This track took hold of my aging prog senses and gave them a really good workout. When gifted guitarist Sarhan suddenly launches into a magnificent and clever Santana style break I was almost transported off to Woodstock, oddly appropriate as we near its 40th anniversary. As strange as it sounds, it fits, and it does so perfectly.
This gives way to an excellent keyboard section, in Tony Banks of Genesis style, which builds towards an uplifting symphonic ending. It’s an utterly brilliant nine magical minutes worth of prog and I can’t stop playing the damn thing.
Quality ideas abound on this album. The seven minute “I Want You To Know” is the track from which the title of the album is taken. ‘Nostalgia feels like wine’ sings the impressive Robert Amirian with hardly a hint of an accent.
“Over Horizon” opens gently before a lush and stylish symphonic section lifts it on high. It all builds towards a killer chorus which arrives like a sudden blaze of sunlight on a spring day. Again it’s uplifting, intricately multi-textured, and is well thought out and brilliantly executed.
“Am I Losing Touch?”, a question I find myself asking quite a lot of late, is a near ten minute epic in the true sense of the word. It is huge in both scale and ambition and is the sort of thing that can easily miss its target if it wasn’t done as well as this. Drummer and writer Wojtek deals with a myriad of time changes of his own making as the music shifts and swirls like sand in a breeze.
Listen out for a bizarre, yet oddly effective, Isaac Hayes moment as the track weaves along its many paths. Of course it could just be me 'losing touch' after all! Sudden harmonies, lead to a bass-over-piano-over-acoustic section which, in turn opens out to more lush symphonic touches. Then it all, rather cleverly, goes full circle.
The album ends with “Is It Over?” which, after a sudden break in the middle, builds towards another sumptuous ending. It is yet more solid and ambitious prog in the best tradition of the word.
The odd clumsy lyric apart this album really hits all of its intended targets and more than deserves the attention that it is attracting. It is available in two versions, the one on CD digipak has two bonus tracks, “The Colour Of Rain”, and “Relaxed”.
I hope you enjoy your trip through Nostalgia.
The album’s impressive artwork was done by Katarzyna Niwinska. Her website is well worth a visit.
The band themselves can be found by visiting their Myspace page (in English).
Article comments
1 - Todd D.
Nice point
Thanks!