It is nigh on short of a miracle that this album by English prog rockers Also Eden was ever completed. On July 20 2010, Rich Harding, the lead singer and guitarist was involved in a near-fatal motorcycle accident shortly after he joined the band.  As a result of the accident, his left leg was badly smashed up, he suffered a ruptured aorta and had to be put into an induced coma while surgeons tried to stabilise his condition after he started developing a chest infection which could have led to pneumonia. Thankfully, Harding is now making a steady recovery to such a degree that the band was not only able to release this hugely enjoyable album, it has also played a handful of gigs in the UK.  As he told Music Street Journal, making Think of the Children was part of his healing process and gave him a lifeline during probably the most challenging period of his life.

This, in many respects, is what makes this album all the more remarkable especially as his band-mates, keyboards player Ian Hodson, guitarist Simon Rogers, bassist Steve Dunn and drummer Lee Nicholas (the newest addition who joined the band last year) waited until he was suitably recovered to record it.  This is their third album following their debut release About Time which was followed up by It’s Kind of You to ask, but this is the first with Harding on vocals.  The album’s central theme is about the lurking menace which faces the ordinary people of today such as the constant 24/7 surveillance and perceived freedoms we are all told we enjoy but which do not exist. These themes recur throughout to such a degree that all the tracks link seamlessly together to present a composite picture of illusion and delusion.  It is not hard to hear which bands have been their main influences. Marillion, Porcupine Tree and Genesis all surface in equal measures throughout.

This is a wonderfully well-balanced and deceptively clever album which will only be fully appreciated after several airings because of the inner life it possesses as well as its fine musicianship. With bands like Also Eden around, English prog is in fine shape and with Harding now starting to walk again unaided, there will be much to look forward to from them in the future.

This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2012  Volume 1 at lulu.com/strangesound.

Starting with “Think of the Children – I,” the overriding feature is Harding’s urgent, penetrating voice, which knocks you sideways with the power and pain it evokes with just simple piano and keyboards to accompany him before it starts building into a steady solid guitar-led sequence. Though his vocals were changed by the overall impact of the crash, hardly any of the lyrics were altered from their originals written before it happened.