Having enjoyed a relationship with Lion Music (www.lionmusic.com) for the last few months, I’ve enjoyed listening to their stable of artists, an impressive blend of (mainly) Scandinavian Power and Prog Metal. Hubi Meisel’s “Kailash” is the latest offering in the more Prog than Power end of the genre. Building a concept around the Himalayas, Tibet and Buddhist/Hindu mythology it follows a dream memory of lead singer Hubi’s and is based around the element of earth, his previous release “EmOcean” was a concept based around the element of water (you get the pattern?). What I will say from the off, is that progressive rock like this doesn’t do much for me in general, in fact anything more prog than this, I would probably decline to listen to as things tend to get more and more self indulgent and inherently less interesting (read as elevator music). 

Hubi Meisel is a well established singer/producer from Germany, he is in the enviable position to be able to enlist the talents of Johan Niemann, Daniel Flores, Vivien Lalu, Marcel Coenen and Jorge Salan in the realisation of his somewhat disturbing dream scenarios. It is self-indulgent, but not in an brash sense and is absolutely faultless in it’s delivery, “Kailash” features some stunning music both in an instrumental and vocal sense, but in the end I found it hard work to listen to.  

It’s clear that the fault is with my attention span; real prog rock/metal fans will totally get it. Shredders will totally get some of the guitar work; it just demands a lot of attention to fully appreciate what has been created. The best way to describe “Kailash” is in terms of a film, say “Apocalypse Now”, you have to sit and take it in, all of it, at one hit. If you get up and make a pot of tea halfway through, you’ve lost the thread of the whole piece. Unfortunately that tends to be down to the type of listener and in honesty limits the market, what is without doubt is that this is a quality piece of music, if self indulgent, and certainly to me, a thoroughly enjoyable listen but ultimately lacks the fire that I go for in music. If the end justifies the means, then in this case, the means slightly outweigh the end.

Let us know your views on 'Kailash'

Track List

Potala Palace
Red Oracle
Snow Lion
Himalayan Sunset
Shiva's Dance
Kailash - Jewel of Ice
The Wheel of Life
Milarepa's Cave of Miracles
Merdeka
The Great Prayer (Monlam Chenmo)
The Gentleman of Great Magic
Tigers of Everest

Line Up

Hubi J. Meisel - Vocals
Vivien Lalu - Keys
Marcel Coenen - Guitars
Jorge Salán - Guitars
Daniel Flores - Drums
Johan Niemann - Bass