Camel

As what has become my latest music craze in the last year, the progressive rock band Camel. At school one day sitting on our usual bench with my friends, my one friend Michael tells me to listen to this band name Camel, and the song “Lady Fantasy.” I told him i lied what i heard and decided to delve into Camel. Little did I expect a band that would blow my mind on levels like only one other before (Rush being the other band.) My music downloader at the time was the lowly Limewire, which i no longer use, unfortunately this left me restricted to the amount of Camel I could hear. Yet, once I obtained Soulseek, there was no restrictions on the amount of Camel I could hear.

Camel is a band of many stages, starting off on their earlier works from the self titled debut album Camel, Mirage, Music Inspired By The Snow Goose and Moonmadness (which I shall argue is their best work,) is the most progressive rock sound Camel had. After Moonmadness; Rain Dances is a fairly considerable shift in their sound, as you hear a less progressive rock side, and more of this jazzy, radio friendly sound.

The follow up to Rain Dances, Breathless only further pushes the point on a more radio friendly sound, while still incorporating this wonderful progressive sound, yet toned down even more. But produces two wonderful songs in “Echoes” and “The Sleeper.” Both tracks contain the progressive rock roots you will find in the first four albums, but again with the radio friendly sound that was being pushed.

I Can See Your House From Here truly i feel is the midpoint in Camel’s career, their sound combines the best of what they were trying to go for, a radio friendly feel, while staying true to their jazz and progressive rock roots. One of my favorite songs of all time is of I Can See Your House From Here, and that would be: Eye Of the Storm, which just has this lovely sound to it. The guitar work of Andrew Latimer, mixed with the wonderful keyboards of Peter Bardens is something that is almost unimaginable, in any era of music.

Nude is a very interesting album, as it is one of Camel’s concept albums, to quote Wikipedia: “The concept of the album is based on a true story of a Japanese soldier (Hiroo Onoda) marooned on an island in World War II who doesn’t know that the war is over. “Nude” derives from his family name “Onoda”.” As you listen to this album you can feel the pains, the struggles, the victories, everything Hiroo must of felt. At this point, Camel still has that radio friendly sound to them, yet all the while remembering and not forgetting who they truly are, a jazzy progressive rock band.

The Single Factor, the next album, produces truly the most beautiful song that I have ever had the pleasure of listening to, “End Peace.” Andrew Latimer’s majestic guitar work on this song is one that will warm your heart, and make you think, back to a simpler time in your life, with no worries, or a perfect moment where nothing was wrong in the world and time seemed to stop and want the moment to last forever.

Stationary Traveler is yet another concept album by Camel, once again to quote wikipedia: “Like much of Camel’s output, it is a concept album, in this case centering around the trials of East German refugees attempting to cross the Berlin Wall into West Berlin.” Much like Nude, you truly get the feel of concept that was being aimed for, coming to a climax at i believe the title track “Stationary Traveler.” Once again, Andrew Latimer’s guitar and flute work  paired now with Ton Scherpenzeel’s piano and keyboard work is once again something amazing. Camel now is getting to be a little more of a pure rock band, still keeping a slightly jazz and progressive feel, but getting away from the radio friendly sound they aimed for through many albums.

The next two albums Dust and Dreams, and Harbour of Tears continue on the trend brought up by Stationary Traveler, simpler albums, getting back to the roots of rock, with the jazz and progressive feel flowing through the albums. Finally, we hit Rajaz, an album that for it’s time is out of place. Rajaz, is Camel’s first attempt since Moonmadness to get back to pure progressive rock, and for me at least, it works. Following Rajaz is the last studio album released by Camel, A Nod and A Wink. Like Rajaz, getting back to their progressive roots, but with that sort of jazz sound mixed in.

If you are wondering why there is little to no review on the first four albums, I do enjoy those albums, however, they i feel are true progressive rock albums, with great music on them, and for the true experience should be checked out by themselves without me reviewing them.

Fleet Foxes

In a time where i feel that music has been watered down, this band with their debut album appeared out of nowhere in 2008. So far this decade all I have seen talked about is rap, hip-hop and Green Day. While out of those three options I would have to say Green Day is the best, i find them highly overrated and their music to be rather lackluster. As opposed to the seemingly “popular” music that has become artists like Justin Timberlake, Rhianna, Lil Wayne and Usher, which I find to be highly repetitive and having no real soul to it.

That all said in one nice little paragraph, let’s focus back on Fleet Foxes. The sound the Fleet Foxes have, at least for this album, is one that transcends many genres, as I would find it hard to label it just one style of music. The vocals are soothing and warm, I would even go as far as saying they are comforting. Mix these vocals in with some stellar lyrics and it is just pure magic. There is nothing fancy on this album in terms of how the instruments are played, when you listen to any of the songs the instruments provide a gentle and embracing background for the powerful and  soothing vocals. Yet, when the vocals are indeed removed, and the instruments must stand alone, it is quite the magical experience. When you close your eyes during a song off this album (to me at least it really does not matter what song) you get a clear picture of the vocals being sung, and a wonderful picture painted in your head. Even on a song such as, Heard Them Stirring, when there are no words being  sung, when you close your eyes and imagine, this sets the perfect backdrop for a peaceful, and maybe even romantic setting. I feel what truly stands out in this album, is nothing is competing with something else. You do not have to struggle to hear the drums over the guitar, the bass over the vocals, for examples, everything just kind of flows, as reference to the point I made early about how the instruments were being played.