Author Topic: Flower Kings Official Thread  (Read 231031 times)

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Offline Nick

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #595 on: June 20, 2012, 09:26:39 AM »
It's unfortunate that MySpace went extinct, because it's still 10x better than twitter.
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Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #596 on: June 20, 2012, 09:38:35 AM »
The MySpace link for Zoltan's band is all I found on a quick search for samples of their music.

Offline Nick

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #597 on: June 20, 2012, 09:25:38 PM »
Busy and thus late to the party, but here is my review of the album:

https://www.wpapu.com/rev065.html
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Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #598 on: June 20, 2012, 09:57:21 PM »
It's still waaaaaay too early for me to imagine giving a rating or ranking to this record, but I like it a lot so far.  Seems pretty consistent and a definite upgrade over their last effort. :tup :tup

Offline The Letter M

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #599 on: June 20, 2012, 10:09:51 PM »
I gave the album a good spin today, and while only 2/3rds of my attention was paid to it, I do have to say it is pretty damn good. It's as good, if not a bit better than The Sum Of No Evil. Definitely well worth the 5-year wait, IMO, and I'm excited to hear what this line-up has to offer in terms of future albums. I recall reading somewhere that Roine plans on going back in the studio this fall/winter for another album. Guess once you get going, you can't stop!

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Offline The Letter M

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #600 on: June 20, 2012, 11:19:06 PM »
Jordan Charles Rudess just listened to Banks Of Eden on MOG, as just posted on Facebook. :metal

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Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #601 on: June 21, 2012, 09:07:32 AM »
I've listened to it now 4 times and I really love it.  Not sure if it will top The Sum of No Evil as my favorite just yet, but it might. 

Every track is a winner, and for me that's pretty rare with TFK


Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #602 on: June 21, 2012, 09:54:54 AM »
It IS pretty consistent, but then again, I think just about every TFK record is consistent from start to finish (except for The Rainmaker, A&E and The Sum of No Evil), so this is no surprise to me. :biggrin:

The question will be, how many, or if any, of these songs will stand out as truly great TFK that I can call one of their best.  The last album was lacking in that area, IMO.  I liked the last five songs, but none of them wowed me to the point where I'd call any of them GREAT TFK tunes. 

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #603 on: June 21, 2012, 11:40:14 AM »
The interview is pretty cool, they show a lot of the vintage components that were used in recording the album.

Got my package yesterday:



Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #604 on: June 21, 2012, 01:46:17 PM »
I still need to watch that, but I still can't get over how icky the new album cover and all of the other artwork associated with it is.  It's just...icky.  But great album covers have never been their thing, anyway...;) :lol

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #605 on: June 21, 2012, 01:49:20 PM »
Also, I swear that drum intro of LoLines reminds me so much of the beginning of Transatlantic's Lenny Johnson.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #606 on: June 21, 2012, 01:56:31 PM »
The artwork is typical Flower Kings, I think. 

As far as the intros to Lenny Johnson and LoLines, they share the similarity that they're both played primarily on the snare drum, but they're in different time signatures, dude  :lol

I guess I can understand how you might thing they sound alike though, they are played at almost the exact same tempo and a very similar duration.

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #607 on: June 21, 2012, 04:42:56 PM »
I reckon.

Also, in redoing my TFK mp3 CDs for my car, I realized that they now have too many songs I like to fit them all on to two full 700 MB max CDs. :eek :eek :eek

So, I decided to break them up into three, while throwing in some of the stuff from side projects and Roine's solo albums:

Disc 1: Back in the World of Adventures, Retropolis, Stardust We Are and Flower Power, plus select tracks from Roine's solo albums The Flower Kings and Hydrophonia
Disc 2: Space Revolver, The Rainmaker and Unfold the Future, plus select tracks from Kaipa's Notes from the Past, all of Kaipa's Keyholder, all of The Tangent's The Music That Died Alone and The Tangent The World That We Drive Through track
Disc 3: Banks of Eden (placed first, as I always put the newest CD by a band first, so it comes up first when popping the CD in), Adam & Eve, Paradox Hotel and The Sum of No Evil, plus select tracks from Karmakanic's first three albums

And there were a few songs here and there from the TFK albums that I left off, simply because there wasn't room for everything, and it was better to lose a few interlude songs that get rid of one "normal" song that I wanted on there: a few of the shorter songs on BITWO and SWA, a few off of Disc 2 of Flower Power, One More Time from TSONE, some of the songs near the end of The Rainmaker, etc. 

