Neo-Prog
United States
A prog fan's dream album and the first REAL prog supergroup since UK!!! Line up includes Ken Jaquess, bassist for LA based Atlantis, multi-instrumentalist and Peter Gabriel sound-a-like Shaun Guerin, ex-UK guitarist Allan Holdsworth, drummer extraordinaire Doug Sanborn, keyboardist/synths player Ryo Okumoto and violinist Yvette Devereaux on a magnificent sounding album of pure progressive rock at its absolute best. K2 sound similar to and as good as anything UK ever did and not that far from classic GENESIS either, with a feel that's firmly rooted in the 70's, while at the same time sounding just incredible. With 5 tracks over forty-six minutes, the band get more than their fair chance to shine, yet the sum of the parts makes a whole that is breathtakingly spectacular. The songs are the best you'll have heard since any number of vintage and classic British 70's prog albums, with a vocal that is pure GABRIEL-esque in terms of its sound, its passion, even its phrasing, and on compositions as amazingly written and arranged as this, it's as close to prog heaven as you'll get.
But that's by no means the whole story - we're talking Holdsworth's guitar work at its most prog-sounding and expressive best, melodic, fluid, flowing and it's like UK all over again. The drumming is every bit as good too, as Bruford or Bozzio, even a mix of the two, while Okumoto & Devereaux provide a sea of synthesizers, Mellotrons and violin, just soaring and flying in ways that will leave you jaw-dropped in admiration and stunned as to the brilliance of it all! The album itself is, in the fine traditions of the best 70's releases, a "concept album", written and arranged by Ken Jaquess. The opening track is a staggeringly fine twenty-three minute epic that will occupy a place by your player for years to come with its fantastic symphonic keyboards intro and many twists and turns along the way, sheer flowing construction and impassioned delivery, making it the 'Supper's Ready' of the new millennium. Everything about this track oozes pure class and quality, but, more than that, the sheer spectacle of hearing the synths, vocals, rhythm section, electric guitar and violin played like THIS, is nothing short of spine-tingling stuff! The 2nd track has an intro that will leave you swearing you've been transported back to the heady days of the 70's, while the main body of the song has a similar effect. The sound swirls all around you and it's like having classic Genesis playing in your living room at times - it's monumental and then some, nearly seven minutes of utter prog bliss. What follows is like a delicious collision of UK and GENESIS with 3 tracks running for seven, three and six minutes, and these just put the icing on the already sumptuous cake.
In short, 'Book Of The Dead' is magnificent - one of the best "seventies prog-rock" sounding albums ever made - and it's only thirty-three years late!!! So worth the wait, you'll want it yesterday!
Highly Recommended !!!
2005 - BOOK OF THE DEAD
- Ken Jaquess / bass, keyboards & 10 string acoustic
- Yvette Devereaux / violin
- Shaun Guerin / vocals
- Allan Holdsworth / guitar
- Ryo Okumoto / piano, moog
- Doug Sanborn / drums
- John Miner / additional guitar
1. Chapter 1 : Infinite Voyage (23:25)
2. Chapter 2 : Mirror to the Spirits (6:54)
3. Chapter 3 : The Edge of Light (7:03)
4. Chapter 4 : Aten (Window of Appearences)(3:22)
5. Chapter 5 : Cloak of Antiquity (5:54)
Total Time: 46:38
Look!!
