Album Review: Lars Fredrik Frøislie – Fire Fortellinger

Artist: Lars Fredrik Frøislie | Album: Fire Fortellinger | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2023

From: Oslo, Norway | Label: Karisma Records

For fans of: Yes, Wobbler

Lars Fredrik Frøislie is the keyboardist and a backing vocalist of Wobbler, and Fire Fortellinger (Four Stories) is his first solo album. I had a few people reach out, independent of one another, to tell me about this album, and they all had a line to the effect of, “I know you’re not really a fan of Wobbler, but…” I would like to clarify something: I don’t dislike Wobbler. I think they’re over-praised in modern progressive rock discourse, but I don’t think they’re bad. Dwellers of the Deep was a mixed bag of a record, yes; but From Silence to Somewhere, Rites at Dawn, and Hinterland are all pretty solid. They’re not doing anything groundbreakingly original, but they’re putting out good, classic-style, Mellotron-and-organ-powered prog.

So, I went into Fire Fortellinger less skeptical than many people probably expected me to be. This guy’s the keyboard player for a very keyboard-forward band, so I knew about what to expect. And sure enough, this album is pretty decent, classic-style prog.

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Album Review: Monika Roscher Bigband – Witchy Activities and the Maple Death

Band: Monika Roscher Bigband | Album: Witchy Activities and the Maple Death | Genre: Progressive rock, Avant-pop | Year: 2023

From: Munich, Germany | Label: Zenna Records

For fans of: black midi, Frank Zappa, UK, Van der Graaf Generator, iamthemorning

Bandcamp

When I first had this album recommended to me, I was a bit skeptical. When I think of mixing big-band jazz with rock music, my mind immediately goes to Diablo Swing Orchestra, and I hate Diablo Swing Orchestra. However, the person who recommended this to me is a reader who has given me a number of other good suggestions, including Daniel Rossen’s You Belong Here, so I decided to give this a shot.

I’m glad I did. The massive ensemble assembled by bandleader, guitarist, and vocalist Monika Roscher manages to form amazingly coherent songs from disparate musical ideas. Aside from rock and jazz, electronica, blues, and avant-garde music all get their moments across this sprawling record.

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Odds & Ends: June 5, 2023

Band: Demolished Men | Album: In a Violent Way | Genre: Jazz-Fusion, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This EP is full of light, smooth, complex instrumental passages that equally put you at ease and keep you guessing where they’re going next. It constantly treads the line between rock and jazz, and sax, electric piano, and guitar share lead duties fluidly. The hand percussion is executed excellently, adding a nice depth to the rhythmic elements of this release.

Score: 81/100

Band: Krallice | Album: Porous Resonance Abyss | Genre: Progressive metal, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Prolific prog-metallers Krallice have returned with another new album, but this one is pretty distinct within their discography. This sprawling, four-part piece has synthesizers as the lead instrument for almost the entirety of its runtime. There’s a lush, haunting atmosphere to this release, and it suits the band’s black metal quite well. There’s a Gothic aesthetic to the coldness and oppressiveness of the synths, and the whole 40-minute suite flows together beautifully.

Score: 82/100

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Album Review: Seven Impale – Summit

Band: Seven Impale | Album: Summit | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2023

From: Bergen, Norway | Label: Karisma Records

For fans of: Van der Graaf Generator, Beardfish, Leprous’s good stuff, King Crimson

Bandcamp

Seven Impale is a Norwegian sextet that plays a fairly dark, heavy, jazz-inspired version of progressive rock. In many ways, they bear a lot of similarity to Van der Graaf Generator, albeit with more maximal arrangements. It’s been seven years since their last release, so when they announced this, I was very excited to hear what they had been working on.

