The Flower Kings

Dreams are an essential part of the musical world. Despite having been firmly involved in Sweden's highly fertile prog rock scene in the '70s, Roine Stolt (Kaipa, The Tangent, Transatlantic) was still harbouring dreams of maximum creative fulfilment when he arrived in the '90s, guitar in hand and a head full of sublime musical ideas. The end-result was a solo album, 'The Flower King', which struck such a resounding chord with a small but growing number of prog fans around the planet. It also proved to be one of a handful of albums that helped to kick-start and underpin a worldwide resurgence for adventurous, symphonic rock music that is still gaining momentum over two decades later. You can find the proof of what happened next within this lavish, generously proportioned box set containing the first half of The Flower Kings' extraordinary catalogue of immersive, immaculate studio albums…

Waiting for Miracles is the first long-player by the Flower Kings since 2013's Desolation Rose. It marks a return from exile for the Flower Kings after 2018's Waiting for an Alchemist - which was billed to Roine Stolt's the Flower King. Here Stolt, Hasse Fröberg, and Jonas Reingold are joined by new members keyboardist Zach Kamins and drummer Mirko DeMaio who are not, based on what is here, fully integrated into TFK's aesthetic. This is a band offering that contains the complex mood, textural, and color changes, intricate melodies, atmospheres, and dynamics that are at the heart of TFK's musical signature.
Waiting for Miracles clocks in at 85 minutes but showcases TFK in a more economical mode compositionally. That's not to say the band are writing pop songs; their music remains challenging prog rock that recalls the sound and feel of the band's first five records…

There are a few artists out there that, without trying to change the world, succeeded in accomodating the old recipes to the present day. In the domain of Progressive rock, The Flower Kings is the perfect example. Following a path not unsimilar to Spock's Beard's, the swedish band led by guitarist Roine Stolt achieved to leave its mark in the middle of the Nineties, accompanying the rebirth of Progressive rock. It remains on top of the genre nowadays. It is no surprise then if, after having paid tribute to most of the giants of the Golden Seventies, the artists of today tend to care about that second generation as well. That's how the Musea label and the Colossus fanzine created an album in four CDs, tailor-made for the excellency of The Flower Kings: "A Flower Full Of Stars - A Tribute To The Flower Kings".

Swedish progressive rock legends The Flower Kings, and longtime label-partners InsideOutMusic, will begin an extensive reissue campaign in 2022, which will see the entire catalogue of the band reissued on CD & Vinyl in remastered editions, with it being the first time many of the albums have been available on wax. The next in the series is the band’s sixth album ‘The Rainmaker’. It will be available as Ltd. CD Digipak & Gatefold black 2LP+CD & LP-Booklet (for the first time!), both featuring remastered and partly remixed audio and new artwork.

Swedish progressive rock legends The Flower Kings, and longtime label-partners InsideOutMusic, will begin an extensive reissue campaign in 2022, which will see the entire catalogue of the band reissued on CD & Vinyl in remastered editions, with it being the first time many of the albums have been available on wax. The next in the series is the band’s fifth album ‘Space Revolver’, which saw the arrival of Jonas Reingold on bass. It will be available as Ltd. CD Digipak & Gatefold black 2LP+CD & LP-Booklet (for the first time!), both featuring remastered and partly remixed audio and new artwork.

"Flower Power" is a 2 CD set of epic proportions. CD 1 basically runs as 1 long track which contains some of The Flower Kings' most diverse and powerful pieces ever recorded! Epic track, "Garden Of Dreams" runs 59 mins in length and builds in emotion and intensity until the most beautiful, symphonic climax in unleashed upon the listener. This long track moves so cleverly in atmospheres, moods and emotions that the listener will not be tired throughout at all (a real trick to pull off for such a long track!). "Flower Power" contains lots of real The Flower Kings classic progressive rock moments which will please all prog heads out there in prog land.

The Flower Kings enjoyed a rather long break following 2007's The Sum of No Evil album and the tour that ensued, with individual members undertaking solo projects or simply laying low, recharging their creative batteries after years of grueling, non-stop work. Naturally, however, this hiatus only heightened fan expectations leading into the band's next progressive rock challenge, 2012's Banks of Eden, which inevitably found the lovable Swedish egg-heads both reveling in and wrestling the characteristic excess, majesty, and hubris of their chosen art form, as expected. Indeed, cynics could easily allege that the album's opening, 25-minute-long "Numbers" is pretty much what happens when a prog rock band starts jamming and simply doesn't bother stopping (nerds armed with instruments gone wild!?)…

Swedish progressive rock legends The Flower Kings, and longtime label-partners Inside Out Music, will begin an extensive reissue campaign in 2022, which will see the entire catalogue of the band reissued on CD & Vinyl in remastered editions, with it being the first time many of the albums have been available on wax. ‘Stardust We Are’ was the band's third studio album, and first double-album. It features the epic 25-minute title track which has since become one of the bands signature songs.