In the beginning there was, there is and there has always been Chaos, the beginning, the past, present and future of everything, Chaos existed, chaos exists and it will always exist. We are the sons of Chaos and trough Chaos we discover our reason to be. Chaos is our home and we should be thankful to it, it created everything we see, everything we feel, we owed it our lives. All-thought to pay him back is impossible, impossible might not be to reach the unreachable.
Chaos exists but it is not the only thing that exists, is not the only thing in our reality, something else was born from Chaos, a force that descended from it, it's greatest offspring, the direct daughter and the direct mother of everything.
When this happened, patters start to emerge, patters coexisting in this chaotic world. The amalgamation between nature and chaos created this world, the reality in which we live. The amalgamation between nature and chaos created life. It was here, in this omnipotent and transcendental that a third and last force was born, the bastards of nature, we emerged, it was here where Luca was born.
The birth of life must had been an extremely funny and extremely anti-orthodox process for the things that happened in those times, the birth of organisms capable of recreating themselves, capable of living and capable of interacting with this created world. Capable of interacting with the nature that created them and with the chaos that they lived in. The purpose of life is to live, that was something that the first keepers of life understood well, and for living they needed to survive, and the best way to do this, is using the simple and beautiful survival instinct. And that who could use it the best, it was going to live the best and the longer. But they also knew that living wasn't enough, they needed to transcend. The greatest enemy of every human being or better yet, of every living being is time, time is death.
The first keepers knew this, they needed to defeat time in some way, they needed to leave their mark in this world before it was too late, they needed to deliver something of themselves to the next generation. And then it was when they got the brilliant idea of reproduction, and with that, they guaranteed their immortality with the next generations to come, that's how they defeated death. Then the structure of immortality emerge, a simple manual with just 4 steps: Born, Survive, Reproduce and Die. And that was and that is the structure of immortality. And with that, our microscopical ancestors created this wise philosophy, they developed all this knowledge by simply just using their survival instinct, and that was truly: The First Philosophy.
This is a little video I made for my English class discussing why teenagers just can't get a long with their parents, focusing more on the eternal differences of generations and the constant frictions that are between them, I guess that you can call it a sequel or a prequel of my post "Generation Y: What's the Deal With Us?"
The following is the process of the rain that I've created conscious and subconsciously, a manifest that will help me or that will make my life even more complicated, searching the constant that I'm holding on, it's not the only way, there's a thousand ofways, this will set me free or destroy me, if there's even a difference. The meteors that will fall right here have been floating in this space for a long time and the time has come for them to impact in this Tabula Rasa, what I'm going to do is a little experiment of perspective, all will agree with me, nobody will agree with me, but it doesn't matter, what I've assigned to myself goes beyond me and them, what I've assigned to myself goes to me and them, because there's only two ways of living an existence: Living for Ourselves or Living for Life and all the Others. That's the choice that we must make. That at the end of the day you will conclude that both of them are unified in the most fundamental and imaginable process. In any way that you choose to live, it must be done in its absolute form. Because if we don't live in an absolute way here, it could be that we could never live in that way ever, or maybe we should just simply follow that totality without any clue if we could even reach it.
The eternal question with the infinite answer, the collision of that question with that answer is what I call Life.
So, what do we have here, a project that just by the look of the cover seems interesting. Well let me tell you more about it, Flying Colors is a new superband created by Neal Morse and Mike Portnoy (geee these two working together?), the formation seems interesting and if you throw them together in a studio this is what you get.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="420"] I really loved the cover[/caption]
The Band consist in Steve Morse (guitarist and founder of Dixie Dregs), Neal Morse (who needs no introduction), Mike Portnoy (who we all know and sometimes love), David LaRue (also from Dixie Dregs, Joe Satriani, John Petrucci and another shit load of projects) and the new comer Casey McPherson, (who I didn't knew shit about).
So yeah the cover is awesome, the line-up seems really interesting, but how is the actual album?
Well let's get into the real stuff.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="341"] How can I say this?[/caption]
For this I will give a little introduction about my experience listening to Neal Morse's music, and that is that: I don't like Neal Morse's music, I only like Transatlantic, and that's the only project of him that I really loved, Testimony, Testimony 2 and all of his other projects and solo albums I... just... don't... like...them. I don't know why, I don't like them , I don't hate his music but I just don't like it, I just don't think that his music is that good. And no, it's not because he makes Christian music, I think it's because his music is just too happy, cheerful ,mellow and one-dimensional for me, and I'm sorry but his lyrics are really REALLY cliché. His instrumental pieces are really good (for example in Sola Scriptura, if that album was only instrumental progressive music, it would be a masterpiece!) but I don't know, when he starts to sing, everything falls apart for me. And on top off that, I really don't like Neo-Progressive Rock, why? I honestly cannot answer you that, besides Marillion I don't like any Neo-Prog bands.
So with that little confession I just made, you're probably wondering that I completely hated this album and this project.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="299"] And the answer is: No[/caption]
I got to say that I like the album, is really interesting. A lot of styles, a lot of genres and a lot of good songs in just one album.
