Gucci Mane Breath of Fresh Air

Although there are those who nail their spirals to Vertigo as the prog label of choice, EMI’s Harvest certainly vies with it for pole position. With Harvest, the detail was everything. Loaded with the bizarre, striking and the strange, turns abounded like the Third Ear Band, Kevin Ayers and The Greatest Show On Earth. From the bad acid of Edgar Broughton’s There’s No Vibrations, But Wait through the squiffy majesty of Dave Mason’s You Shouldn’t Have Took More Than You Gave, to Be- Bop Deluxe’s future pop of Jet Silver and the Dolls Of Venus, this collection is impressive and nostalgic – its very lack of a house style providing its consistency.

Powerful, melodic, beautiful symphonic rock in the vein of Moody Blues, Barclay James Harvest, Camel and Genesis. Features a guest appearance by Camel's Andy Latimer. With an emphasis on lush keyboard orchestrations, soaring melodies and extended length compositions, David's album is firmly rooted in the classically influenced symphonic prog rock tradition…

He’s back again! But was he ever truly gone? Rock 'N' Roll with a capital N – showing that anything goes in this profession – is experiencing what feels like its seventh or eighth spring. And in the middle of it all: John Diva & The Rockets Of Love.

Improving upon its predecessor in virtually every way, Plains Of The Purple Buffalo uses more of what made their debut so fantastic, creating a very solid release. *Shels opts for rather vast song compositions upon this album, creating an almost dreamlike air and sprawling instrumental sections. Despite this, strong instrumentation, such as commanding guitars and pulsing drum beats, keep the release grounded enough so that it does not feel too far off for a listener to easily grasp. Brass sections are tastefully placed, usually in the more ambient, or quiet, portions of each song. This usage of brass instruments is extremely refreshing, providing a rather unique feel to quite a few songs. Consisting of a large variety of instrumental arrangement, Plains Of The Purple Buffalo does not allow a single moment to feel incomplete.

Entropia is Pain of Salvation's first studio album. It is a concept album concerning the story of a family in a fictional society that is torn apart by a war. "This album is a very complex concept that is pretty hard to grasp. It is about a family in a war situation, about a father that fails to protect his family, about a child who needs a father and not a soldier, about a society that kills and excludes and then takes its hand away from the remains in shock of what it has become. It is about a world I have chosen to call Entropia, which is a combination of the two words "Entropy" and "Utopia". Entropia is suspiciously similar to our world"…

This debut recording by Swedish prog metal band Pain of Salvation proved to be a well-needed breath of fresh air for a genre that was full of self-parody and self-indulgence. Led by vocalist/lyricist Daniel Gildenlow, their unique style draws from influences such as Dream Theater, Queensrÿche, Faith No More, King's X, Pink Floyd, and Frank Zappa, to name a few. Their theatrical, concept-like approach is offered in three chapters and is delivered with emotion, intelligence, integrity, passion, and poignancy. These qualities, which are often strived for but rarely attained, seem to come from the number of years the band spent together honing their craft. Their fine musicianship serves the music first and rarely falls into self-aggrandizing. While their fastidious approach would eventually push them to even greater creative heights, Entropia marked the arrival of one of the genre's few innovators.