, and the band does so wonderfully. Every bombastic passage is perfectly prepared and exited, demonstrating a sense of purpose and balance that truly makes each moment shine without seeming like it was included in error or as a result of some drug-induced lapse in judgment. As wild and seemingly mad as each idea may be, they all declare their intent clearly and unapologetically, and that to me is what makes this album truly remarkable. Why be ashamed of your quirks when you can show them off and use them to set you apart? Not everyone will appreciate them, but those that do will find your sense of pride and abandonment from the harsh opinions of the masses will find you a true inspiration. In a way, this album encapsulates everything progressive rock represents, and can even serve as an anthem for fans of the genre as a whole.

This album is truly one of the best, most significant collection of songs in my collection and only becomes more enjoyable and meaningful with each new listen. I strongly recommend this to anyone willing to broaden their horizons musically and experience an emotional journey both intense and cathartic. To paint a beautiful picture, you have to use some dark colors, and this album is sure to add a sense of depth with its brooding palette. If you find it off-putting on first listen, give it a few more chances. As dense as it is, there's no way to absorb its full effect with one spin alone. Upon giving it the attention it deserves, you will feel moved and cleansed in a truly unique way. It will exercise every intense emotion in your arsenal, possibly ones you haven't used or wanted to embrace in quite some time, but you won't regret the experience. This album very richly deserves a place of reverence in the history of progressive music, and for that I award it 5 stars. It truly is a perfect album, one that sits in my top 5 of all time, and will always hold a place of special emotional significance in my heart. If not for Godbluff, it would be my favorite VDGG album. But even so, it sits so far above the entire discographies of so many other groups in my book by a very wide margin.

Needless to say that after such a long experience in the music field, Balestracci is the one and only person performing the material of the show.Unfortunately ''Existences invisibles'' sounds closer to Free Improvisation than Progressive Music, incorporating elements from Electronic, Jazz and New Age music, and that's a pitty because the man known how to play.The album, split in fourteen short pieces, presents different, dreamy soundscapes, coming as a blend of natural and programmed instrumentation, and are mainly delivered as a background orchestral/Electronic synthesizer music interrupted either by light jazzy guitars and pianos or by a jazzy drumming, supported by bass.There are also many other sounds here, like sound effects or programmed strings, but the result is deeply unconvincing.The absence of structural parts, the lack of energy or even some more virtuosic themes is just dissapointing.Additionally the heavy use of sampled instrumentation is another huge disadvantage, as the album sounds so cheap and mechanical all the way.Last but not least comes the overall mood, which is totally cold and inhuman with no sign of any moving or emotional texture.The extended length of the album, does not help either, in my opinion listening to such kind of music experiment more than 20 minutes is an achievement.

Plastic and unnatural musicianship with zero level in energy and melody.Simply boring and far from recommended.

It's a really good one, though. Initially, I actually listened to the versions of Tunnel tracks on this album far more than I did to the studio versions, and while I eventually came to prefer the originals on the whole, I still have a strong fondness for how the tracks are done on here. "Sleepers" and "Still Waters," in particular, breathe in a way that they didn't in studio, and they absolutely sound like classics in this context. As far as the older solo material goes, there aren't really surprises (I guess "Slogans" is pretty surprising, though), but the material is all done well and feels very at home with this lineup (which says something given that it was tailored to accommodate the Tunnel material more than the older material).

Oh yeah, there's also Genesis material. The inclusion of "Los Endos" near the end isn't really a surprise, and it's done pretty closely to how he'd started playing it during the Genesis Revisited era (aside from the new inclusion of the "Myopia" introduction), but the other performances deserve special notice. "Blood on the Rooftops," if you'll recall, was never performed live by Genesis, and it was only after the Genesis reunion (without Steve) had come and gone that Steve apparently decided it needed to make it onto the stage. Well, I'm glad it did. The drummer, Gary O'Toole, is nowhere near as good of a singer as Phil from a technical standpoint (even Phil on Wind, where I feel he's not that great), but the deeper, rougher, more clearly British voice helps a lot, and he throws a lot of passion into his part. The use of saxophone in some of the spots that had previously been keyboards is a nice touch, too. Elsewhere, "Firth of Fifth" is done pretty closely to the original, albeit with sax replacing flute, and people who didn't like the Revisited version will be plenty happy here. And finally, they do the "Fly on the Windshield/Broadway Melody of 1974" medley (starting from just after the vocal part in the original "Fly"), and it sounds great, with just a little more primal power in the drums and a little more bite in the guitar (which was fine enough in the original), and O'Toole does a great job on vocals in the "Broadway Melody" part as well.

