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At the Casual Silence and Kayak concert in november 2004 out of
interest I lokked at a music paper and read a short review of the
album October Dreams, which was released indepenendly by Inspire.
Some research learned me Inspire as in fact one man: Erwin Idema.
The
biography on his website does not give much information, save for
the fact he is active in music for a long time.
When listening to October Dreams, I kept in mind it was not recorded
at a professional studio. And the drums were coming out of ‘a box’.
But fortunately the quality of the album is pretty good. While
listening to the album, one name jumped in my mind: Herman Brood (a
late Dutch rock and roll singer). Not that I’m a great fan of this
Herman Brood, but I recognized to a certain extent the same style of
Brood in the compositions if Idema.
It is mainly, fairy straight on hard rock, but with a very melodious
guitar sound. It may be very clear Idema controls his main
instrument perfectly, because the guitar parts are top notch. But
there are some great pieces on the album, such as ‘Train to
Freedom’, which made me think of John Wetton. This song would not
sound out of place on any of his albums. Or the instrumental ‘1995’,
which reminds of Gary Moore in his better days. No, nothing is
copied, but in the same vein.
The vocals are better than I expected, just in the spoken parts the
English sounds like a typical Dutchman, speaking English with a
heavy Dutch accent. Pity. Most songs are relatively short, 3 to 5
minutes, but in ‘Sacred Mystery’, Idema takes more time to work out
the composition, which is for the better. This is a very progressive
piece, with good keyboard play and nice experimental guitar sounds,
from distorted to nice and heavy, and great solos.
The second half of the album, as it is more symphonic/progressive,
while the first half is more (rough) hard rock. Fact is, there are
some great songs on the album. Of course, the album does have a few
slips here and there and the production could be better, but it is a
good album, which will appeal to the fans of melodic hard rock. The
album is available through the website of Inspire and for the money
you don’t have to let this one pass you buy. Personally I think
there are enough interesting parts that will also appeal to the more
progressive minded people.
Hopefully, though, Idema will get the chance to work with like
minded musicians, because I think then more justice to his
compositions would be done. |
