Posted: July 16, 2010 at 9:55 pm
Online magazine for symphonic & progressive rock
Proximal Distance -
Proximal Distance
(CD 2010, 74.24, Own Production)
The tracks:
| 1- Algol |
(7:52) |
| 2- The Shaman |
(8:03) |
| 3- Gypsy |
(11:22) |
| 4- Contemplation |
(3:17) |
| 5- Flashback To Now (A Hippy’s Lament) |
(4:40) |
| 6- Deep Space Intermission |
(5:36) |
| 7- Leaves Fall |
(3:50) |
| 8- Journey of Truth |
(7:33) |
| 9- Coherence |
(7:54) |
| 10- Expanding Universe |
(14:16) |
|
 |
Proximal Distance is a collaboration of two American progressive rock groups: Slychosis and Majestic, featuring multi-instrumentalists Gregg Johns and Jeff Hamel in that order. They asked Jessica Rasche from Majestic to do the vocals and from the Slychosis-camp Jeremy Mitchell for the drums. The progressive influences of Proximal Distance are many: Yes, Rush, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Saga and Eloy, just to name a few.
What kind of music does Proximal Distance make? The first track Algo, is a beautiful heavy instrumental opener in the same style as Canadian heavy prog rockers Rush. The middle-section is a bit more relaxed with synths, space sounds and a lingering kind of bluesy guitar chords: Pink Floyd meet Eloy. The Shaman is up-tempo with mysterious dark and distorted vocals in the vein of Maryson, a great contrast to the heavenly voice of Jessica Rasche. Many changes in tempo and breaks held my attention all the time. The beginning of Gypsy strongly reminds me of Renaissance especially the Annie Haslam- like voice. Furthermore, we hear electric and bass guitar playing in the vein of Steve Howe and Chris Squire (Yes). ‘Talking’ guitar solos interact with heavenly voices building slowly to a climax and ending with dramatic singing and an acoustic guitar. Gypsy is a rather long piece that contains plenty of good musical ideas. It’s a perfect piece for daydreaming, but also for playing your ‘air guitar’.
Contemplation Harsh is a short song beginning with ‘attacks’ on the acoustic guitar, then accompanied by high and heavenly singing in the vein of Iona and Renaissance. This song is a welcome rest after all those impressive and tremendous symphonic rock pieces. Flashback To Now (A Happy’s Lament) starts with an Eloy-like bass plucking theme, but you can hear influences of Dutch prog icon Ayreon as well. It’s a rather odd song with strange vocal chords and a weird structure. This one certainly doesn’t belong to my favourites and is in fact the only disappointing track on this album. Fortunately Deep Space Intermission is another instrumental highlight with a spacey and dark start, directly followed by the Pink Floyd/Eloy guitar licks. This piece is brilliantly floating through my speakers while slowly building to a climax. The lyrics and the vocals of Jessica Rasche perfectly fit in the tuneful music. Leaves Fall is a song about sad memories set to music with acoustic guitars and dramatic voices, just like the overall feel of autumn. In Journey to Truth you hear over seven minutes of rocking guitars reminding me of Deep Purple’s Space Trucking with nice interludes of dreamy and spacey Moog-synths and catchy lyrics ending with a dreamy guitar solo. Coherence has a typical Hawkwind-sound starting with news flashes, followed by dark vocals and music in the vein of Dutch prog rock/gothic bands like Within Temptation, Ayreon and After Forever. The middle-section of this song is rather hectic, but the final part is much more interesting with its fast and spacey rhythms and well-played pinball music.
Expanding Universe is the longest piece of the album that starts again with that typical spacey Eloy-sound: howling guitars and bluesy rhythms. This song contains all the elements a good prog song needs: good lyrics and fine guitar, synth and Hammond-solos. This epic piece ends in the same way as the first song Algol began. You will be surprised about the end, but I won’t reveal it. Just buy this album and you will be amazed, because Proximal Distance succeeded in creating a 70-minute debut album containing perfect and powerful progressive rock. This album will certainly belong to one of my favourites this year.
****+ Cor Smeets (edited by Peter Willemsen)
www.progwalhalla.com
Posted: March 28, 2010 at 10:45 pm
Original Link Found Here:
Prolusion. The US outfit MAJESTIC is the creative vehicle of composer and multi-instrumentalist Jeff Hamel, who made his debut, “Discension”, under this moniker in 2007. Since he was signed by Russian label MALS Records, which reissued his first effort, he’s recorded and released a second album on vinyl, and now in 2009 his third production “Arrival” has, well, arrived.