Quite honestly, I probably listen to this more than any other Hackett album, and while somebody who isn't predisposed to enjoying live albums might find this a bit high of a rating, I find that there are sufficient amounts of surprises and reinventions (mostly mild, but sometimes not) of older material that a rating like this is justified. And besides, while it may not quite work as a Tunnel replacement (I just couldn't go without "Nomads") it does make for a nice set of alternate versions.

The first two songs on here have to be numbered among the best songs Hackett ever did, and oddly enough they're also the two where Yes bassist Chris Squire makes a contribution (he doesn't make his presence obvious, but there's a lot of power in the bass playing on these tracks). "Fire on the Moon" is a distillation of everything great about this era in Hackett's career; the verse melody is quiet but intense, growing out of a quiet music box melody (he used a similar trick to start off Wild Orchids, but it's more effective here), the "chorus" is huge and anthemic with wordless harmonies, and the two extended instrumental passages are led by monumental guitar passages that each have their own distinct personality and vibe. "Nomads," then, is Steve revisiting his fondness for middle- Eastern music, and it really comes across as the kind of song that "The Gulf" could have been if it hadn't gotten too stuck on its typically 80s synths. Much like with "Moon," the melody is a big ball of tension, reaching points of near ecstasy every time the "It's a cry from the heart, it's a crying soul" line pops up, and the climactic instrumental passage, growing out of a frantic acoustic part into a searing electric part, is sheer bliss to my ears. The final repetition of "It's a cry from the heart" might be somewhat predictable, but it's soooo necessary and satisfying.

Naturally, the album can't quite hold onto this level of enjoyment and intensity throughout, but it holds a pretty decent level nonetheless. "Emerald and Ash" really shouldn't be nine minutes long; the ballad portion (the "Emerald," I suppose) and the noisy rocker portion (the "Ash," I suppose) don't fit well together, certainly not as well as "The Fundamentals of Brainwashing" and "Howl" did. Still, I quite like the "Emerald" portion, which is awfully dark and moody for a track whose first lyric is "Sugarplum fairies on parade." The following instrumental "Tubehead" is basically just a noisy shredfest (with pounding up-tempo bass pushing it forward), and I kinda feel like its effect is muted a bit by coming right after the "Ash" portion, but it's definitely a lot of fun.

As far as multi-part epics go, "Sleepers" is much more impressive than "Emerald and Ash." The lengthy acoustic introduction gives way to an unsettlingly calm (and surprisingly memorable) verse melody, which in turn gives way to an intense darker melody (featuring a great lyric in one stanza: "Surveillance camera in the sky/Big big brother telling you why/Too many saviours on my cross/Might as well worship the Wizard of Oz"), which in turn gives way to an anthemic climax, culminating in the "All the sleepers send you their dreams" repeated line. If this track isn't in the top tier of Hackett tracks, then it's knocking on the door.

The album finishes quite strong as well. "Ghost in the Glass" makes the transition from moody acoustic instrumental to moody electric instrumental impeccably; "Still Waters" is a great pounding mid-tempo jazzy-gospel rocker that reminds me a lot of the little I've heard of Spiritualized; and the closing "Last Train to Istanbul," as tempting as it might be to call it an inferior little brother of "Nomads," does pseudo-ethnic music proud, from the great percussion to the flow of strings into flute and saxophone, and it's a great way to close things off.

If there's anything significantly to the album's detriment, aside from the "Emerald and Ash" and "Tubehead" pairing (both tracks are plenty enjoyable, but in a more hollow way than I prefer), it's that the album, for all of the interesting things that happen on it, doesn't really show much in the way of Steve stretching himself; even the best ideas feel mostly like a refinement of ideas that had come on earlier albums. Still, that's a relatively minor ding, and it's one that I don't really think about when I'm listening to it. If you like rock music that's at all artsy (not just Hackett) you need to hear this album.

PS: The 2010 2-CD special edition is worth mentioning, even if the additional material doesn't factor into the rating. Around this time, Steve started to re-embrace his past in his live performances, and this disc features live performances of "Blood on the Rooftops" (!!), "A Tower Struck Down," "Firth of Fifth" and "Fly on a Windshield/Broadway Melody of 1974" (the Genesis tracks feature drummer Gary O'Toole on vocals). The three Genesis tracks would later appear on Live Rails, but it's still a lot of fun to have additional versions of these. The disc also contains what's essentially a remix mash-up of "Sleepers" and "Still Waters" called "Every Star in the Night Sky," and it's a nice treat for people who enjoy those two tracks.

