THE THOMAS TRACKS

Symphonic Rock lovers, rejoice! For what 5Bridges have done here is create some excellent music that any lover of symphonic rock will enjoy. There isn't much here in the way of innovation (bar some strangely effective combinations of electronic effects/drumming + real instruments in parts), but what they lack in newness, 5Bridges makes up for in quality.

I can't help but envy Rob van der Linden. Beyond the obvious fact that he can play drums (a skill I hope to acquire someday), he not only gets to write books, but then gets to go and create a prog rock band based around the events in his book ... and write lyrics for them? Let's see, plays drums, writes books, writes music, plays prog ... yep, I'm definitely feeling some envy here.

The band he has assembled sure seems to know what they are doing. The album runs close to the full length of the cd, a length that most bands can't seem to fill effectively, but there isn't really a single note in here that leaves me feeling bored. It all seems to flow so naturally, from the first note of the first song to the ending of the album.

Personally, I don't quite see the correlation between lead singer Piet Roelofsen's vocals and Peter Gabriels. For one, I am too aware of his accent, and secondly, I think his voice lacks some of the theatric power that Gabriels had. While Piet sings with passion and emotion, I think of Peter Gabriel's vocals in "The Musical Box", and they really sound quite different to me.

When I'm listening to this album, I can't imagine it being anything but a 4 star album. When it's off, it drops to three in my mind, because I can't think of any high points in the album. But the tricky thing is, this whole album is full of excellent music - very consistently excellent music - and there aren't really any low points either. If this album were a graph, it would be a pretty straight line.