DARK DAYS/LIGHT YEARS

What do you get when you combine psychedelic/space rock, electronica, progressive rock and pop music altogether, throw in a few tricky rhythms, stray away from the usual verse/chorus formula, throw in some chaos once in a while, add an odd instrument or two, sing in Welsh and rap in German just to throw you off a bit, put in a wild guitar solo or two, shake in a bunch of amazing hooks and add a lot of non-obnoxious keyboards and add a dash (or spill it in sometimes) of humor? You get this album! In fact, you might get a few Super Furry Animals albums.

Some may wonder why this band is in the Prog Archives. It is listed under Prog Related because it is a brand of unconventional pop music, but there is so much more to it than pop music. This is, to me, an updated version of Sophisto-Prog, which was popularized in the late 70's, early 80s by a band by the name of Supertramp. But this is a much more updated sound AND you get a whole truck load of variety on top of that. Where Supertramp's sound was easily recognizable, SFA is not so recognizable because they give their treatment to so many kinds of music. You can really hear that in this album, which is probably one of their best. This album is full of surprises, but if I told you what they were, they wouldn't be surprises anymore. And that last epic track called "Pric" is simply amazing music that even propels you into avant garde territory before you even realize what is going on.

This is not music that you have to concentrate on and because of that, the album can play by track by track and before you know it, you've been tapping your foot and bouncing your head for over an hour and wondering where the time went. But you will have sounds echoing in your head and you will be thinking, "Wow, where did that sound come from and how could a pop group do something that cool?" You will question whether you really did hear that or if it is something that popped in your head from another album. This is good stuff and it very seldom gets boring. Pop and prog really can work together. Though the prog might be light, the band does not follow pop formulas though they may retain some of the sensibility of it all, but at the same time, the music just hangs on the edge of sanity.

Enjoyable music. I wish pop music would take lessons from this music more often. Excellent addition to your collection. 4 stars (with a fifth star that just kind of winks in and out a bit, kind of like that Christmas light with a short in it).