The best aspect of the album is that it has some really top-notch ballads. "Set Your Compass" may be more atmosphere than melody, but it's a gorgeous atmosphere, somewhat reminiscent of Voyage, and the periodic "set your compass by your dreams" line could stay in my head forever if it wanted to. "To a Close" is more traditional and conventional, but no less impressive, centering around a set of gently swaying acoustic guitar lines and featuring lovely flute lines, subtle orchestration and fantastic vocal harmonies. A small step behind them, but still a delight, is "A Girl Called Linda," a jazzy French-tinged number that just drips whimsy but never becomes too cutesy for its own good. Oddly, these three songs are grouped close together in the middle of the album, and I somewhat feel that lessens their overall effect, but that's just a small gripe.

The rest of the album is downright nutty, though that's not necessarily a bad thing. "The Fundamentals of Brainwashing" is a solid downbeat ballad in its own right, featuring some nice lyrics ("History is a vinyl record stuck in a groove" strikes me as a really inspired opening lyric) and a great vibe (and a great brief pedal steel solo) once you get beyond the way it sounds like a Division Bell outtake, but rather than moving into a gentle conclusion, the song dissolves into a monstrous instrumental, "Howl," which maintains the same main underpinning set of piano chords but covers it in noisy jazzy anger (manifesting in, well, howling and screeching guitar sounds of pure passion that give way to a nice extended jazz piano solo). The combination of the two tracks makes for a great conclusion to the album (I ripped the two as one track and can't imagine listening to them separately), but it's an extra strange experience to listen to this immediately after "Why" (a minute-long 30s jazz send-up, or basically a more condensed "Sentimental Institution") and "She Moves in Memories" (basically a five-minute orchestral rearrangement of "To a Close"). Maybe the sequencing would make more sense on the 17-track special edition (which I haven't heard yet), but here I'm just kinda baffled.

Coming immediately before the final stretch of the album, and right after the "ballad" stretch, is the "rocker" stretch, and the results are mixed. "Wolfwork" has a couple of nice ideas in the quieter moments, but on the whole it's a bit of a tuneless pounding mess without much to compensate, and it doesn't add much to the album. "Ego and Id" is pretty fun, if only for the novelty of Steve clearly trying to make his sound harder and noisier, and he manages to squeeze some great sounds and passages out of his guitar in the process. And finally, the Dylan cover is rather pleasant and moody, but the choice of song to cover ("The Man in the Long Black Coat") ends up being startling for a reason outside the context of the album; this track had been covered by Emerson Lake and Palmer a dozen years earlier on their In the Hot Seat album. Who would have ever thought that this decent-but-not-especially- notable track from a decent-but-not-especially-notable late-80s Bob Dylan album would become the Dylan cover of choice for aging progsters? To be honest, I actually kinda prefer the ELP version; this one is just fine, but it's pretty conventional, whereas the ELP version had a little more variety in the sound (for better or worse) and a growling repeated riff that made it stand out.

Finally (or initially, I suppose, since these tracks are all near the beginning of the album), there's the "eccentric Hackett music" stretch. The opening "A Dark Night in Toyland" has some great guitar parts tucked underneath that betray it as Hackett, but as I said earlier, I feel like this should have been a Bowie song, maybe on Heathen; there's just something about the combination of the music box in the beginning, the up-tempo orchestration, the deep vocals and the slightly dark lyrics (with the great repeated line, "If you can't find heaven I'll show you a ghost train to hell") that instinctively makes me want to file it as a Bowie song. "Waters of the Wild" is another nice example of Steve's occasional fascination with Eastern-tinged music, featuring a fun set of sitar lines (or maybe an imitation, whatever) over a decidedly non-Western beat, and maintaining a solid intensity that keeps it interesting for its full five-and-a-half minutes.

And finally, there's "Down Street," yet another one of Steve's ventures into a track that features a spoken downward-pitched vocal. Fortunately, this is much closer to "The Devil is an Englishman" than the two Dark Town instances of this, and the music is a lot of fun, moving from something vaguely Tom Waits-ish into (as mentioned) something driven by Gilmour-ish "Another Brick in the Wall 2" lines, eventually bringing in some great harmonica lines to make the whole thing seem about 20% less dorky than it is, and then going in various directions that could be expected on a Hackett album. The vocals are hard to shake, but truth be told they do disappear for a large chunk of the song, so I can listen to the track without feeling like they really ruin much.

For me, the bottom line is that this is another very good late-period Hackett album, but it's also one that I think would be a pretty bad introduction to this period of his career, and I definitely don't think somebody should hear it before hearing at least one of the "regular" albums that bookend it (To Watch the Storms and Out of the Tunnel's Mouth). There's some tremendous material that every Hackett fan should eventually, hear, though, so don't put off getting it indefinitely. And hey, if you're somehow the kind of person who thinks of Please Don't Touch as one of Steve's career peaks, then maybe this kind of messiness will appeal to you more than it does to me.

