I was really excited to hear that Mark Boals had returned from total obscurity to lend his superb vocal talents to an album for the first time in way too long. The album he has chosen to do so on is the new one from Royal Hunt and it's a concept album follow-up to their Paradox release. Rather unexpectedly, Boals’ voice suits the material perfectly and his performance is nothing short of brilliant, reinforcing the feeling that it's a real shame that such a great talent hasn’t graced us with his presence for so long. 

The production on this incredibly complex album is superb, which it needs to be, given how much is happening musically all over the album. There is no question that all the musicians are absolutely first-rate exponents of their individual instruments, but I have to say that as I am not really a prog rock fan, I found the lack of any decent choruses to be somewhat grating as the album progressed. This is obviously just down to personal preference and fans of the prog genre are going to say I’ve completely missed the point, but that’s just my opinion. 

The idea behind the concept of the album is a clash of cultures between the Western world and a “new breed”, grown on Eastern religious movements. Thought-provoking and very relevant stuff indeed. Despite not being a prog rock fan, this is clearly at the very top of the tree when it comes to that particular genre and there is an awful lot to enjoy and admire throughout the album, with some superb rock passages and killer melodies intervened between some hugely complicated and intricate progressive arrangements. All fans of the genre will be very impressed, I have no doubt and it is an essential purchase for such fans.

Paul Williams