New Album By Design Or By Disaster By For All We Know

If that title is confusing it's because the album is called 'By Design Or By Disaster' and the band is called 'For All We Know'. You can find out more about them here:

https://www.forallweknow.net/

Overall, we're in heavier territory rather than acoustic/folky prog. We're also at the end of prog which is less about long developed song structures and more about straightforward verse/chorus forms. Songs come in at around 4 to 7 minutes.

The album opens with what you might call a prog pop song with a great guitar riff that reminds me of early XTC. The song smashes it with a cracking chorus - a good start to the album. The third song has a piano break about a third of the way through which is most definitely prog, but the musical development of the section doesn't quite deliver for me. Another great chorus though - these guys can certainly write an interesting melody.

I really like the fourth track, 'The Future That Came Too Soon'. It has an interesting vibe and develops nicely, with lots of interesting ideas crashing into each other. However, it then goes into another chorus which sounds like the first three songs, and I'm beginning to wonder whether there's enough variation in this album to keep me interested.

I don't intend to review the whole album, rather give a flavour. These blogs are supposed to be on the shorter side. But I find myself still listening at track 5, and it has a refreshingly different sound. It starts with acoustic guitar and develops with a string accompaniment. This is a good change of pace for the album, and once again the melody in the chorus really works well - it has several unexpected harmonic twists. One of the high points of the album so far.

The singer is channelling James LaBrie (Dream Theater) at times, which is no bad thing. The guitar playing is great. The synths are mostly not in the forefront of the sound, and I think I detect some programming rather than playing, but that might be in my imagination. Overall, I think this is an album well worth listening to.

Reasons to listen:

  • A great sounding modern prog album slightly on the heavier side at times with great melodies and interesting ideas
Reasons not to listen:
  • You like your prog only with flutes and fairies and stuff
Interesting fact of the day: For All We Know is the solo project of Ruud Jolie, the lead guitarist of symphonic rock band Within Temptation. You can read his explanation of what it's all about here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruud_Jolie

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