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I have no problem
with the fact that both the Flower Kings and it’s members have tons
of musical ideas but for the average music lover it becomes an
expensive hobby collecting the entire Flower Kings and side projects
output. Compared to a lot of similar situations the solo releases of
our beloved friends do indeed include appearances from most of the
other bandmembers so in a way every single solo release does contain
a decent amount of pure Flower Kings magic. For his third solo
outing keyboardplayer Tomas Bodin has been smart enough to enlist
Roine Stolt only on two songs but to give most of the guitarparts to
his friend Jocke JJ Marsh. This move means that the typical FK
trademark has been masked as instead Marsh’s guitarplaying on ‘The
hero from cloud city’ ranges from Gary Moore to Jeff Beck. The song
also illustrates Bodin’s great gift what arranging is concerned.
Next to the guitar outbursts the song also contains several pure
symphonic passages which made me think of The Enid.
Bodin uses a lot of
interesting, pleasant sounds turning “Sonic boulevard” in the ideal
canvas to illustrate his many talents regardless of the musical
style he tackles. Over the years we have learned to love and
appreciate the person and musician Tomas Bodin so whether as part of
the Flower Kings or on his own we do know we can give Tomas every
bit of room to improvise as he will always land on his own two feet.
In ‘Back to the African garden’ he does indeed approach different
corners from the musical spectrum but in the end it all fits. You
have people who make a puzzle by first putting aside the straight
edges whilst others put the pieces together by the same colour.
Bodin mingles it all together putting a piece left then right then
top then bottom yet in the end he delivers the most colourful result
! And what better proof of his versatility than with the classical
‘Picture’ where Bodin and piano become as one. This could be ideal
music for a movie so if someone in Hollywood is reading this : give
the guy a contract ! But “Sonic boulevard” doesn’t stop here as it
really is a calling card for the guy’s many talents and equally as
many faces. On ‘Walkabout’ he even takes on the challenge to work
together with African scatting to put his mark on a rather funky
piece. Bobby McFerrin eat your heart out ! Bodin certainly uses the
Swedish multi cultural environment to his advantage.
I mentioned The
Enid before and I have to mention them again when I listen to ‘A
beautiful mind’. Maybe guitarist Jocke JJ Marsh has listened a lot
to the guitarstyle of Francis Lickerish because it’s he who delivers
these dreamy sounds. As the composition evolves the guitar becomes
very fragile reminding me of some of Jan Akkerman’s better moments.
Another side of Bodin’s complex personality is illustrated by means
of the funky ‘The happy frog’ which contains some jazzy
interventions from Ulf Wallander on saxophone. Most impressive of
all is the guitar improvisation by Roine which is so different from
what he is famous for. With Thomas adding some Fender Rhodes parts
our ‘frog’ sounds like one big jam session. The final two songs are
like opposites of eachother as one title suggests ‘Morning will
come’ whilst the other informs us that ‘The night will fall’.
‘Morning will come’ sounds as fresh as Vivaldi’s ‘Spring’ with
Anders Jansson reminding us of the vocal section in Pink Floyd’s
‘Breathe’. The build up of ‘The night will fall’ to me has a similar
feel like the music of Saint-Preux yet adding some jazzy elemts such
as the saxophone and Reingold’s fretless bass.
“Sonic boulevard” is not the kind of solo album you would normally
associate with a keyboardplayer. Of course you get some nice solo’s
but throughout the album it’s mainly Bodin’s sense for composing
which is the central idea. Tomas leaves plenty of room for other
musicians to get involved so in the end you get the jazz freedom
within a well structured pattern turning the album into a real
calling card for his versatility and talent. To my great relief this
is not a Flower Kings album with less guitar and more keyboards.
Instead you are treated to a collection of outstanding genius which
can stand the test of time with our without the help of the Flower
Kings.
If you lay your
hands on a solo album by a keyboard player, you would expect some
demonstration of his skills and a lot of tracks with the keyboards
dominating the music. But this is certainly not the case for this
one. Of course, the musicians that he called upon are not the easily
dominated either. In fact, he got almost the whole Flower Kings clan
together. Of course Jonas Reingold on bass, Zoltan on drums, Hans
Bruniussson on percussion, Roine Stolt (only for two songs) and even
Ulf Wallander on saxophone. And to be honest, if you were a friend
of these men, who else could and would and should you pick for your
solo CD? But luckily, this doesn’t mean it has become a new Flower
Kings album.
“The Prayer” is a perfect intro.
Anders Jansson is crying out the song and some very low vocals (the
first time I didn’t even notice them) are playing the bass part. I
wouldn’t be surprised if that is the voice of Tomas who’s mentioned
as vocalist for the first track. A church organ and a heartbeat
rhythm make the link to the rest of the album.
“The Hero from Cloud City” must be Jocke with a wonderful guitar
solo. Zoltan is steady as a machine as usual. This is the best track
of the album, with lots of mellotron and church organ sounds in the
second half.
“Back To The African Garden” could have been entitled “Back To The
Garden Of Dreams”. A lot of joyful synth, mellotron, guitar and
drums give you the feeling of a sunny garden. Zoltan is playing on
the snare drum as if he was leading a brass band walking by.
“Pictures” is a classical piano piece accompanied by mellotron and
flute. It’s a great melancholic, quiet dreamaway track. “Walkabout”
starts rather funky and gets jazzier to the end. The scatting (think
of Al Jarreau) is done by N’nogo Bjurhäll in a duel with the guitar
of Jocke JJ Marsh who is also trying to imitate some scatting on his
instrument.
”The Horses from Zaad” is a very rhythmic track with a flute melody
that reminds me a bit of “Games Without Frontiers” from Gabriel.
More ambient sounds are delivered in “A Beautiful Mind” that gets to
a symphonic church organ climax.
You can hear the frogs in “The Happy Frog”. A very joyful piece that
brings the humour of Tomas Bodin to the surface.
”Morning Will Come” is a track that could be on a solo album of
Jocke in stead of this Bodin CD because of the great guitar work.
The background vocals remind me of “A Great Gig In The Sky” by Pink
Floyd.
A low piano riff together with the fretless bass accompany the
wonderful voice of Anders and the soprano saxophone of Jonas
Knutsson in the jazzy ballad “The Night Will Fall”.
“Sonic Boulevard” is what it says, a boulevard with lots of
different shops with different music styles and sounds. I wouldn’t
mind if that street was in my neighbourhood, so I could browse the
shops from time to time. |
