Being a long time fan of progressive rock and metal, this album ought to be just my style, according to the promo-notes.

Apparently this Swedish band has made “several” albums, and undergone several line up changes, but (unfortunately) this is my first encounter with the band, so I was quite blank about the bands former history and sound when I received this one for review. According to the bands MySpace site, the band exists primarily as a project, focusing on studio recordings, which it has been doing occasionally since 1995. Simon Says has so far produced three full length concept albums, Ceinwen (1995) and Paradise Square (2002) and now Tardigrade. This Galileo/Progrock Records joint venture, took 4,5 years of computer crashes to finish.

This is to be the ending of a story about Simon, apparently the main character of an ongoing story of earlier albums, this time reborn as “Tardigrade”, “and his difficulties of dealing with surviving and becoming an anti hero and revolutionary against his own will in a depraved society” (from the promo material and SS’s MySpace site). To be quite honest the concept story didn’t really catch my attention, maybe because I don’t know the two previous albums, but I don’t think you have to be into the story to enjoy this album and the numbers, they can easily stand alone. At the same time the sound and the melodies makes the album stand as a whole, with very few weak links between the tracks.

This album’s Hammond sounds on the organ/keyboards and the general guitar sound reminds me mostly of the seventies sound of bands like Camel, Strawbs and Gentle Giant, with an occasional hint of Saga when the keyboard sound gets more 80’s-like. But even though the sound of the instruments is kind of retro, the album is well produced in a clear and modern sound.

The musicianship is very able, and I especially like the vocals. There’s a good “flow” on the album and also diversity in the tracks, so it doesn’t get boring and repetitive or too complex to enjoy the melodies. Personally I tend to prefer the tracks with classical guitar, but the rest more rocking tracks comes across just fine as well, mostly carried by the keyboard/organ melody.

If you’re into the melodic progressive rock of the 70’s and 80’s with broad layers of guitar (electric as well as classical) and synthesizers (keyboards/organ the “old fashion way”, 70’s/80’s style), spiced with orchestral string-pieces, big choruses and different kinds of percussion, you ought to give this one a try – a nice journey back in time awaits you.

Members:

Daniel Fäldt - lead vocals
Stefan Renström - bass, keyboards, vocoder
Mattias Jarlhed - drums, percussion and backing vocals
Jonas Hallberg - guitars, percussion
Magnus Paulsson - keyboards