THE DREAMS OF MEN

The Dreams of Men was recommended to me by a fellow Argentinean prog lover who assured me this albums and this band was not Neo, not that I have anything against the genre, but it´s normally not my cup of tea. After listening to this album a few times I had to disagree, this is typical Neo, and it's the good Neo also.

Pallas could be considered one of the most important Neo acts around, but unfortunately they don't make it even in the top 5 bands. It seems Pallas never did a strong album until this, after 20 years of career. Now, this is good and bad. It's good cause I like it when a band keeps on getting better and better (another example of this in this genre is IQ´s Dark Matter) but it's also bad for the fact that. they don't have more good albums. but lets focus on this one, shall we?

The Dreams of Men brings us a band that knows itself, the band members know of their personal limitations, how good, fast and precise they can play and they respect that. There also seems to be a certain professionalism here, cero naivety, this guys have been doing this for a while, nothing comes out just because, everything seems to be thought through, every line, every note, every word for that matter also. Now, having said that, there is nothing new in this album that you haven't heard before. In structure, in feeling, in concept, look for no groundbreaking music here, you won't find it. If you keep that in mind, you might actually like it quite a lot.

As usual there are good and bad songs, most of them however fall somewhere in the middle. The opener, The Bringer of Dreams, might be the best song of the album for it's instant hooks, good vocals, power and good composition. Other highpoints here are Ghostdancer, my personal favorite, for its lyrics and great chorus. Almost at the end of the song a Native American sings a few lines, which I consider to be among the best things of this album, they did a good job here. Mr. Wolf might also be a good song, and it's short, so it doesn't drag unlike others. Finally I think I should take The Last Angel in consideration also, for it is a brilliant song, but it's on the border with cheesiness with those female vocals and the Latin spoken words at the end. BUT, it's still pretty good. Now, the bad ones! First of all I must say, that although the song itself is good, just because of the riff I can't think of Warriors to kindly. Man, I have heard that same riff in at least 5 songs; this is not acceptable, not in prog! As I said, the rest of the song is good, but that riff. that riff can't get away with it. Too Close to the Sun is way to long and drags quite a bit, making the song uninteresting and unfocused. The last, and worst in my ears: Invincible. Man, this song has got cheesy written all over it. Especially bad is the last time Reed sings "This is my life and you can't have it", for he tries to make a. type of growl and it comes out just as. well, I always have to laugh and shake my head when I hear it. The rest of the songs fall in that middle category: they aren't bad but neither good for that matter.

The end result is a good, quite solid album, but nowhere near a masterpiece or such. The stand outs, apart from the songs, are Reed´s vocals that seem to be a mixture of Fish, Nicholls and even some Waters here and there, the rhythm section and the (already mentioned) Native American singer in Ghostdancer. The rest is also quite good actually, but this are the stand outs for me. Recommended to any Neo fan, this is the good stuff. If this would be NeoProgarchives I would give this album another star, but in general prog, this is a 3 star for me.