AFTER THE STORM

It often happens that the first album one obtains by a band becomes one's favourite. The reasons for this phenomenon might vary from the sentimental to the scientific. For instance, if one is moved enough to buy a second disk by a band, then likely one thinks highly enough of the first disk to make it hard to match. In addition, one might deliberately acquire one of the more highly regarded works of a band in the first place, which again becomes a tough act to follow. So much is this the case for this reviewer that I must note a blatant exception, in the form of Kaos Moon. Granted, over 2 decades and only 2 albums, the "group" is more of a pet project of Bernard Ouellette than anything else. I sought out their debut after rather enjoying "Circle of Madness". Once it entered the confines of my mobile CD player, it there resided for about 10 days and probably 12 full listens. Conclusion: it's all good, much of it great.

Take a healthy dose of melodic rock, delicately executed mood shifts, the full continuum of shades from very dark to very light, superb singing and instrumentation, especially in the tasty and versatile lead guitars and bass, augmented with just the right keyboard atmospherics, perky punchiness that avoids metallic malapropisms, and you have "After the Storm". In this incarnation Kaos Moon is like fellow Canadians Saga without the Queen-like drama. In other words, certainly not wholly progressive, but wholly enjoyable without overstatement and with all but the tastiest fat trimmed. If I had to single out a few tracks, albeit minimized if taken out of the overall musical context, I would pick "Nobody's Perfect", "Sayana", "If Someday", and "Vision". The 2 instrumentals are both adventurous yet accessible as well. Indeed, it is the overall entertainment value of this work that places it way above most prog, while avoiding that velveeta factor at the same time. The only exception might be "Symphonia" due to silly rhyming lyrics and a trite unmemorable chorus.

Pick this one up, give this a listen, followed by another listen, and another listen....and after the storm has passed, I think you'll agree this warrants 4+ stars.