1996 - "No to Be Or Not to Be"
Tracklist:
Innocent Victim 13-06 (Koopman)
Sewers 7-59 (Heijboer, Koopman)
The Artist 10-40 (Huigen)
Ragnarok 24-54 (Koopman)
Moon 3:25* (Heijboer)
(*This piece's playing time is exactly 3:25, but not 4:30 according to the CD
booklet.)
A real present-day masterpiece of Classic Progressive Rock. You'll find it in
the "Musea" catalogue.
Don't save cash on this album: buy it and enjoy! "Not to Be Or Not to
Be" is even more interesting and
complex a work than their debut, with some raw, very original intricate music
from start to finish.
Although your CD display shows 73 minutes of album's total time, in reality it
clocks in at 61st minutes.
So there's no need to hear silence for the next 10 minutes just in order to
listen to some random sounds
that the guys elicit from their instruments, i.e. to hear what they probably do
between the parts of their
rehearsals by the end of the CD. But, as I said, a whole hour here is complete
with wonderfully
interesting music. Need I really add anything more to my own honest opinion (in
other words, to the
opinion of more than just quite an experienced Prog-lover) on "Not to Be Or
Not to Be" a few lines
above? I'd only say that although anything featured this album are high-quality
stuff (including even
a short instrumental "Moon"; let alone a real Prog-killer Sewers), the
only "side-long" composition here
(Ragnarok), as in case with the previous album, is a special treat anyway. For
both cases here comes
special thanks to the compositional talents of bassist Koopman.
1998 - "Mirror Site"
Tracklist:
Rainforest 7-16 (Heijboer)
The Final Frontier 4-57 (Huigen)
MirrorSite - I 11-35 (Koopman)
MirrorSite - II 9-51 (Heijboer)
MirrorSite - III 5-23 (Koopman)
Sunday Afternoon 4-27 (Koopman)
Truce 4-43 (Huigen)
The Undiscovered Country 8-54 (Koopman, Huigen)
Just now I understand why lots of Prog reviewers consider Cliffhanger the Neo
band. Only the three
songs (two of them are the longest ones), and one of instrumentals (also the
longest one) on this album
can remind you of that really tight and strong joint playing the compositions
throughout which you
used to hear on the first two albums. Particularly, these tracks are 3-4-5 &
7. This is actually the titletrack
itself - the Mirror Site "suite" in three parts (two being composed by
Koopman again, taken together,
sound as an LP's side-long piece) and Truce. