Moving through the decades, we reach the 1990s. Perhaps not the greatest time for prog? We'll see.
Album title: Subterranea
Artist: IQ
Nationality: English
Year: 1997
Chronology: 6
The Trollheart Factor: 1
Track Listing: Overture/Provider/Subterranea/Sleepless Incidental/Failsafe/Speak My Name/Tunnel Vision/Infernal Chorus/King of Fools/The Sense in Sanity/State of Mine/Laid Low/Breathtaker/Capricorn/The Other Side/Unsolid Ground/Somewhere in Time/High Waters/The Narrow Margin
Comments: Leave it to me to choose, not only a concept, but a double album for my 1990s offering! I’ve tried to get into IQ before but always ended up bored. Let’s see if this one can pique my interest. Apparently the story concerns a guy held captive underground and subject to experiments, don’t know why, who is released into the general populace while still under observation. Kicks off with an instrumental, the “Overture”, which is pretty good, then a short, voice and synth only track to take us into the title, which drives along nicely, some good vocal harmonies, lovely sax break, then slowing down for “Sleepless Incidental”, quite stripped back with mostly acoustic guitar for the first two minutes, then it breaks into a keyboard freakout.
More aggressive in its way is “Failsafe”, one of the longer tracks at nearly nine minutes (though nowhere near the longest!) with a lot of sharp guitar and punching keyboards, gets a little Spock’s Beard as it goes along. The first ballad comes in “Speak My Name”, relatively short and quite simple but enjoyable, then “Tunnel Vision” turns the heat back on again, grinding guitars and a slightly snarly vocal, “Infernal Chorus” keeps this pressure up with a lot of romping synth and then a slight interlude for “King of Fools” before vibraphone takes us into “The Sense of Sanity” with a feeling of Peter Gabriel’s “San Jacinto” and a final powerful instrumental to end the first disc.
Another instrumental to kick off disc 2 then “Breathtaker” rocks out and strides along nicely with an almost new-wave sensibility in the music, while “Capricorn” is a little more restrained, though with a lot of passion in the vocal. Another short instrumental in “The Other Side”, then for a moment it sounds like Marillion’s “Garden Party” is starting, but it’s the AOR-influenced “Unsolid Ground”, which is pretty good to be fair. I can’t say an awful lot about “Somewhere in Time” other than it’s fairly mid-paced and I think guitar driven, but as usual with IQ I’m finding it hard to keep my attention on the album. “High Waters” is a piano ballad which leads into the closer, by far the longest track. “The Narrow Margin” runs for twenty minutes, and you know it’s probably really good, but I just have this thing about IQ; find it very hard to keep my interest on their music.
Track(s) I liked: Honestly I think I liked most of them but I couldn’t pick one out individually. Maybe “Unsolid Ground”?
Track(s) I didn't like: See above
One standout: Maybe “Unsolid Ground”
One rotten apple: Nah
Overall impression: You know, I chose this album to try to see if this general boredom I experience with IQ had changed or if it could. It hasn’t, and I don’t know if it ever will. I’m pretty sure it’s a good, even great album, but the problem for me is that it’s a good, or even great
IQ album, so it tends to make less of an impression on me. I don’t know what it is, but I usually measure the worth of an album, or at least the impact it has, or doesn’t have, on me, by the amount of songs I’m singing after it’s over. I can’t even remember any of these.
Rating: 7/10
Future Plan: I’m going to keep trying to get into this band. Maybe it’s just a case of finding the right album of theirs and it will all fall into place. Yeah.