The Flower Kings, Chapter 7: Unfold The Future

 7) Unfold The Future (2002)

Now so much wiser, so much more in tune...

After the triumph of Space Revolver, an album that won the band many new fans including yours truly, The Rainmaker was a disappointment to many. Had the band's unforgiving one-album-a-year approach taken its toll? Were The Flower Kings already on their way out?

No, apparently. I don't know how or why, but in 2002, just after Roine did four albums and four tours in two years, The Flower Kings released the biggest, boldest, longest, most ambitious, best-selling and probably best album of their career. This is one for the desert island.

Unfold the Future introduces a new line-up for The Flower Kings. There's a new drummer in town, and we'll be talking about him a great deal. His name is Zoltán Csörsz, he is Hungarian and he was introduced to the band by Tomas Bodin. Tomas first met him in the Swedish jazz scene, in which both were active. Tomas, being deeply impressed by the young Hungarian's skill, invited Zoltán to play on some of his solo songs. When Jaime Salazar quit the band, Tomas immediately knew who to call.

The Flower Kings had a great drummer in Jaime Salazar, but Zoltán Csörsz is an exceptional one. A jazz man at heart, Csörsz is not just a drummer but a creative force, someone who elevates everything to a whole new level. His playing is so refined, subtle but powerful, with an unstoppable rhythmic drive. His work on the high hat and the rolls on the snare add a world of depth. With Csörsz on board, the entire band seem to have upped their game once again. So yes, that was a good call from Tomas.

The other new face is equally exciting: Roine has brought Daniel Gildenlöw to the fold, of Pain of Salvation fame. Gildenlöw had joined Transatlantic on their 2001 world tour as an extra background singer and miscellaneous instrumentalist, and his role in The Flower Kings is basically the same. His voice can go both extremely high and extremely low, and is often added to the harmonies. Even though he is one of the most accomplished and distinctive singers in the prog-rock world, his role in TFK is relatively modest. He sings lead on only a handful of songs. It is still Hasse Fröberg who is very much the lead singer of TFK at this point in their career.

Unfold the Future, for all its considerable success, is one of the more controversial albums in the back catalog of the band. While its qualities are well-established, the album has a lot of very out-there and dare I say “unproggy” moments, mostly in the form of free-jazz experiments. I will defend the position that it is one of their best albums, but you will find many people willing to contest that opinion.

So here's a not-at-all controversial statement: Unfold the Future opens with the greatest Flower Kings song of all.

Thirty minutes long, “The Truth Will Set You Free” is a bona fide masterpiece, and I do not throw that word around lightly. From the unforgettable opening marimba riff to the deeply satisfying conclusion, these are thirty minutes of pure prog rock bliss. The genius of it is that it is both based on a single thematic link that is followed all the way through, chock full of ideas and themes to keep the listener completely invested at all times, and fundamentally a completely cohesive and “whole” piece of music. This is probably the hardest thing to pull off for any progressive rock epic, and The Flower Kings just completely blow it out of the water. The pacing is brilliant, the dynamics are masterful and it's once again an explosion of creativity. Every time you feel like you've heard all the song is going to do, another fantastic section with a great melody comes out of nowhere and puts you right back at the edge of your seat. These are masters at work. I cannot praise this song enough. It's easily the equal of “Close To The Edge”, “Supper's Ready” and “Tarkus”, and it deserves to be named in one breath with these. I'm serious. It's that good.

You could follow something like that up with anything, and The Flower Kings, rather than the usual ballad, choose a simple, straightforward rocker called “Monkey Business”. Man may have evolved beyond a mere monkey, Roine says, but we still haven't shaken off our primal instincts quite yet. The song reaches crescendo at the end, with church organs spicing it up. Also, there's handclaps. I like handclaps. It's a good track.

“Black and White” turns the spectacle up again. It actually starts as a ballad, and a pretty one at that, but it quickly turns into a busy, very bass-driven and quirky instrumental section, with many crazy sections and that familliar humourous streak. Another great track, though it doesn't really have an ending. It doesn't quite fade out, it sort of fades into the next track.

