Record Reviews

LIZARD ~ W GALERII CZASU (21ST ANNIVERSARY EDITION) AUDIO CAVE 2018/003 (Barcode: 5905669566469) ~ POLAND ~ Progressive Rock Recorded: 1996 Released: 2018 This is a reissue of the debut album by the Polish Progressive Rock group LizardFind albums by this artist, newly remastered for this edition. At the time of the recording the lineup of the group included vocalist Damian BydlinskiFind albums by this artist, guitarist Miroslaw WorekFind albums by this artist, keyboardist Andrzej JanczaFind albums by this artist, bassist Janusz TanistraFind albums by this artist and drummer Mariusz SzulakowskiFind albums by this artist. The album presents six original compositions, three of which are multi-part mini suites. The music is composed by Bydlinski or co-composed / composed by him and / or other band members and all lyrics (in Polish) are by Bydlinski. This album was already reissued before with added bonus tracks. Since Prog by definition includes a layer of improvisation it is therefore closely related musically to the Jazz / Fusion idioms. However, in contrast to Polish Jazz, which is a flourishing genre and often considered as perhaps the most creative on the international scale in the last two decades, Polish Prog never achieved the same success. The "original" wave of Prog (1960 / 1970s) almost completely missed Poland except for the Fusion oriented SBBFind albums by this artist and Pop / Rock oriented SkaldowieFind albums by this artist making fairly significant statements. The Neo-Prog (starting in 1990s) didn´t do much better overall, and with the exception of QuidamFind albums by this artist (debut album released in 1996), Lizard (debut album released in 1997) and RiversideFind albums by this artist (debut album released in 2004), not much else happened. All the above mentioned bands produced a series of albums, which over time showed a deterioration in their quality, and in time either disbanded or left the Prog idiom completely. Over time there were quite a few other bands out there, none of which made a truly significant statement, on the world scale. To be perfectly honest, the Neo-Prog genre was a bad idea to start with anyway. It was a priori derivative, almost completely unoriginal and often criminally boring. The idea of bringing back to life a musical genre that burnt itself out during its original period of activity is by definition absurd. Having said all that, the early albums by the three abovementioned groups (Quidam, Lizard, Riverside), including this one, have their merits. Musically "W Galerii Czasu" is an archetypal Neo-Prog album, with lengthy multi-part tracks, which offer several melody lines within one track and theatrical vocals. In this case the melodies are solid and interesting enough to make the album quite listenable. The instrumental work is fine, but not exceptional, well balanced and overall coherent. The vocals are somewhat monotonous and the vocal range is limited, but at least the vocalist sticks to singing in Polish, so the listener is not subjected to the bad English accent torture. The album aged well and lost nothing of its initial fine form, but again Neo-Prog did not move an inch since its conception, so this is not surprising. Overall it is still a very good listening experience, especially for the Prog Heads that are still around. For the sake of nostalgia and the great remastered sound, I can wholeheartedly recommend it!

Updated: 21/09/2021Posted: 04/07/2018

CD 1 Digipak Remastered Recommend To A Friend