Watch, The - Timeless


Year of Release: 2011
Label: self-released
Catalog Number: n/a
Format: CD
Total Time: 44:46:00

Just before the big bang

Simone Rossetti's decade-long exploration of the music of early Genesis has finally reached back to the very beginning, with a new set of songs inspired by From Genesis To Revelation. And, perhaps unsurprisingly, it sounds like the beginning of a whole new adventure.

The Watch is a highly anglophile band from Italy that plays original music for people who like early Genesis. This latest CD reworks a pair of songs from the Genesis To Revelation album and uses them to inspire new songs.

The instrumentation is judiciously moved forward, closer to the Trespass period. So you have piano, Hammond organ, mellotron, acoustic, electric and twelve-string guitars weaving textures above drums, bass and bass pedals. On top of these sit Rossetti's Gabrielesque voice and flute. Finally, analogue synth is added in small measure -- making it all the more effective when it arrives, whistling like some ominous electric wind, buzzing sonorously in the low register or suddenly knocking a song sideways with its tone.

Take, for example, the gloriously odd trombone-like sound that squeezes out of the speakers to begin the long outro of "Scene Of The Crime": this is a slow seasick waltz that sounds like a collaboration between members of Procul Harum and Genesis.

What this all adds up to is music that sounds as though it were made right at the end of the sixties -- English pop music about to burst out into a whole new soundworld. The re-working of "In The Wilderness," for example, opens with a syncopated exchange between the bass and the rest of the band that is essentially beat music. And the song ends with a guitar-led theme that could have come from Trespass.

Overall, the songs are still short, punctuated by quick tight instrumental moments rather than the long musical excursions that are essential to the core prog repertoire. They have a brittle naivety and open-eyed sense of adventure about them that captures the spirit of the early prog era -- the excitement of young English musicians operating slightly outside their own comfort zone that characterized early recordings by the likes of Pink Floyd or Yes.

The two Genesis songs that are re-presented here give a good account of themselves. Played by seasoned musicians steeped in the longer musical tradition of English progressive rock and recorded under modern studio conditions, you would expect them to be an improvement on the originals -- and they are.

"Let Us Now Make Love," in particular, benefits from a tight forceful rhythm and sharp interplay between the keyboards and the rest of the band. It shows the band changing gear regularly from gentle open acoustic melodies to short bursts of organ-driven rhythm. At the climax, Giorgio Gabriel's soaring guitar theme leads to heady exchanges between the group and the mellotron that directly echo the opening of "Wilderness." By the end of the song, you have a lot of exciting music compressed into four and a half minutes. It's exhilarating and it gets better every time you listen.

Also worth highlighting is the reworking of The Watch's own song, "Soaring On." Originally, this made an unsatisfactory ending to the Primitive CD, with its electronic keyboard sounds failing to build an emotional intensity.

Here, that has all been changed. A revised arrangement introduces the flute and uses the mellotron to paint a more organic context. It sounds more intimate and highlights the most emotive lyrics ("it seems like a lifetime, until you showed up again"). And it never hurts to sound like the beginning of "Cinema Show."

What gives Timeless its fundamental integrity is the band's scholarship and attention to detail in understanding the song framework and instrumentation of early Genesis. But what really enables these songs to deliver is that they clearly love what they are doing.

If there's any doubt on that score, it will be blown away by the bonus track, a live recording of "Stagnation," from the last tour. It crackles with electric tension from its fragile opening to its famous grand ending.

Check the back catalogue of CDs and you will see that The Watch is one of the best things to happen to progressive rock in the last ten years. This new release confirms that status -- it's deliberately limited in its scope, perhaps, but it is pretty near flawlessly executed. You can't say they don't make music like that any more, because they do.


Tracklisting:
The Watch (1:47) / Thunder Has Spoken (4:48) / One Day (4:09) / In The Wilderness (4:05) / Soaring On (4:23) / Let Us Now Make Love (4:39) / Scene Of The Crime (5:13) / End Of The Road (6:21) / Exit (0:57) / Bonus: Stagnation (live from the "2010 shows")

Musicians:
Simone Rossetti - vocals
Giorgio Gabriel - guitars
Guglielmo Mariotti - bass
Valerio De Vittorio - keyboards
Marco Fabbri - drums
John Hackett - flute

Discography:
The Night Watch - Twilight (1999)
Ghost (2001)
Vacuum (2004)
Primitive (2007)
Planet Earth? (2010)
Timeless (2011)

Genre: Progressive Rock

Origin IT

Added: February 21st 2011
Reviewer: John Hendry
Score:
Artist website: www.thewatchmusic.net
Hits: 3008
Language: english

  

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