Allow me a teensy departure from NWOBHM. I like my prog/symphonic stuff too and in particular anything Arjen Lucassen puts out. A stone cold musical genius in my book. Here we have his latest, The Gentle Storm, which – in the usual Arjen way – is a beautifully produced, lush, imaginative concept album involving a collaboration with another artist. This time the collaboration is with Anneke van Giersbergen with the concept/story set back in the seventeenth century when the Dutch were a major seafaring nation with the Dutch East India Company.
The story unfolding over the songs being told of a couple seeking to communicate with each other whilst the husband is at sea. The only means of doing that is via a covert postal system with letter carried by crew with no way of knowing if or when they would reach the recipient.
What we have on the double-CD are two versions of the songs. One CD (gentle) pretty much acoustic/quiet folksy in style and the other (storm) being a full-on rocked up progressive/symphonic version in typical Ayreon style.
I’d not heard of Van Giersbergen before. She has a beautiful, haunting voice. She takes care of the singing. Ajren the rest pretty much.
The “gentle” version is, to these ears, far too gentle. Yes it is well arranged, produced and sung but I found it too one-paced and unable to tell one track from another. The quiet, polite folky style not to my liking. Now where’s the “full on metal assault” (that’s what is says on the cover sticker) Storm CD……
Oh yes, that’s the stuff. We’re back to normal and it’s much more like it. We’re on familiar Lucassen territory. Big, big production in his unmistakable prog/metal/symphonic rock mixture. Chunky riffs, flightly soloing, Ed Warby drums up a, er, Storm and it’s a real musical treat. Van Giersbergen’s vocals seem much more at home on this version too. She has the power to match the guitars and drums. A stonking listen.
The arrangements are varied with, unlike the “gentle”, version each being distinguishable and their own identity. We have power and poise with some light touches too occasionally which still fit in well with the overall bombastic feel.
Check out in particular Shores of India. Six and a half minutes of Eastern-tinged rock along. It’s quite haunting too. To be fair, it’s the stand-out on the “gentle” version too. But to the rock/prok/metal fan the Storm version most certainly hits the spot and Arjen’s done it again.
Perhaps the slightly “schizophrenic” release of the two distinctly different versions is something of a marketing masterpiece as for one price it keeps the acoustic/folk fan happy as well as those of us who prefer something harder. Very clever Mr. Lucassen.
Whichever camp you fall in to, you should find quite a lot here to keep your ears happy.
>> CHECK OUT MORE GENTLE STORM REVIEWS ON AMAZON <<
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