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Camel - Rajaz CD (album) cover

RAJAZ

Camel

 

Symphonic Prog

4.10 | 984 ratings

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

Mr. Mustard
3 stars Though Rajaz is long past the essential period of Camel, the songwriting and style still seems to be strong as ever. The core sound of the band is still the same, as Latimer is the main songwriter. But the album is definitely missing Bardens, whose contribution on keys was equally important. Nonetheless, a few of the songs are packed with catchy melodies and frequent time signature, tempo, and mood changes throughout to make this a perfectly respectable Camel album.

This is a very song oriented album in comparison to some of their past few releases. Most of them are built off the same Camel sound and style, and thus all sound pretty similar to my ears (perhaps my only problem with the album).

The highlight of the album is Three Wishes, which begins with a slower ambient section, but eventually hits you with melody after melody often in an odd time signature.

There is an overall Eastern or Egyptian feel on a few songs, such as 'Final Encore.' Latimer really shows off his Gilmour-esque style of playing in songs like 'Rajaz,' Straight To My Head,' Sahara' and parts of 'Lawrence.'

The remaining 'Shout' is rather uninteresting.

Overall, while this is a good return to the Camel sound, a lot of it seems uninspired. Maybe it's the lack of dominant keyboards (or that there is too much Latimer's guitar). Either way, this is still a solid album for Camel fans.

5/10

Mr. Mustard | 3/5 |

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