We've heard two prog songs and a rocker so far. Nothing out of the ordinary for The Flower Kings. But “Christianopel” is the first sign of a new element that has entered The Flower Kings at this point: free jazz. Jazz was always part of this band's sound, going all the way back to Back In The World Of Adventures, but Unfold The Future takes this element to a new place. It feels fresher somehow, more inspired, sexier. Less like a “gimmick” and more like a thing that The Flower Kings just do, naturally. This was, in no small part, due to the addition of Csörsz, whose creative and energetic drumming broguht the band's jam sessions to a whole new level. Having this guy around allegedly made jamming so much fun that they could barely stop doing it. It's no surpirse, then, that room was made on the album to include some of this.

A small man can cast a large shadow...

You know by now I'm not a huge fan of these escapades, but “Christianopel” is surprisingly listenable, in a King Crimson's “Moonchild” sort of way. It starts like a free-flowing collage of sounds floating in the void, but gets a more solid shape about halfway through, when the band gets a nice groove going. It's still, admittedly, something I sometimes skip, but it doesn't hurt the album at all.

Still, Roine is wise enough to follow this one up with a long, yummy slice of prog, the steely and hard-hitting “Silent Inferno”. It opens on a simple, tight rock riff before breaking down into an ominous first verse. The song the builds to an early climax in the shape of a heavenly guitar solo built around a delicious chord progression. This is then followed by a suprise latin section, weird but cool. The rock riff from the sart brings things to a close. Great stuff.

The closing two pieces of CD one are similarly fantastic. “The Navigator” is one of the sweetest little songs I've ever heard, built around a cute piano melody and sung by Roine at his most understated. I quite love it. You might expext to hear something darker to close disc one off, but instead, The Flower Kings double down on the sweetness with “Vox Humana”, a variation on a theme taken from “The Truth” which again gives us bookends. It's most charming, though we know the real end of the album will be something heavier...

CD one of Unfold The Future is one of the strongest single disks in The Flower King's discography. Apart from the strange-but-interesting "Christianopel", it's as tight a collection of prog rock songs as I've ever heard, and it of course contains that incredible epic. Inevitably, the second CD is the lesser half of this equation, but it's still really good. Where the second disks of Stardust and Flower Power had some unquestionable filler dragging it down, Unfold The Future's lesser moments are still quite interesting. If anything, they are the result of too much enthousiasm and experimentation than too little.

First wish: A new Flower Kings album!

“Genie in a Bottle” opens act two, and it's an odd-time rocker. A fine rock song with a touch of humour to it, though nothing too remarkable. It's a very vocal-driven song, with not a lot of room for instrumental fireworks. The quiet middle-eight reminds me of early Marillion, of all things, though I might be the only one who hears it.

Track two is something far more exciting: “Fast Lane”, the first song by The Flower Kings with Daniel Gildenlöw as its lead vocalist. It's another very driven piece that romps along in an odd but tight beat, though this one has more of a jazz than a rock edge. The verses sound a little abstract, but it all resolves in a euphoric chorus, creating those elusive tingles! And then there's Gildenlöw. He does bring a different feel than the two main singers: he has a lot more range than Roine Stolt, and a lot more subtlety than Hasse Fröberg (whose thunderous voice can be a bit of a blunt instrument). His emotional extraversion is a welcome change for The Flower Kings.

We bring things down with “Grand Old World”, a song that reprises “The Truth” once again. It's an inversion of the Stardust We Are formula: that album had previews of the grand epic throughout the album, this one has reprises. “Grand Old World” is a higly athmospheric, mysterious, exotic sounding song that gives an understated version of The Flower Kings' usual message of peace and love.

As is so often the case with this band, four is the unlucky number. “Soul Vortex” is another of those disembodied jazz improvisations that are this album's “thing”. This one is slow and a little directionless. I don't let it rain on my parade, but it's really the only song on this album that I really couldn't care less about.

“Rollin' The Dice” is a fun one. It's Tomas Bodin's full-blown six minute Christian rock opera, in which The Devil tries and fails to tempt a pure-hearted mortal into evil (and is a bit of a jerk about it). It's a bombastc, bass-driven rocker that romps along at a jolly old pace. It's a very theatrical song, with singers playing different roles, Ayreon style. Gildenlöw is both the innocent ingenue and the Devil's servant, while Hasse Fröberg gets to ham it up as Old Scratch himself, clearly having himself a – forgive me – Hell of a time. I wonder what it was like for Daniel Gildenlöw, who I gather is an agnostic, to sing one of The Flower Kings' most overtly religious songs?

I'm going to hell for all my puns.

