Salmon is an excellent progressive rock band from The Netherlands and “When The Dust Settles...” is their second album. It’s not every day, a new band arises that plays genuine progressive rock. And I mean real progressive rock, without any influences from jazz or metal. The best description for Salmon’s style is maybe a hybrid between progressive rock and neo prog.

A Taurus pedal opens the first track “King For A Day”, but further on the bass guitar is taking over the lower sounds. The first song is bulging with variation. Sven proves that a bass guitar is not only made to accompany but also to play some melodies on it. Michael is getting different kinds of surprising rhythms and breaks out of his drums, maybe a bit too much from time too time. Only the sound of the drums could have been a lot better.
Jan Jaap isn’t really a top vocalist, but he has a pleasant voice and he puts a lot of feeling in his work. Especially the vocal harmonies are very beautiful. But there’s only one singer mentioned in the booklet, so I suppose Jan Jaap is doing all the voices. I wonder how this will be done live. And the question pops up again when there is more than one Jan Jaap singing in awesome canon.
Halfway the song there’s a recorder solo accompanied by an ‘Entangled’ Hackett twanging on the guitar. And keep a close watch for the little “Doors” organ solo.

“Grey Velvet” is a sensitively sung ballad with a middle piece on piano.

The longest track “Time to Fantasize” starts with some medieval sounds on clavichord and recorder. According to the lyrics, the track is divided into 4 different parts. I’d rather listen to it as a long track with different vocal parts accompanied on piano or acoustic guitar. Between the vocal parts, there are each time more complex, instrumental pieces with references to some early progressive or even classical music. There’s a fair part of solos on guitar, synth, piano, bass, recorder,..., with a lot of variation and countless breaks. During the second part “The Sandman” you get to hear a beautiful guitar solo, but as so often on this album, it’s not mixed in front enough.

“September Weeps” impressively opens with a recorder solo. It’s another ballad during which the vocals remind me suddenly of Kayak.

They all rise to the occasion during the exiting instrumental track “Three”. It contains a lot of organ and piano but especially some awesome bass playing. The mixing of the guitar is a lot better this time. And there are also some references to classical music again.

“Dubious Dried Ink” especially stays in your head because its references to Kayak. It’s no coincidence, they will be supporting Kayak in the future. I even think their cover artwork looks a bit like the one from Kayak’s ‘Royal Bed Bouncer’.

It’s a pity, the production isn’t top notch. Maybe they should have called upon an external producer. The sound of the drums could have been a lot better and some of the solos are not in front enough. Especially the guitar has often got its wings clipped. But if you succeed to listen through all that, you get to hear a fine piece of music from Salmon, a band, of which you surely will hear more of in the future.