 :hat :hat :hat

Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #608 on: June 22, 2012, 12:13:21 PM »
Listening to BoE again. This time, I am not listening to the bonus disc along with the actual album, so that I can focus just on the main disc. I was starting to feel that BoE is not as good as most of the previous TFK output, but this listening session is making me think this might be a top 3 TFK album. I think listening to the bonus songs right after BoE brings the album down, so I will now keep the 2 separate from now on. I like the bonus songs by themselves, but not part of the album proper.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #609 on: June 22, 2012, 12:18:37 PM »
Kevin, no "Mindrevolutions" by Kaipa?   :eek   

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #610 on: June 22, 2012, 12:22:02 PM »
I never bothered checking out Mindrevolutions considering reviews for it across the board were not that great.  Looking at both PA and RYM, it looks to be their lowest-rated album of the five newer ones.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #611 on: June 22, 2012, 01:03:31 PM »
I guess I need to check out Angling Feelings and In The Wake of Evolution, I never got around to those two.  I thought Mindrevolutions was pretty decent, but nowhere near the perfection of Keyholder, which I consider a masterpiece.

Offline Nick

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #612 on: June 22, 2012, 02:54:41 PM »
Huzzah. Bought the 1 disc edition and got shipped the 2 disc edition.
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Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #613 on: June 23, 2012, 12:43:29 PM »
Sweet deal!

Before BoE came out, I asked my local record shop if they were going to have the special edition in stock. They said they were only ordering the single disc version, they even said that they had the single disc edition they day I found out they had it on the shelves. When I got there, they ONLY had the special edition, there was no single edition in sight.

This also reminds me, Ive never seen a copy of the single disc version of The Whirlwind either... Interesting.

Offline pain of occupation

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #614 on: June 23, 2012, 10:55:05 PM »
so far, the only track ive really really gotten into is Going Up. probably havent given it a fair shake yet, though.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #615 on: June 24, 2012, 05:27:54 AM »
Like most TFK albums, this album didn't really start to click with me until about the 4th listen.   Definitely a grower.

Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #616 on: June 25, 2012, 11:13:59 AM »
I finally got a chance to listen to BoE in the car yesterday, and it was great. I got into Numbers so hard (always love music in the car, I can just blast it). The epic is great for air-drumming. Good album to drive to, as most of TFK's music is, imo.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #617 on: June 25, 2012, 11:50:32 AM »
Nice review of "Banks of Eden" on Ytsejam.com


And he loves the artwork, like me  :hat

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #618 on: June 25, 2012, 09:38:24 PM »
So far, I pretty much like all of the non-epic songs quite a bit (which is all of them but Numbers :lol).

As for Numbers, it sounds good, but I am starting to wonder if it will ever rise up enough for me to call it great.  I know, I know, it has only been a week, but I am just spitballing here.  A friend and I were talking about it the other day (he is as big a TFK fan as I am, and our tastes when it comes to them are usually pretty similar), and we both agreed that Numbers might end up being similar to The Truth Will Set You Free and Love Is the Only Answer: good songs, but so long that it is hard to justify dedicating that many minutes to them on a regular basis when they have other songs of similar long length that are significantly better (I Am the Sun, Stardust We Are, Devil's Playground, etc.), especially once we get past the phase of listening to the album from start to finish, which is normal to do a lot when a CD is first out.  Time will tell...