Analysis. While I found the initial effort from Hamel’s Majestic project to be rather underwhelming, I was pleasantly surprised by this latest effort courtesy of this talented composer and musician. In two years he’s managed to substantially improve what I felt where the main flaws of his first production, and this time around we’re dealing with an album that comes across as well made and well performed in all departments. Of the four creations at hand on this disc, the first and the last, Gray and Arrival are the ones of real importance. Clocking in at 58 minutes in total, these two efforts dominate this release, and, as they are the best tracks by far as well, these are the ones who will make or break this excursion. Both compositions seem to have a foundation of sorts in a stylistic expression rather similar to mid-‘70s Pink Floyd. Wandering acoustic and clean electric guitars form the melodic foundation, bass and drums support in the rhythm department, while rich, warm layers of keyboards, organ and synth add a symphonic backdrop or overlay, more often than not with space-tinged embellishments. On select occasions heavier passages add a metal tinge to the proceedings, while mellow acoustic and ambient, spacey keyboard passages add variation of a more gentle nature. Instrumental sequences and vocal parts are well balanced, and, while vocalist Jessica Rasche is a real find for Hamel, his own vocal contributions aren’t too shabby either – a great improvement from Majestic’s 2007 debut. Both compositions shift back and forth between gentler and more energetic movements, rich in melodies and harmonies. Not the most challenging music around, but the tracks are well made and well performed, and more often than not it’s hard to tell that this is, in fact, a one-man effort rather than a full-fledged band. And, while moments of true brilliance aren’t quite yet within the grasp of Hamel, the improvements he’s made in just two years indicate that it won’t be long until he creates an album that will make a stunning impact.
Conclusion. “Arrival” is a strong effort by a rapidly evolving musician and composer who might find himself becoming a household name in record time if he keeps evolving as much as he has done over the last two years. Those fond of symphonic, space-tinged progressive rock made in a manner similar to Pink Floyd’s mid 70’s efforts should find it an interesting production – particularly if long, epic length compositions are of interest.
OMB=Olav M Bjornsen: March 15, 2010
The Rating Room
Posted: February 12, 2010 at 11:11 am
Original Link
MAJESTIC – Arrival (****)
- Majestic is a musical project of USA citizen Jeff Hamel (guitar, keyboards and vocals). He started to play guitar when he was 14 years old, in The Eighties he was a member of prog metal band Osmium and in the Nineties he studied a few years recording technology in Detroit. In 2004 has passion for symphonic progrock to the foundation of Majestic, then he released the albums Descension (2007), String Theory (2008), Majestic Sampler 09 and Arrival (2009). I was not familiar with Majestic their music but after reading lots of praise about their latest effort, I asked Progwalhalla Hans to sent me Arrival in order to discover their music and to make a review.
- This very long CD (close to 80 minutes) opens with the 22 minutes composition Gray: first a dreamy intro with twanging electric guitar and pleasant vocals, then the music alternates between a fluent rhythm with bombastic keyboards, heavy guitar and a thunderous rhythm-section and a more mellow climate with wonderful female vocals. In between we can enjoy a blistering guitar solo. After a part with fine synthesizer flights, propulsive guitar riffs and ominous sounding keyboards, follows a mellow part featuring all sorts of sounds and soaring vocals. Then a great build-up, the music gradually turns into more lush and heavy, somewhere between gothic and prog metal with heavy guitar riffs and majestic organ. In the final part the music slows down but in the end it’s again bombastic with heavy work on guitar and keyboards. The next song Wish (almost 10 minutes) is an oasis of silence in comparison with the previous song: warm acoustic guitar with soaring vocals, then gradually the music slowly becomes more compelling and halfway we can enjoy an excellent, strongly build-up guitar solo with biting runs and sensational use of the wah-wah pedal. The third track Gilde (also close to 10 minutes) starts in a prog metal atmosphere, then a spacey interlude and a captivating build-up to fluent and sumptuous with spectacular work on guitar and keyboards. Finally the epic titletrack clocking …. 36 minutes! But despite this very long running time, Majestic succeeds to keep my attention, due to the many strong musical ideas and surprising twists and turns. After a spacey intro with subtle guitar work, a pleasant female voice joins, followed by a build-up to compelling and bombastic prog with emotional vocals and fiery wah-wah guitar. Then lots of shifting moods, breaks and great dynamics: prog metal, a slow rhythm with organ and slow drum beats, a hypnotizing guitar solo with fiery runs, a dreamy part with classical guitar, a blistering guitar solo with wah-wah, a compelling bombastic atmosphere delivering organ, vocals and a propulsive rhythm-section and finally a beautiful part with a moving guitar solo, accompanied by sequencers, very original!
