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I have got this
demo in my hands by visiting the ProgPower festival. And look, what
a pleasant surprise! Darwin’s Pride plays progressive metal/rock but
I cannot discover any impossible angles or forced tendencies.
‘Illusions’ is a sample of melody and high technical competency. The
style has some broad Dream Theater influences, but never mentions
that kind of vertiginous parts of the heroes of progmetal. Also
singer Rob Laarhoven did a good job. It happens quite often that
prog vocalists have a rather nasally voice causing some irritation
after a while, but not in this case. Rob has an euphonic voice with
elastic power.
Guitars and
keyboards fit very well in the global mix. And there is a place for
a fine guitar solo in ‘Scared’. During the last track ‘Emotions’, at
the same time eight minutes long, the softer side of the band
appears and here we are on a more symphonic rock level. Where does
Darwin’s Pride differs from the rest? In stead of placing the accent
on musical knowledge itself (which is clear enough if you just
listen to this) the music is full of emotions. This clarifies that,
in spite of many rhythm changes, we can speak of a song structure
that suits you directly.
When I looked a bit around for info about this band I learned that
Rob Laarhoven is also the singer of Casual Silence (a group that
played at ProgPower on Sunday) and earlier this year he contributed
to a project called Medea. Based on these three songs we’ve got a
new prog metal promise in the Netherlands. |
