DE GOUDEN EEUW

Flairck

Prog Folk

2.95 | 12 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

toroddfuglesteg

The golden age.

......That's the translation of the album title. I very much prefer the Dutch titles to the English titles. Anyway, De Gouden Eeuw is a concept album based on the voyage of a Dutch sailing ship in the 17th century. The excellent artwork, one of Flairck's best ever, tells the story.

Music wise, the album starts out as an opera and then continues throughout as a mix of Dutch folk hymns, classical music and opera again. Yes, there is vocals on this album. A lot of it. Both female solo, male solo and a choir. The vocals are in Dutch and I find that fitting the music.

De Gouden Eeuw is though not the Flairck I know from the first two albums and the final album. Flairck was branching out on this album. But that also adds another dimension to this band because the music still have all their trademarks. Flairck also used an obscene amount of instruments on this album. Which gives this album a baroque feel. Yes, I understand what Erik Visser said in the interview with ProgArchives when he called Flairck a "Symphonic folk music" band. That is exactly what this concept album is. Symphonic folk music.

Quality wise, this is not their finest hour. The music is good, but not great. It really lacks any great songs. It weaves it's way through different songs. It changes between symphonic music and folk rock hymns. This is a concept album through and throughout with all it's ills and a few moments of brilliance. Windstilte is one of the brilliant moments. The same is Aankomst in Holland. The rest of the album is good, but just that. This is though an album I want to listen to a lot more so I may change my opinion on a later date. But this is a three stars album at this very moment.

3 stars

toroddfuglesteg | 3/5 | 2010-3-22

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