Now that I'm going to actually start the review of the album, there's another thing that I have to say: This is not a Progressive Rock album, if you're expecting good old Progressive Rock you are not going to find it here, the first song and the last song are the only ones that you could call them Progressive Rock, the rest of them are... let's call them Mixed Rock. It's interesting because the premise of this band was: "Neal Morse and a bunch of Progressive Rock masterminds with a Pop singer" and I thought that was really interesting because I always thought that Neal Morse's music was kinda Pop-ish. So, in a way you can call this album Pop Rock, if you think that's too offensive you can call it Mixed Rock. I call it a Mixed Rock album because every song almost belongs to a different genre and that was the thing that I really like about the album.
Now let's get into the album.
1.- Blue Ocean: Classic Neal Morse prog song, happy, cheerful, mellow, with a high and catchy chorus and lyrics that are just Ok.
2.- Shoulda Coulda Woulda: Nice Hard Rock song, simple, with one strong solid riff and a good guitar solo, and that's pretty much it.
3.- Kayla: This one starts with a little folk passage and then it becomes a happy rock ballad, the song is meeeh, the chorus is just too simple it could have been a great chorus but something was missing there.
4.- The Storm: This one is a great song, really effectively emotional, the chorus is really powerful and the singing is amazing, it would make a really good radio hit.
5.- Forever In a Daze: This one is really cool, good old Funk Rock, not a masterpiece but really cool thought.
6.- Love Is What I'm Waiting For: The first time that I hear this one, I was like, what the hell?, is this a Beatles cover?, yeah, the first half is really Beatles-inspire, the second half is more pop rock oriented, with a really good guitar solo.
7.- Everything Changes: What the hell? a Coldplay cover? jejeje, no, but you can definitively hear the resemblance, later, the song sounds like a Dream Theater ballad, and for a moment as a classic Neal Morse ballad. It's a really good song.
8.- Better Than Walking Away: Again you can hear the heavy Coldplay resemblance here and the chorus is really Disney-Aladdin-Oriented.
9.- All Falls Down: We are getting into the Progressive Metal realm here, it sounds like mixture of Ayreon and Rhapsody of Fire.
10.- Fool In My Heart: Now we finally have it, Portnoy singing a song almost in it's entirely, why this doesn't surprise me at all. Overall it's a good blues mellow karaoke song.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="354"] There, there Portnoy, let it all out[/caption]
11.- Infinite Fire: And after all those genres, and after all those styles and mixtures you have finally reached to: Progressive Rock. Amazing song. Powerful at the beginning, then it falls down a little bit for me in the chorus and in the first two verses but the bass is amazing here. And then in 4:40 we finally get into the real stuff, here you have Progressive Rock in flesh and blood, this passage is amazing, you can hear Genesis and can hear Yes all throw together, powerful, technical, emotional, perfect. And finally a last ballad-Morse moment before the big eclectic finale.
And that's the album.
Overall a nice, decent, fun, solid Rock album, it's not a masterpiece and it's not going to completely blow your mind. But you're definitely going to enjoy it, it's a good listen from time to time.
I remember that someone was asking which was the best album for getting into Progressive Rock, and I have to say that this one is a good option, because technically is not Progressive Rock but it gives you a nice introduction to the genre.
So the other day I was just checking out videos about languages in YouTube, and I found this guy.
His name is Steve Kaufman, and he is the founder of a Self-Learning Language Online community called LingQ, he also makes nice videos talking about language learning, if you are interested in this you can check out his channel.
I became really interested about this LingQ community so I decided to join in, is free so you don't have to worry about money, well if you want a premium account you have to pay, anyway, LingQ uses the Liberal Method that I already described in a previous post, so you know, it's a nice community for you to start learning a new language. The languages that they have available for their community are English, Japanese, Dutch, French, Russian, German, Italian, Chinese and Spanish and a few more.
Now I'm not being payed for talking about LingQ or anything, no, I just found this website, I thought it was really interesting and I decided to share it with you.
What I really like about LingQ is that they have a lot of audio media for you to listen in your target language, always remember: Listen, is the most important part of learning any language and sometimes is really hard to find audio media for you to listen, yeah, you found books, you found magazines, but always remember, listening is the MOST important part, and if you don't have audible media, you're missing the most important part. The audio files in LingQ are easy to download, they're in mp3 format and you can be listening to them in your MP3P, LingQ actually encourages you to do this.
One thing that I didn't like, is the actual LingQ process of learning new words, it's a little tedious for me, to start selecting the words that I don't know, I'm the supporter of the idea that it's not really effective to learn new vocabulary without context that you can see right there. So I always prefer to read a lot, than memorize one for one the words that I don't know. Other thing that I didn't like is that there are just a few text translations of the text in the lesson, sometimes you have a sentence that you don't understand, you can check out the meaning of each word but sometimes that doesn't help because you still don't understand what it actually means within the text, so you try to check it out on the text translation and oh surprise, there's no text translation, and that's a little bit bothering, I don't know how it is in English but there are not too many translations in Spanish.
