Last February, I was scouring the last of the bins as the Rockford, IL Media Play prepared to close its doors. I was sad because they actually carried titles I liked withouth having to order them. As I flipped through, depressed that all that was left was copies of Wrecking Ball by Grace Slick, I saw a familiar label name on the side of a jewel case and snatched it up. InsideOut is a Germany-based record label that specializes in progressive, neo-progressive, and progressive metal. I had yet to go wrong picking up something put out by them, so I went home full of hope, if not necessarily joy.
The band I had never heard of, Sieges Even, and the CD title, Learning to Navigate By the Stars, seemed pretty typical. I went home and sat and listened I listened again. I was, to be honest, stunned. This was actually something different. The music was crisp, clear, reflecting a production that stripped echo and reverb, creating a sound that was sharp, distinct. The singer was a typical tenor, although he had more control than most (not a whole lot of vibratto), and the lyrics, though enigmatic and metaphorical, pretty clearly described the emotional turmoil surrounding the ending of a relationship.
I just couldn't get the crisp, almost minimalist production approach out of my head. There was something som refreshing about a band that stripped away the gee-gaws of the modern sound studio (available to most amateurs thanks to computers) and created a sound that forced one to listen to the music. One song begins in 13/8, shifts to alternating bard of 5 and 4, back to 13. This rhythmic complexity is not self-conscious or affected. It is what the song is and flows very naturally. With only a few keyboard overdubs, and the stripped-down style of production, there is very little cover for the three instrumentalists and one vocalist. They either get it right, or they flub it. For the most part (no album is without its weak moments) they get it very right, taking turns I would not have thought of, the music moving in surprising ways.
Ten months later the CD still sounds fresh, and I look forward to getting their back-catalog (once it becomes available again; the band had broken up in 1999, only reuniting in 2004, and its back catalog is on a German label that no longer exists) and to future CDs (ihave seen, on their website, they are back in the studio). The truly new and different is rare, and usually not as new or different as its promoters would claim. This is unique, and satisfying. Give it a whirl.
Virtual Tin Cup
