If you follow the myprogmusic reviews, you should know that I am particularly attached to progressive bands influenced by 'Pink Floyd' and, in these groups, the Germans from 'RPWL'. And so, it was only natural that when I listened to the Finns first studio recording of 'Confusion Field', I found myself on familiar ground because the resemblance between the Germans and the Finns is striking both melodically and on the level of the singing of 'Tomi Kankainen' which is very close to that of 'Yogi Lang'.
'Sky Is Never The Same' opens the album with a fairly typical 'RPWL' composition, with this characteristic of associating powerful instrumental parts with more restrained sung parts, the rather slow rhythm unrolling a melody which never leaves you, then, 'Close Call' continues in this calm atmosphere which reminds me of the sounds of 'Therion' in the 'Vovin' period (see my playlist of 'Therion' here). With 'Nothing Holds The Storm', the melodic lines catch us on the first listen and the instrumental part offers a very beautiful guitar solo, the atmosphere continuing to release a certain quiet force, then, 'Become Invisible', after a refined introduction, shows a more classic face bringing us back to the rock formations of the 80s/90s while having very nice alternations between powerful parts and others much calmer, and as for, 'Distort Reality' which follows, it makes us come back to this comparison with 'RPWL' which merges an important sound base with a softness in the vocal arrangements, the keyboards also bringing this airy side. Follows 'Anxiety Reflected' in the same vein as its predecessor and in a more disturbing atmosphere with a strong emotional tension throughout the title certainly accentuated by admirable rhythmic alternations and intensity, tension that we find on the next title 'See Through Walls' in which the bass/drums rhythm section is particularly inventive. 'Zen Garden Moment' continues in a particularly intense atmosphere with a monotonous melody giving the impression of accumulating an enormous tension ready to explode at any moment and which finally falls delicately into a refined final, the album ending very beautifully with the longest track, 'Connecting The Dots' which unrolls an addictive and haunting final melody with chord changes accentuated by the rhythm section which again brings us back to that quiet force of 'RPWL'.
In summary, the Finns of 'Confusion Field' offer us an already very mature first album which gets better with listening in a relatively accessible melodic neo-progressive style in the tradition of 'RPWL' which should appeal to a whole public adept of a modern progressive drawing its influences from the 70s/80s with obviously at the top of the list 'Pink-Floyd'... | |
