I hope you don't mind a semi-fan chiming in, since I would like to share my unconventional history with The Flower Kings with someone. About ten years ago, as I was becoming a fan of Dream Theater, Spock's Beard and Transatlantic, I bumped into The Flower Kings and picked The Sum of no evil at random. I think I dug the album cover. I found it very solid, but wasn't blown away by it. It was only afterwards that I realized it isn't one of the band's more popular releases.
I wasn't too interested in checking the rest of their stuff, but I gave a spin to Banks of eden and Desolation rose when they came out. The latter one appealed to me quite a bit and I still think there are some great songs on it. Still, it wasn't enough to motivate me to check out the earlier stuff.
Years went by, The Flower Kings remained kind of quiet, and then Waiting for miracles was announced. I saw it as a good opportunity to check out another album of theirs or two before I dig into the new one. As I was only familiar with the newer stuff, I decided to move backwards. Paradox hotel featured two of my The Flower Kings songs up to that point: Lucy had a dream and Blue planet. Adam and Eve was fine, but not a single song blew me away as a whole. Unfortunately, I ended up being quite underwhelmed by Waiting for miracles.
So, Islands was announced a while ago and I got excited. It struck me as odd that I am looking forward to a new album by a band that never truly struck a chord with me. A part of me still thinks that, over the years, I will get to the older albums that are being held in a high regard, which will help me appreciate the latter stuff even more. After I'm done with Islands, I will dump the concept of going backwards and check out the first two albums. Lets see how that works out.
Oh, and Islands is pretty enjoyable, actually. Morning news, All I need is love, Broken, Looking for answers and Goodbye outrage are magical. There is something about this band that keeps me going back every now and then. It's like a potential waiting to be unleashed.