To call this the album “Equilibrio” by Xystus is a bit mundane perhaps, so I’ll give it the full billing: “Equilibrio Overture” is a Rock Opera in 11 scenes over 2 acts by the Dutch band Xystus featuring the 80 piece US Concert Orchestra and 30 singers and dancers. It took 18 months to make, and according to the sleeve notes, “is a complete theatrical production which the likes of (sic) had never been seen before in the Netherlands, and probably, far beyond”. I guess they happened to overlook London’s West End when they wrote this.
It’s clear that to have any chance of fully appreciating this symphonic Emo-Prog “overture”, you have to stop what you’re doing and immerse yourself in it, otherwise it may escape you. The other side of the contract is that the band have to produce something worth listening to and investing 57 minutes in. Well, they’ve clearly made a serious attempt. Quite apart from the bombast in the sleeve notes, the packaging is excellent, however there is a major flaw. There’s no clue as to what this “clash of Metal, Musical, Classical and Theatre” is all about. Reading the lyrics, I’m none the wiser. I don’t know if it’s different in Holland, but opera audiences in Britain like to clue themselves up in advance. The research enhances appreciation. As far as I could see, the various characters represented by the band and other singers, including Simone Simons of Epica incidentally, seemed to spend their time in self-doubt, conflict, making up and finding a “place among the Gods”. Or something like that.
Packaging apart, the net musical result is disappointing. Devotees of this emotional style of Prog may disagree but I personally couldn’t get into the development of it. I presume there was some. My emotional state was no different at the end from what it was at the beginning. The scenes in Act 1 go from 1 to 3 to 5 to 6 to 8. Did they miss some out? Theatre is visual and it was always going to be hard to capture but apart from apparently having only (as the sleeve notes put it) “part of the production”, I’m not sure that I missed out on anything. There were good musical moments, but surely this was supposed to be a whole musical concept. To say that it’s “OK” is not really what they’re looking for in the grandiose scheme of things, and I’m reluctant to even describe it as “OK”.
To try and get into it, I decided to listen carefully and tried to pick the bones out it, which rather defeats the object. What did I find? I did enjoy the orchestral parts in general. The orchestra played its part in turning the atmosphere from a dark one to brighter scenes, conjuring up images of open air and wide skies on “My Song of Creation”. Sometimes there was urgency, at other times there was a softer feel. The problem I was always having was to relate this to the dulcet female vocals, the emotional male vocal, and the voice of Death. There was nothing wrong with the vocals, in fact the voices of “Aveline” (Michelle Splietelhof) and “Primos” (John Vooijs) were fantastic. It’s just that there just didn’t seem to be any context or point to it, certainly in the audio version. I appreciated isolated moments of the album, notably the Celtic flute playing at the beginning of the beautifully sung “My Time of Need”. At the other end the spoken parts and acting sections were just trite. As a stand-alone track, I thoroughly enjoyed “Divided We Stand”. The band, the orchestra and the singers managed to use their talents to a common aim and pulled it all together to achieve dramatic poise. There was an epic Power Metal feel about it. The following track started in a similar vein before disappointingly descending into familiar oblivion.
If I want to listen to this style of music, I’ll stick to Tristania and Trail of Tears. As for the concept of the Rock Opera, Overture or whatever, I would draw attention to an album called “The Aftermath Odyssey” by Nation Beyond which I reviewed a year or so ago. That had all the drama that “Equilibrio” lacked. I can think of a few fellow devotees of ProgPower Europe who might see “Equilibrio” as the answer to their wishes, so maybe there is hope, but as a concept, this was just lost on me. Much was promised but not so much was delivered.
http://www.myspace.com/xystusmusic
http://www.xystus.nl
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