The Prince of Darkness continues to have a strong presence on the second disk. “The Devil's Danceschool” is, you guessed it, another jazz improvisation. For what it's worth, this is the one I like best. It feels like the one that would be most at home in a smoky jazz bar after midnight. It's credited to Jonas Reingold, a strange fact given that this isn't the kind of thing Reingold is most known for writing (if you follow Karmakanic, you know Reingold can compose epic prog with the best of them). I can't quite tell if the “sax” in this song is a real, albeit distorted, sax or something out of Tomas Bodin's magic box...

“Man Overboard” is one I can't quite get on board with (come for the music criticism, stay for the dad jokes!). It's only a minute or three long, but there's a lot going on in there. It opens with a pizzicato string sound, it then has a rather pastoral verse, an oddball prog rock chorus in what I believe to be 9/8 time, an extended cinematic outro and it's all over before you even know it. Its far to short for all those elements to gel together in any meaningful way. Oh well.

It's time to sit on the edge of your seat again, because up next, we get a duo of the most effective album closers this band has pulled off since Space Revolver. “Solitary Shell” gets to be the last short song before the next deep dive, and what a song it is! It's basically a reprise of “The Navigator”, only ten times more majestic. Its connection to that piece and its function on the album are a brilliant way to tie a neat ribbon around the whole album, but more importantly, it's sort of an emotional crutch in which the whole of what has gone before culminates. It's one of those TFK songs that can actually move me to tears. And it neatly sets up the insanity that is to come...

“Devil's Playground” is the album's “other” epic. It's somewhat overshadowed by the behemoth on disc one: a good five minutes shorter (as if that matters) and not played live as often. It's only a slight handicap in this case: “Devil's Playground” is very much of the same outstanding quality as “The Truth” and can be counted just as easily among the band's best songs. The Flower Kings really have made lightning strike twice.

No relation to the terrible Danny Dyer movie.

It is, of course, a very different song. As the title suggests, it's a much darker and more brooding affair. Instead of the clean, lyrical soprano sax that Wallander uses elsewhere, here we are treated to his dirty, screeching tenor, giving it a Crimson vibe. There's metallic riffing, free jazz and funky business. The main chorus meanwhile is just as catchy, if not catchier, than the one on “The Truth”. Straight down the middle, the theme from “The Truth” makes a little cameo, adding to the cohesiveness of the album once more. Goosebumps abound when Daniel Gildenlöw unexpectedly takes over the lead vocal from Roine in the finale, before the mother of all guitar solos brings the album to a rapturous close. Very good indeed.

(Some versions of the album also have an extra bonus track called “Too Late For Tomatoes”, but I'm not going to talk about it because I don't want to. Pretend it isn't there and that the album is perfect.)

Unfold the Future could easily be ranked among The Flower King's very best albums on the strength of its two epics alone, but it is much more than that. It's the perfect blend of tradition and experiment. It's the most diverse album from the band, with many musical styles blended into the instantly recognizable TFK sound. A lot of these experiments work really well. Still, the album has much more coherence than you might expect, and even the lesser moments feel like they should be where they are and don't drag the album down. The abundance of jazz gives the album a completely unique character, but if you can take or leave these parts you are still left with an incredible progressive rock double album. It represents a band at the pinnacle of their career, in their very best line-up, at the top of their game. This album is one of the crowning achievements of a very fruitful career and a must-own for any progressive rock fan.

One question remains: is this my favourite, or is it Space Revolver? Space Revolver is certainly a more cohesive album, while Unfold The Future is wild and unruly. Space Revolver remains personally significant to me in a way no other TFK album can be, but Unfold The Future might have the edge by virtue of sheer quality. However, if you are a newcomer, Space Revolver is definitely the one to check out first. Unfold The Future is the advanced class.

RATING: Five out of five stars. Sometimes, you just have to play it straight.

CHURCH ORGAN COUNT: Subtly (if you can call it that) in “The Truth Will Set You Free”, less subtly in “Monkey Business” and “Devil's Playground”.

BETTER (DOUBLE) 50 MINUTE VERSION:
CD1:
The Truth Will Set You Free
Black And White
Silent Inferno
The Navigator
Vox Humana

CD2:
Genie In A Bottle
Fast Lane
Grand Old World
Rollin' The Dice
Solitary Shell
Devil's Playground

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