A useful tool is the Incomplete Text exercise or Cloze text exercise in the Vocabulary menu, that one is really helpful. A quick advice, if you have the free account, you can only choose 100 LingQ, that's your limit, if you reach it, you have to erase some.
Another advice about listening jejejeje: When you enter the Library you will find numerous podcast of your target language, when you enter to them, you'll find at the left the text of that podcast for you to read, and in the right you'll find the actual audio podcast for you to listen. My advice is: listen, do not read. Ignore the text and just hit play and listen, listen and listen. Do this like four times and then you read, and then you highlight the words that you don't know, LingQ will tell you the meaning and then you listen again a few more times.
There's also an Skype-way of having conversations with tutors of the target language in the target language that you're learning, I haven't try it yet, but when I do, I'll tell you about it. You can also send written works in the target language so people that know the language can check out your grammar and correct you if you made any mistakes.
So overall is a really nice Language community and you should definitively check it out.
I must admit that I completely underestimated this album, and that is coming from a Fates Warning fan. I don't know what was I thinking: I wanted it to be good, but something in my subconscious told me that it was going to be bad or not that good. Especially since Jim Matheos hasn't been part of a big project for a long LONG time, except for OSI that I don't like very much. The last album with Fates Warning was in 2004 and Twist of Fate with John Arch was in 2003. The same with John Arch, no, John Arch was in worse conditions, he hasn't made an album since his Fates Warning years in 1986 and an EP in 2003. I was exited by the idea of the album but skeptical at the same time.
Man that I was so SO wrong
[caption id="attachment_190" align="alignnone" width="300"] Shelter me my asylum, SHELTEEEER MEE[/caption]
Sympathetic Resonance is easily the most balanced Progressive Metal album that I've heard in years. This is Progressive Metal at it's purest state. All the pieces fit together incredibly. The solos, the harmonies, the vocals, the lyrics, the drums, everything fits perfectly and it feels natural, they're not trying to be pretentious, they're not desperately trying to do new things. They just stick with their true genre and did what they do best. This album made me remember why I used to call Jim Matheos the Father of Progressive Metal.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="220"] That's right, The FATHER of Progressive Metal[/caption]
He truly is, and now I can say it without any doubt. I said that this album is Progressive Metal at it's purest state because if you listen to it, is Heavy Metal with Progressive arrangements and structures, that was what Progressive Metal was all about in the beginning. No synthesizer, No overlong keyboards solos, No woaaa woaaaa (cauf cauf Rudess cauf), No symphonic theatrical sounds. Just two amazing guitarist, one of the greatest bass players ever, a bad ass drummer, and an incredible singer who's voice is still in perfect shape after all this years.
I was completely amazed of Arch voice, it has change, but now is way more unique , it still has that Bruce Dickinson feel but more high and operatic than ever.
This is the song that made me fall in love with Arch's voice, amazing song
His style is still intact and his voice has change for the better
I said that this album is balanced because all the songs are perfect, there are no bad, slow or transitional songs, all of them are solid, bad ass, with unique and original riffs and solos, great lyrics and if you were a fan of Progressive Metal in the mid 80's it'll definitely throw you back.
I completely love this album, I think that possibly is going to become one of my favorite albums of all time. This project was amazing and I'm so exited of what they're going to do next. I heard that a new Fates Warning album is going to be release this year :D and after this I just can't wait.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400"] 7 years guys, 7 years[/caption]
I don't know of this is going to become a Black Sabbath / Heaven or Hell thing. When they are with Alder is going to be Fates Warning and when they are with Arch is going to be Arch/Matheos? Jejejeje I really don't know.
Too bad that Mark Zonder is not in any of these projects :(
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="450"] Where are you hiding Mark ?[/caption]
Bottom line, the album is absolutely amazing and you must check it out, fresh Progressive Metal at it's finest.
[caption id="attachment_191" align="aligncenter" width="300"] And another thing, if you absolutely hated this album, you just don't like Progressive Metal, I'm sorry but is as simple as that.[/caption]
I will dedicate this category of the blog for language learning, I'm going to start a little experiment with a new language teaching method that I'm developing right now.
I make this method using the Assimil and Pimsleur philosophy and also combining the teaching philosophy of a few teachers that I had, my personal experiences in learning languages and the philosophy of a few polyglots that I know , loki2504 is one of them, you should definitely subscribe to him if you if you’re a language lover.
Another great youtuber in the area of languages is FluentCzech his videos are awesome and incredibly useful
This is a webiste that I recommend alot for everyone trying to learn any language:
I really loved the cover[/caption]
Nice, nice[/caption]
How can I say this?[/caption]
And the answer is: No[/caption]
There, there Portnoy, let it all out[/caption]
2.jpg/220px-Jim_Matheos_(Fates_Warning)2.jpg)
That's right, The FATHER of Progressive Metal[/caption]
7 years guys, 7 years[/caption]
Where are you hiding Mark ?[/caption]
