ESCAPING FROM THE HANDS OF GOD

One of the guidelines of progarchives is that you should write your own review without referring to someone else's. I understand why that is and I agree. I usually don't inform myself with other reviews about an album before I do mine, but in this case ...

I was at least curious what others had to say about it because we are talking about a very interesting album here. The only thing I knew about it before I bought it was a track on a Cyclops sampler and I can't say I was too impressed by that but when I saw the average rating I got intrigued because it was really high. When I read the reviews it was supposed to be a not really straightforward album (to say the least) but it had to be something special.

And that's what it turned out to be now that I gave it several spins myself. As one can see in my list I'm a true fan of the neo progressive style although I don't like everything there is to get of this category. And this album is not quite neo you might say. It's indeed somewhere between neo and symphonic but you could even call it eclectic at certain moments. This album leaves you puzzled about the final judgement because the moments of sheer beauty like on Babel lights and Alone for instance are being alternated with moments of aversion. For instead of keeping things beautiful and melodic all the time Saens makes a habit of surprising the listener with these changes. And you wonder: why ...? This is one way to approach it all but another version is that Saens plays symphonic-like neo and tries to be original in the way they do it. I gave it several intense listens by now and while listening to Ayanda I suddenly reached some sort of click with what I was hearing.

And then I return to my opening lines referring to other reviews about this album and I think I have to agree most with prognut and then especially with his last few sentences. I fully agree that this is an album that requires a lot of spins before you can really judge it. And with me it's also the case that it grows on me more and more. But I have to say I can also relate to the opinion that the whole thing could have been a very melodic masterpiece (in the vein of Clepsydra for example) if that would have been the choice of the band. But they decided differently, so it's take it or leave it. If you like the challenge it appears to be, it's very recommended. If you like pure neoprog, leave it.

To me it's all things considered a clear case of 4 stars. Maybe objectively it's a masterpiece but I will also have to include my personal taste for the judgement and then it will have to be 4.