THE WINDOW OF LIFE

Pendragon's 'The Window Of Life' is for my opinion the second best album by the British neo-prog band - second only to their follow-up album, 'The Masquerade Overture'. What we have on this album is a refined and purposeful sounding Pendragon really coming into their own sound and maturing as a band with some beautiful progressive compositions.

Musically there is a great deal to love here, the songs have a brilliant identity, exploring a variety of progressive styles and even moving into more heavy metal moments from time to time! Clive Nolan's keyboard playing is brilliant, and some of the guitar solos from Nick Barrett are utterly divine, no-more so than on the third track, 'Breaking The Spell'. For my worth the final few instrumental minutes of 'Breaking The Spell' is the best moment on the album.

Vocally Nick Barrett sounds pretty good on here. There's no denying that Barrett isn't the greatest prog vocalist of all time, he's certainly no Fish or Gabriel, but having said that I do personally find something charming about his vocal style - it has a rustic and quaint style to it. Maybe as a British person I don't really have an issue with his accent but I can see why some people might be turned off.

A brilliant Pendragon album, bested only by their follow-up. 4-stars; I can't imagine any prog fan who wouldn't enjoy this album!