On a Dark and Stormy Night (10T Records , 2012)
The latest album by New Jersey band Shadow Circus is a concept album inspired by Madeleine L’Engle’s science fiction book, A Wrinkle in Time. The band presents an intriguing mix of attractive progressive rock and tired heavy metal.
The great symphonic opening of the ‘Overture’ leaves a really good impression. The piece presents notable keyboard work, including mellotron, and the weakest point is the hard rock guitar in the middle part.
On track 2, ‘Daddy’s Gone,’ the band treats the listener to outstanding progressive rock with an epic feel, featuring a mix of acoustic and electric guitars, synths, vocals mellotron, including a significant electric guitar solo.
The symphonic rock continues on ‘Whosit, Whatsit & Which’ and ‘Make Way for the show.’ The later has a very dramatic feel, where orchestral keyboards, piano and electric guitars stand out.
You can skip track 5, ‘Tesseract,’ as it is the same old metal that has little to say.
Progressive rock returns with ‘Uriel,’ followed by another stale heavy metal track titled ‘Camazotz.’
Track 8 shows the great talent of the band with outstanding keyboard work. And the album concludes with more metal.
The lineup on the band includes John Fontana on guitars, Matt Masek on bass and cello, David Silver on keyboards, Jason Brower on drums, and David Bobick on vocals.
Shadow Circus’ clearly demonstrate that they can compose and perform high quality progressive rock. Hopefully, they will continue in that direction and ditch the cliched heavy metal elements that have become such an unwelcome guest in some of today’s bands.
Buy theOn a Dark and Stormy Night CD or MP3s in North America
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