- If you like harder-edged symphonic rock, Heavy Prog, prog metal or gothic rock, I am sure this album will delight you!
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars! [4 of 5 Stars!]
Posted: October 16, 2009 at 7:33 pm
RTR Review Link
This is a second review of Arrival from S.O.T.
Majestic: Arrival
Posted by Steven Reid, SoT Staff Writer on 2009-10-16 06:23:13
My Score: 
If I was to be honest, when you receive a CD to review that has a single page cover and a cheap looking design on the disc itself that all suggests extremely low budget stuff and then go on to discover that the band in question, namely Majestic, is a one man project with help from a singer. Then on top of that you notice that the disc contains only four songs, all of which are over nine minutes long, two at around the half hour mark, then it would be fair to suggest that I first approached Arrival with some trepidation.
Unlike my colleague Jon, this is my first brush with Majestic and after getting over my initial impressions the only thing I can say is boy have I been missing out!
Jeff Hamel is an impressive master of many instruments; however his guitar work is flawless throughout. Ranging from dreamy, atmospheric passages to sharp incisive work outs and including most else in between, all the guitar work is of the highest standard and slowly but surely draws you into the joys held within this album.
There are many reference points on the disc, however I would have to agree that Porcupine Tree and Pink Floyd loom large on most of the music, however they do so without on the whole over shadowing it, although there are moments on the 36 minute epic title track, where you are checking the song writing credits to see if Dave Gilmour dropped in on the sessions. That in itself is no bad thing when the mix of the spoken word parts, wonderful vocals and the sublime guitar solos interlink to make the outcome is as impressive as it is.
That’s not to diminish what is also achieved elsewhere on Arrival as there really is no point where the standard drops below excellent. Each of the four tracks are engaging and interesting in equal measure, with Hamel not putting a foot wrong at any turn. It is also to his credit that he has brought the wonderful Jessica Rasche and board to compliment his vocals with her fragile yet confident voice knowing when to blend with its surroundings and when to shine through and dominate for a while.
Hamel is also an extremely deft keyboard player. The album is swathed in atmospheric keys which lift the satisfyingly simple moments to melodic spells that captivate you with their beauty.
Majestic have put together a quite wonderful progressive album with Arrival that will appeal to those who lap up music from the current crop of prog’s leading lights, or those who still hanker for the genres past glories.
Posted: October 14, 2009 at 3:16 pm
Majestic: Arrival
Majestic is the project formed by multi-instrumentalist Jeff Hamel. My first experience with the artist’s music was the album Descension which I thought was a good listen. I am happy to say the new release entitled Arrival blows that one out of the water. Hamel has outdid himself this time around. While Hamel has a pleasant enough voice, I felt the vocals were somewhat lacking with the Descension album. On the new release Hamel has brought in the vocal talents of Jessica Rasche who has an excellent voice totally suited to Hamel’s style of progressive rock. Hamel adds some of his own vocal touches taking the occasional lead and adding backing vocals. Hamel combines elements of neo, heavy prog and symphonic rock, blending them together to make a delicious musical concoction. There is a good mixture of heavy and light moments that showcases the excellent musicianship of Hamel. While Hamel is still influenced by bands like Porcupine Tree and Pink Floyd he is really starting to develop his own style on Arrival.
Although there are only four tracks, there is over seventy-five minutes of music thanks to a couple of monster epics bookending this release. The album starts with “Gray”, an ambitious opening number that sets the tone for what is to come. From softer sections to hard edged progressive rock this song has a lot to offer prog fans recalling moments of Porcupine Tree. Hamel’s vocal work is quite good as he seems to have matured in this area. My favourite song has to be the thirty-six minute title track that closes out the CD in fine fashion. With its soaring lead guitar solos, ala Gilmour, beautiful layered female vocals, spoken word samples and at times a darker electronic vibe, this song is epic with a capitol e. It is so good in fact I barely noticed where the time had gone. Sandwiched in between are two tracks that are also of a very high caliber.
Arrival does not feel like a one man band in the slightest. The sound is so rich and full it is hard to believe this is the work of one man. This is an album I highly recommend. Arrival is truly majestic in every sense of the word.
Track Listing:
1. Gray (22:38)
2. Wish (9:12)
3. Glide (9:36)
4. Arrival (36:04)
Added: October 14th 2009
Reviewer: Jon Neudorf
Score: 
Related Link: Artist’s Official Site