City of the Sun, their 2014 debut, is a stellar record and one of my favorite albums from that year. 2016’s Contrapasso, though, never quite landed with me. It isn’t bad, by any means, but it just lacked that certain something that would have allowed it to click. I think a lot of it had to do with the sheer length of that release. At 67 minutes, that’s a lot of jazzy, sax-forward prog to listen to, and it became a bit exhausting. Compare that to their debut, which clocks in at 45 minutes. Summit, their new release, sees them staying in their usual vein, but consists of just four songs. So I went into this hopeful I’d like it.

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Album Review: Yes – Mirror to the Sky

Band: Yes | Album: Mirror to the Sky | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2023

From: London, UK | Label: InsideOut Music

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About a year-and-a-half after their dull-as-dirt twenty-second studio album, The Quest, Yes has returned with a new release. At times, I question whether or not this band really is “Yes,” though. They’re a bit like the Ship of Theseus at this point. Jon Anderson was booted from the band in 2008, following a severe asthma attack. Chris Squire was the last remaining of the original members in the band, and he passed away in 2015. Then last year, Alan White, the band’s drummer since 1973, also passed away. Steve Howe’s still with the band, though he did have a 16-year absence from the band from 1981-1997. Keyboardist Geoff Downes was briefly in Yes in the early ‘80s before returning in 2011. And Bassist Billy Sherwood was a longtime friend of Squire’s who has collaborated with the band since the mid-90s. My distaste for vocalist Jon Davison should be evident from my last Yes review.

Philosophical conundrums aside, I haven’t been shy about dragging big-name acts through the mud when they put out a bad record. The Quest was terrible, and I mentioned that I liked Heaven and Earth even less in that review. I’m not a fan of The Zealot Gene, and I gave RökFlöte a lukewarm rating. (And that RökFlöte review prompted someone to send me a downright apoplectic email full of typos and shoddy reasoning. It really was funny how bent out of shape that person got.) I’m both looking forward to and dreading my eventual Dream Theater Deep Dive; if you think I went hard on The Wall’s sophomoric storytelling, just wait ‘til I talk about The Astonishing!

I went into this record with low expectations. The members of Yes seem to have simply gotten kinda lame in their old age. I was not particularly impressed with the first single, and the fact that this is another of those stupid disc-and-a-half money-grab releases also didn’t do much to give me hope. Despite all that, I wound up being pleasantly surprised. Mirror to the Sky is Yes’s best album since Magnification, and I’m willing to unambiguously call this album good. Not great, but good.

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Album Review: K’mono – Mind Out of Mind

Band: K’mono | Album: Mind Out of Mind | Genre: Progressive rock | Year: 2023

From: Minneapolis, USA | Label: Ephemerol Night Terrors

For fans of: Yes, Genesis, Wobbler

Bandcamp

When I posted my Best of 2022 list, I noted that the central US had an especially strong showing on it, with five of the top 25 hailing from either St. Louis or Minneapolis. One doesn’t normally think of the Midwest as one of the major hotbeds of prog, alongside southern England, Northern Italy, and (more recently) Scandinavia. But the band Kansas (from Topeka) was a major success in the mid-to-late ‘70s, and smaller bands like Zerfas (Indianapolis) and Yezda Urfa (Portage, IN) have since received cult acclaim. Even in the two years I lived in Kansas I found a couple of great local prog bands: Flight/Dirigible Squared and The Last Glacier (both long defunct or disbanded, sadly). So it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that a group from Minneapolis has put out another great progressive rock record.

Coming two years after Return to the ‘E’, Mind Out of Mind is this trio’s second full-length album. The eerie, Sergeant Pepper’s-meets-They Live album art is an excellent complement to the music here. It’s flashy and attention-grabbing, but there is a lot of subtle weirdness that gradually unveils itself, too.

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Album Review: Missing Jack & The Kameleons

Band: Missing Jack & The Kameleons | Album: Human Cycle | Genre: Psychedelic rock | Year: 2023

From: Toulouse, France | Label: Six Tonnes de Chair

For fans of: Slift, Hawkwind, Neu!

