Erik Norlander - Into The Sunset

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Artist:	Erik Norlander
Title:	Into The Sunset
Label:	Transmission TM-022
Length(s):	55 minutes
Year(s) of release:	2000
Month of review:	07/2000

Line up

Erik Norlander - keyboards
Arjen Anthony Lucassen - guitars
Tony Franklin - bass
Greg Ellis - drums
Cameron Stone - cellos
and on vocals Glenn Hughes, Lana Lane, Edward Reekers, Robert Soeterbroek

Tracks

1)	Sunset Prelude	3.17
2)	Into The Sunset	5.34
3)	Rome Is Burning	6.05
4)	Fanfare For The Dragon Isle	0.50
5)	Fly	7.53
6)	Dreamcurrents	4.38
7)	Lines In The Sand	5.11
8)	On The Wings Of Ghosts	10.29
9)	Hymn	1.18
10)	Into The Sunset Reprise	1.32
11)	Sunset Postlude	2.25
12)	Neurosaur (bonus, new recording)	5.27

Summary

With a quite a few people whom one can find regularly on Transmission records this is a "solo" album by Norlander quite soon after the release of Oblivion Days, the, at this moment, latest Rocket Scientists release.

The music

Although the line-up is less starriddled than that of Ayreon it does seem that this Norlander solo album is more of a project album than Threshold with vocalists and guitars. Sunset Prelude is the forceful opening with voiceless singing by Lana Lane. The music is quite progmetallic, but with keyboards the main instrumental focus. The title track has a very recognizable theme and the thing is: the first part of the theme sounds so familiar (but who can tell me where I might know it from?). After the thematic opening of I feel the song lets me down a bit in the transition to the vocal part sung by Reekers. The vocal melody of the chorus is more interesting. After a very nice jumpy piano solo in the middle we get a varied instrumental intermezzo at times quite a bit in the Ayreon style, but for me it does little. Rome Is Burning is the powerfully opening next one. With the thunderous vocals of hardrock blues vocals of Glenn Hughes this is an up-tempo accessible piece. This is hardrock of the Europe/Malmsteen type with some keyboards thrown in. In the middle the song winds down a little for a bluesy guitar solo and some tasteful vocal enrichments by Lana Lane. Good for variety. After the short pomposity of Fanfare For The Dragon Isle we come to the powerfully opening Fly. The closest comparison I can make here is with Mastermind: a combination of metal/hardrock and the keyboard bombast of ELP. The accessible up-tempo vocal part of Lana Lane sounds quite poppy, but the rhythm guitar continues to give a heavy impression. I like the orchestral additions on keyboards and the Robert Miles' tune in the middle, but on the whole, I cannot say I'm satisfied with the composition. Okay some freaky full out solo's on the keyboards are usually quite nice, but they are not enough and even if I do like the piano part, the Dreamhouse tune and the fact that the song features a driving rhythm section, it is not enough to make a good song. Dreamcurrents features piano and cosmic keyboards in the beginning and after its playful opening the theme recurs, but now sadly on cello and with thoughtful bass playing. Lines In The Sand is sung by Robert Soeterbroek and has good tension building verses, the chorus is maybe a bit too straightforward. The music is closest I think to likes of Dio and later Deep Purple, but with the addition keyboardsolo's giving the music a more symphonic air. On The Wings Of The Ghosts opens with cello's and sounding a bit eerie. After a rather orchestral continuation the music continues to be dominated by the keyboards, rather fastpaced ones with the rhythm guitars giving the music some dark underpinnings. The drumming is quite loose here. Again it seems Soeterbroek has the better vocal melody, the one of Reekers being a bit mellow. I like the way the piano comes through in during instrumental part between the first chorus and the second verse. The guitar work is good in the transitional part and the song really builds up with the main strength in my opinion being the chorus by Soeterbroek. A small epic where I don't see the reason for ALL the solo's but most of the ones present are good and I think that the song has more melodic content than all the previous songs making this the song to focus on. The song ends with a hammered piano and melodic guitar solo. Well Hymn is like it says a hymn with only sparse instrumentation, and we move right into the Into The Sunset Reprise that recaptures the catchy optimistic theme from the title track and finalizes with the vocal opening of same track. After the Postlude we come to the bonustrack Neurosaur, with a strong vocal opening by Lana Lane. The style of the song is heavy like the rest, with grinding guitar work, but also rather church like melodies. Variation and bombast aplenty and it works.

Conclusion

The music on this album has some echoes of work of Ayreon, something Norlander himself is very much involved with (and of course Lucassen plays on this album). The music on this album is then more in the line of the heavy side of Ayreon (Flight Of The Migrator) and because of the bombast and keyboards combination one might at times think of Masterminds second album, but also hardrock bands such as Rainbow, Dio and so forth are often close by, usually because the vocal parts are quite in that style. Best song by far for me is the longest one, On The Wings Of The Ghost, a song I liked from beginning to end. Dreamcurrents I also liked, because of its rather emotional melodic content (and the use of cello), and Neurosaur as well. The remainder of the "real" tracks I couldn't appreciate in their entirety.