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Progressive Rock CD Reviews

Eyes of Blue In Fields of Arduth Review by Gary Hill This is the reissue of an album from 1969. Perhaps it’s not progressive rock. It’s psychedelic and really very much proto prog, though. That makes it find under the “prog” heading as far as I’m concerned. It doesn’t matter how you label it, though, this is really a long lost gem. I’d highly recommend it to anyone who digs old school psychedelically inspired music. This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2016 Volume 1 at lulu.com/strangesound.

Track by Track Review

Merry Go Round The introduction to this is set in a classically styled prog rock kind of arrangement. It gets some chorale style vocals at times. From there they work out to some killer psychedelically tinged prog rock. As the vocals join it is obvious that this is a product of the 1960s. It’s very much hippie music. That said, it’s also definitely early progressive rock. The piece continues to evolve with a drop back to mellow, dramatic sounds. The growth continues and the song builds back out and continues to work through different modes and themes. This is definitely psychedelic rock, but it’s also definitely progressive. This piece is epic in scope, and at about nine minutes in length, it’s also rather epic in proportion. It has some definite space rock moments.

The Light We See This comes in with more of a standard psychedelic rock texture. There are some cool backwards tracked guitar solo bits on the closing jam. This isn’t the proggiest thing here, but it’s reasonably close.

Souvenirs (Tribute to Django) Although based on a rather shuffling old fashioned sound (ala Django Reinhardt), this still has plenty of proggy elements at play. It’s quite jazz oriented. It’s also instrumental and very cool. They do bring it more into psychedelic territory before it’s over.

Ardath This twists and turns. It has a lot of psychedelic rock in the arrangement. It also has some blues rock at times.

Spanish Blues Jazz merges with psychedelia on this cut. It’s definitely another that lands in the early prog category. It’s a great jam with some exceptional instrumental work. There are things here that make me think of ELP and others that call to mind Deep Purple a bit.

Door (The Child That Is Born on the Sabbath Day) More freeform in some ways, this is decidedly creative early progressive rock with psychedelic elements. There is a trippy section mid-track that has some weird layers of vocals. It works from there in unusual ways, too. There are also some sections that make me think of the later act Pentwater.

Little Bird This definitely makes me think of the psychedelic side of The Beatles. It’s bouncy and fun. Perhaps not the most proggy thing here, it still lands in that neighborhood.

After the War Bluesy harmonica leads this out of the gate. It’s a hard rocking jam that’s very much set in a blues rock motif. That said, it’s also quite a psychedelic rocker. It’s almost like Canned Heat meeting The Doors in a Deep Purple song. The slowed down movement, covered with non-lyrical vocals and organ is a stellar prog rock jam.

Extra Hour Those looking for pure prog need search no further than this cut. It has a jilting kind of texture. It features some cool instrumental interplay and explorations. It does have some vocals, but they are strictly non-lyrical ones. In a lot of ways this reminds me of Renaissance.

Chances This cut isn’t really proggy at all. It’s sort of a basic psychedelic rock song. It’s nothing all that special to my ears.

Apache '69 Now, this take on the themes of the song “Apache” really does bring a psychedelic rock turned prog sound to the piece. This instrumental features some killer jamming with hints of space rock built into it.

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