Quidam - Half Plugged (2006)

#Músicaparaelencierro. Y seguimos con los aportes de Horacio Manrique, y entonces continuamos con la discografía de los polacos Quidam, ahora con un disco en bruto repasando su discografía, en reversiones muy a lo Porcupine Tree, con el buen gusto que siempre ha tenido Quidam y cada vez aplicándole más fuerza. Si te gustó lo que estuvimos presentando hasta acá no te podés perder este.

Artista: Quidam

Álbum: Half Plugged
Año: 2006
Género: Neo progresivo
Duración: 63:47
Nacionalidad: Polonia

Éste es un álbum en vivo, pero es sólo una actuación en directo con versiones libres de sus propios temas, con un resultado completamente convincente. Sespués de la anciana de "SurREvival", ahora un viejo que transporta madera (¿vendrá el invierno?) de su bicicleta... un arte que quizás podría causar envidia a la melancolía de Porcupine Tree.

The title of Quidam’s 2005 album SurREvival (55-minutes) is a reference to their own situation. Their great female singer Emila left the band in 2003, followed by their bassist and drummer, leaving their continued existence in doubt. So the remaining three members went out and found a new rhythm section and a great male vocalist who sings in flawless English, reinventing themselves in the process. Now consisting of six men (still with a full-time flutist), SurREvival has little of the style of their first two studio albums. The band seems freer to stretch out their song forms (the tracks tend to be longer). They are now a much more contemporary progressive rock band, sounding more serious, with some elements of Spock’s Beard but much more of a mesmerizing, flowing, moodier sound closer to Porcupine Tree, Peter Gabriel, Riverside, and that whole aesthetic. The band has gone from strength to strength. This 2CD edition comes in a super jewel box + slipcase and adds the Half Plugged CD. Half Plugged (51-minutes) is a semi-acoustic album released separately in 2006 that includes rearranged songs from SurREvival and covers of The Beatles’ Blackbird, The Moody Blues’ Nights in White Satin, Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here, and excerpts from Deep Purple’s Hush. There are also three videos: one rehearsal and two live. Given that there is electric bass and drums, the major change here is that the guitar is acoustic. The more intimate setting and freed-up sonic space means the flute is more prominent, one can really appreciate how good a singer Bartek Kossowicz is, and the quality of the songs themselves shines through. This CD will increase your appreciation of the current Quidam lineup.

Kinesis CD

Creo que es un disco que sería mucho más disfrutable con la voz de Emila al frente, pero ya no estaba en la banda... les dejo esta versión de uno de los clásicos de la banda, aquí, el "Sanktuarium" de Quidam:

It's an excellent half electric album with great flute work!
I have known the band quite a longtime ago through some progressive rock compilation CD as well as my prog friend's CDs. But only recently I paid a closer attention about the music they have made. This Polish band has a good talents in music especially in the vein of neo-progressive rock. The music is heavily influenced by Pallas, IQ, Pendragon and the legendary 70s bands Pink Floyd, Camel and Genesis. The name of the band, as the website quotes, originates from the Latin word quidam meaning someone, some human being and refers to the poem Quidam by Cyprian Kamil Norwid, perhaps the most intriguing of Polish romantic poets. The title hero of that poem is a man looking for his place in life, searching for goodness and truth. From this philosophy, I learn that this band was created to produce music and lyrics with deep meaning in the quest of value in life. What a nice philosophy.
This live concert has been excellently titled as 'Half Unplugged' because it represents the contents in the CD where the performance was not totally unplugged because some electric equipment were used. The opening track 'SurREvival' (6:07) taken from their last studio album before the gig with the same title is a great music. It has an energetic style with powerful basslines and drums as main rhythm section to accompany vocal. The beauty of the song lies on its excellent flute-work and the musical groove produced by the rhythm section. Flute seems like the main ingredient of this gig as the next track 'Queen of Moulin Rouge' (6:42). The third track 'Sanktuarium (Sanctuary)' (5:49) is very emotional and it flows in mellow style with great vocal and flute-work.
The Beatles cover 'Blackbird' (2:06) was performed beautifully with great acoustic guitar work, performed excellently. Pink Floyd's cover of 'Wish you were here' (4:16) is another good performance with excellent acoustic guitar work. 'The fifth season' (9:18) repeats the tradition of nice acoustic setting followed with The Moody Blues' 'Nights in white satin' (5:25). The live set is featured with 'Not so close' (including excerpts from 'Hush') (11:37) and bonus videos on their rehearsal as well as SuREvival and Wish You Were Here.
Overall, I recommend you to have this album as it has an excellent performance of the band in half plugged setting. If you have never heard the band before, this one is still enjoyable as the music is not that complex. Keep on proggin'! Bravo Quidam!

Gatot Widayanto

En el próximo video hay un cover ("No Quarter") de Led Zeppelin intepretado por Quidam y con Emila en la voz, es eléctrico y no está en éste álbum, pero igual me dieron ganas de compartirlo. Yo recién me descargo éste disco y lo escucho por primera vez así que no comentaré más, pero parece de lo más interesante...
Espero que lo disfruten y acuérdense que esto tiene fecha de caducidad y está muy cercana así que no pierdan tiempo y llévenselo sin demora.

Lista de Temas:
1. SurREvival
2. Queen of Moulin Rouge
3. Sanktuarium (Sanctuary)
4. Blackbird
5. Wish you were here
6. The fifth season
7. Nights in white satin
8. Not so close (including excerpts from 'Hush')

Alineación:
- Zbyszek Florek / keyboards, backing vocals
- Maciek Meller / acoustic guitars, backing vocals
- Bartek Kossowicz / vocals, tambourine
- Mariusz Ziotkowski / bass guitar, acoustic guitar
- Maciek Wroblewski / drums, percussion
- Jacek Zasada / flutes, bass guitar