GLORY LIES AHEAD

"Glory Lies Ahead" is the album in which 2112 make their artsy mixture of hard rock and prog come to its fruition, providing a variety of ideas well integrated into their nuclear sound. This album took some time for completion until its 2000 release, which explains the fact that two men alternated the bass duties in this repertoire, but stylistically speaking, this album is pretty cohesive. The material's dynamics makes it somewhat closer to average hard rock at times, but up to this point, 2112 prove capable of managing their 90s Rush influences, sometimes leaning toward the catchier side of things, other times applying for real complexity and deep melodic sensitiveness, and other times, just doing both at once. Tracks don't tend to be too long, really, usually being framed within the 3.30-4.30 mark. The first two pieces are energetic and punchy, showing some of the most recurrent assets of the album. 'To Other Lands' is a weird mixture of romantic Black Crows and tango atmospheres (there's even a guest on bandoneon!), which works nice as an exercise on melancholy-driven art rock. Pieces 4 and 11 are instrumental acoustic guitar solos in which Juan Tambussi (the band's most prolific writer) displays his taste for melodic subtleties. On the other hand, 'Mr. Funny Shoes' finds the band elaborating a solid rocker with bigger dose of sophistication than on the first two tracks. This provides a proper anticipation of the album's most ambitious number, the multi-part suite 'Deep Blue Experience'. After a brief chorale, the initial frontal rocker establishes the suite's first section, which is followed by an atmospheric keyboard-based orchestration: then comes an alternation between sung rockers in various tempos, all of them linked by instrumental sections. All of this makes it an excellent 15-minute number. Most of the remaining tracks are usually set on the standards of catchy hard rock with incidental prog-related arrangements, but still there's room for unhidden technical brilliance. For example, there's the exciting instrumental 'Monkey Cargo' and, with a more constrained display, 'Amazing Wheel of Despair'. The closure is constructed on an ethnic basic motif, with lots of exotic percussions and occasional female chanting, while the band comes to the fore not for the sake of force but to add energetic colors. I wish this piece had been longer, since in that case, the band could have experimented further with this fusionesque trend in order to make it more magnificent. Anyway, no essential complaints from me regarding 'Mgahinga' since it stands as an excellent closure. Personally, I think this album could have benefited from the presence of less tracks and developing some of them, instead; however, "Glory Lies Ahead" is well-crafted, and as such, the album and the band that created it deserve to be labeled as excellent.

I think i'm being a little generous giving this 4 stars, but I love that heavy RUSH-like instrumental work too much. It's part of the curse of being such a huge RUSH fan I guess. Hey when they call their band 2112 you know they have to be influenced by RUSH right ? And yes they are a trio. Haha. Anyway my biggest complaint about this band from Argentina is the vocals which I really feel would be better received if sung in Spanish instead of English, especially when the lyrics aren't that great anyway. Where's Neil Peart when you need him ?

"Have You Seen My Little Dog?" is a great opener with the grinding guitar as the drums pound away. Amusing lyrics as well. Too short though. "Big Loss" has lots of RUSH moments in it. Chunky bass too. Love the heaviness. Excellent track. "To Other Lands" is more laid back with reserved vocals. Sounds like the accordion a minute in. Tasteful guitar before 3 minutes. Not a fan of this one really. "The Shape Of The Clouds" is a short instrumental of acoustic guitar melodies. Nice. "Mr.Funny Shoes" brings back that RUSH flavour. Thankyou. Heavy guitar in this instrumental that gets more intense late. Great tune ! "Deep Blue Experience" is clearly the best track on here. It's divided into 4 parts and is 15 minutes long. It opens with multi-vocal sounds as guitar comes ripping in with drums. This is the heaviest part on the whole album. A calm a minute in as waves of organ can be heard. It's aggressive again but not as heavy as earlier. Another calm before 4 minutes of keys and synths. Vocals 5 minutes in and a fantastic sound. Love this part. It changes 8 minutes in as it calms down with keys. Vocals are back too. Heavy again until we get some flute before 10 minutes. Heavy again. Atmospheric guitar melodies 12 1/2 minutes in with drums. It ends with the sounds of waves and guitar.

"Save Your Angel" contrasts the laid back sound with the heaviness. Vocals throughout. "Bitter Potatoes" is a very short instrumental of acoustic guitar. "Monkey Cargo" has some atmosphere as guitar and percussion play out to start. Kicks in 1 1/2 minutes in with some aggressive guitar. "Ten Thousand Ladybugs" is a good one. Guitar and vocals in a reserved intro that is quite beautiful. It builds with some great guitar. "Topera Gaucha" is another brief acoustic guitar tune. "Hollow" has a killer intro. Violin comes in. It has a fusion flavour to it with aggressive vocals. More powerful guitar follows. "Amazing Wheel Of Despair" opens with these intricate guitar melodies. Vocals before 1 1/2 minutes. Check out the guitar solo 2 1/2 inutes in. "Mgahinga" features these female ethnic vocal melodies that come and go throughout. I like the guitar a minute in but not a fan of the rest really.

Of the eight reviews (as I write this) four have given 1 star. So buyer beware. There's so much on here though that I absolutely love. A good album to "rock out" to.

Their third album named Glory lies ahead is by far their best work from all 3, here they changes a little bit the style combining in a good measure hard rock with progressive leanings, here they succeded to come with a pleasent album all the way. Mixing, this time, some intristing arrangements from progressive rock with more rockier ones, solid bass lines, good vocal arrangements, 2112 tries and give to the listner a good album. Much more in vein of an heavy prog album, the keyboards are more elaborated, not only as background, this time it has , some spacy moments, some solos aswell, good job. The guitar aswell is more polishe, good riffs, intristing and above all the vocal parts are far better then before. I don't knoew who plays the keyboards here, becus ethe previous musician Katz left the band soon after the release of Intro, this time all musicians works as an unit, an compact one and with good musicianship. IN some parts, specially on guita lines, the Rush influences are obvious, but to me they sound like a good combination rougher progressive music. The instrumental passages are more elaborated, are better and noting boring at all here, lots of minutes are only dedicated to instrumental arrangements, the vocal parts are left aside, good thing because here they relly shine on every piece. All tracks stands as good, again, nothing really something groundbreaking, but pleasent most of the time, definetly 3 stars. A band that for some resons falls into oblivion, IMO.