The first half of the album is nice, with some lovely themes (some of which get reprised later in the album, most notably the main theme in "To Earth Like Rain"), but because it covers the part of Orpheus' life before he experienced pain and sadness, it's a little monotonous in its cheeriness (and it doesn't even cover his time spent with the Argonauts). The only real moment of tension is in "The Dancing Ground," which breaks up a cheery minuet with a disturbing premonition of Eurydice's; otherwise, it's all happy happy happy, culminating in the upbeat but still overlong 12:27 of "That Vast Life." At least this track moves through several ideas, but it never shifts in tone, and thus it becomes more background-ish than I'd prefer for something with its length.

Naturally, the story gets darker once Eurydice dies and Orpheus descends into the underworld to try and get her back, but I like that the music goes beyond formula in depicting these passages. Look, if you're going to make a musical depiction of the Orpheus myth, the quality of your presentation will ultimately rest on how you handle two parts: the attempted ascent from the underworld with Eurydice, and Orpheus' eventual horrible death at the hands of the Maenads. Given this, Steve's decision to write "Under the World - Orpheus Looks Back" as a clear homage to "Mars" strikes me as nothing elss than brilliant. The inecessant rhythm gives a maddening tension to the track, and the ascent portion, first moving in darkness, then briefly moving into triumphant cheer, then briefly moving into doubt, then clearly showing the moment where Orpheus screws up, gives a perfect depiction of the story. And "Severance," well, that's just fun dramatic darkness, hinting at but not fully playing up his horrible death; it might not be great by the standards of classical, but it's just fine by the standards of a rock guy writing a small amount of classical.

The album then works through the happy ending of the story: Orpheus is buried, Orpheus' spirit is reunited with Eurydice, Orpheus' head keeps on singing, and his lyre becomes a constellation (with reprises of happy themes from earlier). Overall, then, it's not an amazing experience, but it's definitely one I like more than his 80s classical guitar albums (as of this writing I haven't heard the other classically-oriented albums he'd done in between those). Steve definitely shows himself as much more adept at writing for a classical ensemble than most rock musicians would be, and the presence of a coherent (and classic) story ends up providing a beneficial framework. Plus, a lot of the music here could have been reworked for use on one his "conventional" albums without a lot of fuss. If you're into later-period Hackett, this is a worthy purchase.

In an act of great confidence and self-belief the French group offered two very long, epic tracks in this album, the 36-min. ''Acte I'' and its following 26-min. ''Acte II''.Both tracks are extremely tight and coherent with no particular dead holes and are great examples of dark, atmospheric Progressive Rock with strong hints from Orchestral and Soundtrack Music next to the standard Classical and jazzy inspirations, with enough complexity but also some very ethereal passages as well.Maybe you should imagine a cross between KING CRIMSON, WOBBLER and SEVEN REIZH to get an idea of how this album sounds, but again some very careful listenings is what is recommended to fully appreciate this style of playing.The album is characterized by some extemely complex guitar parts with a sinister touch, haunting Mellotron waves next to some edgy and nervous electronics and church-styled organs and a very solid rhythm section.This combination delivers very complicated themes, alternating between hypnotic grooves and loose performances, but there are also enough breaks to be found that lead to series of dreamy textures.The later are based on Berthet's superb, crystal-clear voice and the intelligent use of synthesizers, while parts of them even contain some beatiful melodies and delicate orchestrations.This amalgam of diverse themes works very nice and the album flows extremely well with no evident interruptions between the amount of short tracks, of which the two epics are composed.

Nice and recommended example of deeply atmospheric Progressive Rock with a variety of influences and soundscapes, starting from cinematic offerings and ending up in symphonic or jazzy arrangements.Great stuff...3.5 stars.

'Sleepless' was my favourite song in that album (that I quite soon forgot, more or less). It's fast and intensive and yet somehow airy and dreamy / nightmarish -- suitably, being a song about sleep and dreaming (or the lack of it). Few years ago I took 'Sleepless' into my KC compilation disc and the song hasn't lost its effectiveness. My other fave song of that era is the very airy 'Matte Kudesai' from Discipline (1981), otherwise I have no significant interest towards that phase.

'Nuages' is an interesting instrumental piece, deeply original art rock. I haven't heard it in more than 20 years but I can still remember it vaguely. Tony Levin's work on stick & bass is delicious. Back in '87 or so I came across Levin also in the music of Peter Gabriel and the Italian singer Alice.