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #619 on: June 26, 2012, 09:11:01 AM »
I think it's a concept album and really other than the bonus tracks, I consider it a complete piece, to be listened to as a whole.  With that in mind, I think Numbers is great  :tup

Offline obscure

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #620 on: June 26, 2012, 10:34:40 AM »
masterpiece!

Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #621 on: June 26, 2012, 10:52:48 AM »
I think it's a concept album and really other than the bonus tracks, I consider it a complete piece, to be listened to as a whole.  With that in mind, I think Numbers is great  :tup

Yes! I know what you mean. Besides the fact that I almost always listen to TFK albums straight through, if you listen carefully, the "Imperial" theme is all over Numbers of course, it's also in For The Love Of Gold, Pandemonium, and Rising The Imperial. So musically, it could be seen as a concept album. Thing is, almost all their albums are concept albums  :biggrin:

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #622 on: June 26, 2012, 11:50:50 AM »
This doesn't strike me as any more of a concept album than Stardust We Are or Paradox Hotel, both of which have recurring musical themes dotted throughout the album as well. 

So far, I think my favorite songs are Pandemonium and LoLines, but that could change from day to day. :)

Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #623 on: June 26, 2012, 12:13:42 PM »
Right, that's what I was saying. Maybe because of the condensed nature of BoE, it is more noticeable.

BTW, I'm listening to Flower Power for the first time in almost 3 months, and I'm just  :hefdaddy :hefdaddy :hefdaddy

Offline darkshade

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #624 on: June 26, 2012, 02:32:45 PM »
Why don't people like Magic Pie? I think it's a great song. I like Hasse's vocals on that one.

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #625 on: June 26, 2012, 03:43:11 PM »
Why don't people doesn't Kevin like Magic Pie? I think it's a great song. I like Hasse's vocals on that one.


It's one of my favorite tracks ever by TFK.   :tup




Offline pain of occupation

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #626 on: June 26, 2012, 04:36:19 PM »
just read nick's review.  :tup it slays that other one, linked.

perhaps nick's review skills are matched only by his interview skills.

Offline KevShmev

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #627 on: June 26, 2012, 10:23:50 PM »
BTW, I'm listening to Flower Power for the first time in almost 3 months, and I'm just  :hefdaddy :hefdaddy :hefdaddy

Flower Power is nothing short of incredible.  I still remember being in awe the first few times I listened to the first three tracks of Disc 1.  :hefdaddy :hefdaddy :hefdaddy

Why don't people like Magic Pie? I think it's a great song. I like Hasse's vocals on that one.

I just listened to it, to see if I was missing something.  Okay, it is better than I remember.  Hasse's vocals are mostly really good, but as usual, he tends to have a line here and line there that just sounds a bit too wimpy (like having a line sang with a lot of range, but not enough sheer power), and that is sometimes a turnoff for me in songs he sings, although nothing can ever top the absolute wussiness of Starlight Man's chorus. :lol :lol  It's why I always prefer it when Roine sings.

Offline pain of occupation

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #628 on: June 27, 2012, 08:54:46 PM »
last time i made an inquiry in this thread i got shutout, so im hesitant to even ask, but...

can one of you TFK-heads come up with a comprehensive list off all the TFK instrumentals? i own nearly everything theyve released after going apeshit with purchases last summer/autumn, but i only 'know' approximately half the material.  i am looking to make a playlist of their instrumentals to spin at a friend's place (though it'll be nice to have for myself as well).

i'll give a massage to anyone gracious enough to help. no guarantee on a happy ending, however.

Offline Nick

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Re: The Flower Kings Official Thread
« Reply #629 on: June 27, 2012, 09:54:12 PM »
just read nick's review.  :tup it slays that other one, linked.

perhaps nick's review skills are matched only by his interview skills.

I admittedly haven't read the YtseJam one, but I thank you very much for the compliments, and appreciate you taking the time to read it even well after the album has been out.

As for the latter bit, I was actually going to interview Roine but unfortunately due to the time zone difference we weren't able to work out a good time.
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