https://www.progarchives.com/review.asp?id=3214524
Australian musicians Ben Craven (Monsters from the Id), Tim Bennetts (ProAustralia Live), and Dean Povey (Frankenfido) get together to produce an album with the sound palette of David Gilmour’s most dynamic music, only they seem to want to do it better than anything David Gilmour ever did.
- “Future History Part 1” (1:48) Surprise, surprise! This little intro makes it sound like Ben and company are going to try to take us back to the younger, more energetic version of Mr. David Gilmour. Let’s see how well they do! (4.5/5)
- “For All Mankind” (8:16) some great NeoProg sound with vocals that straddle the fence between Peter Gabriel, modern Nick Barrett, and ICEHOUSE’s Ira Davies (especially in the choruses). Nice keyboard work throughout but the synth solo in the fifth minute is exceptionally good. Follow that up with some excellent David Gilmour pedal steel guitar work, bookend it with that winning chorus, and you’ve got a pretty darn good song. But, wait! We’re not done! Not even close! There’s more Gilmour-esque prog heaven to go, paired with a choral background singing of the chorus’ main lyrics and you have a heavenly NeoProg motif that may just surpass anything Australia’s gift to humanitarian NeoProg, Mark Trueack, has ever done. (18.875/20)
- “Provenance” (5:58) more eminently-soothing waves and layers of FLOYDian prog heaven open this one. And I thought that Björn Riis was the best imitator and heir apparent to Mr. Gilmour! The electric piano finish isn’t bad, either. (9.125/10)
- “Earthrise” (9:16) using the same sound palette as the previous songs–and the Gabriel-Barrett reverb-treated vocal– here in multiple tracks–starts off a nice song but the chorus isn’t quite as seductive as the one on “For All Makind” despite the Gilmour-esque guitar riffs and flourishes around and between the vocal lines. Stop and shift into a brief motif classically-picked acoustic guitar and Latin castanets as a break and bridge back to the main motif works okay for me. The next round of the main verse-and-chorus motif ends at the end of the fifth minute at which time computer piano and background pedal steel guitar bridge us back to the acoustic guitar with a running-bass-driven (near Disco) beat beneath. This lasts only briefly before the classically-picked nylon string guitar is supplanted by Ben’s reverb- slathered Gilmour guitar shredding as if the Master himself were manning the axe. At the 8-minute mark this motif is slowly faded out whereupon but 8:28 it is replaced by two acoustic guitars–which then take us out. (18/20)
- “Terraforming” (16:31) for me, the choice of using a computer generated piano instead of the real thing is always a poor one. For me, the choice of using a direct-to-console plug-in acoustic guitar instead of a miked “real thing” is always a poor one. Then bring on a fully Dave Gilmour-esque instrumental song while using chunky Rickenbacker- sounding bass and you’ve really turned me off. Then add chords of Mellotron-like “ooh” and “aah” voices and then choppy Hammond organ play and now you’ve really aroused my ire. This is exactly all that I dislike about the Lars Fredrik Frøeslie albums. Then shift into a pseudo-bluesy bass-and-drum mode for some Hammond and swampy slide guitar interplay and you might as well be telling me that you’re not interested in writing original music–that you’re only interested in being a retro-prog homage band. Talented. Skilled. Masters of old sounds and styles. They’ve definitely got all of this, but this is not what I’m looking for in my musical interests: quite the opposite; I’m looking for creatives who want to think outside the box–who want to boldly, bravely, go where no man has gone before. I’m sorry but, as masterfully as this retro prog has been rendered, there is nothing new or inventive to redeem it from my throwaway bin. (26/30)
- “Future History Part 2” (5:47) Some funk! Now that was totally unexpected! Like Ben’s afore-mentioned countrymate, Mark Trueack, there’s just something off, something feels cringy about trying funk with a Pink Floyd NeoProg palette and training. (Did it ever work for Pink Floyd–or any of its members? Or any NeoProg band, for that matter?) (8.667/10)
Total Time 66:55
B+/4.5 stars; masterful replication of the most lush sounds and most awesome energy of peak-era David Gilmour and his greatest Pink Floyd songs but this is the kind of music for NeoProg, RetroProg, and Old School Prog enthusiasts, not for listeners like me who are looking for progression in their progressive rock music.