Bandcamp

Six Tonnes de Chair is a small French record label that specializes in garage rock, often with psychedelic and kraut-y flairs. I’ve covered acts from this label before (Perilymph, WEEED, Slift), and Missing Jack & The Kameleons fit into this general mold quite neatly. Their style draws a lot from late ‘60s garage rock, albeit often sounding a bit cleaner. Krautrock and surf influences are commonplace here, and they’ve got an overall fun feel.

“You Don’t Think” opens up with a buzzy, jumpy, krautrock-tinged riff. Flavors of surf rock are evident, too, especially in the airy backing vocals. There’s a bit too much going on with the drums for this to have a truly motorik beat, but the spirit is there. The rhythm is insistent and infectious, and it really complements the hazy atmosphere.

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Odds & Ends: May 1, 2023

Band: Arkitekture | Album: Rationalis Impetus | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

Arkitekture is a South Korean progressive rock band that plays a lush variety of progressive rock augmented by strings, winds, and reeds. Jazz, classical, and chamber music influences are prominent across this instrumental album. The individual tracks are well-constructed and full of powerful, emotive playing. If you’re looking for something grand and dramatic, this one is for you.

Score: 88/100

Band: Entropia | Album: Total | Genre: Progressive metal, Black metal | Bandcamp

Entropia’s new album is full of icy, biting riffs. The guitar passages are intricately layered and full of irregular rhythms. They’re often repeated in a krautrock-like way as minor changes accumulate. Though they’re hardly the focus, I love the way keyboards are deployed on this album; they add drama and depth whenever they’re included. The 15-minute title track includes some nice flavors of post-metal here and there. This is a really exciting record, and if you’re into acts like Oranssi Pazuzu or Inter Arma, I would especially strongly recommend this release.

Score: 90/100

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Album Review: Jethro Tull – RökFlöte

Band: Jethro Tull | Album: RökFlöte | Genre: Progressive rock, Hard rock | Year: 2023

From: Luton, UK | Label: InsideOut Music

Bandcamp

A little over a year after their unimpressive return on The Zealot Gene, Jethro Tull is back with another record, RökFlöte. For this record, Ian Anderson stated he drew inspiration from Norse mythology, and the word “Ragnarök” is where he got the idea for this album’s title. Each of the twelve songs on this album is based off a character or concept from Norse mythology.

Going into this, I did my best to keep an open mind. Yes, I’d found The Zealot Gene unnecessary, disappointing, and soulless; but Tull has bounced back from bad records before! Minstrel in the Gallery followed the unfocused hodgepodge of WarChild, and Roots to Branches came after the tepid blues rock of Catfish Rising (and their middling ‘80s hard rock). Martin Barre continues to be absent from the band, so I tried to calibrate my expectations for the guitarwork accordingly.

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Odds & Ends: April 3, 2023

Band: Enslaved | Album: Heimdal | Genre: Progressive metal | Bandcamp

If nothing else, Enslaved is a very consistent band. They’ve got a sound they stick to pretty well, and they release albums reasonably often. However, this can also lead to a number of their albums bleeding together into a vague mush of proggy, blackish metal. Heimdal is certainly better than Utgard, but it still doesn’t do much to stand out in their discography. Maybe it’ll grow on me; Enslaved’s best albums have always taken a few listens to sink in. But as it stands, after a couple listens, this is a perfectly fine–though inessential–release.

Score: 74/100

Band: Fistfights with Wolves | Album: The Sheep That Eats The Wolf | Genre: RIO, Zeuhl, Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This short release has some good ideas on it, but the problem is there aren’t quite enough of them to justify the 28-minute runtime. This band is clearly heavily influenced by Magma, especially in their vocal arrangements, but they feel like a bit of a one-trick pony. None of the songs stood out that much, and the 12-part mini-suite “RMFP” is scattershot and unfocused. The opening “Skeletons” is pretty good, so maybe this should have just been a single with one other tightened-up song.

Score: 61/100

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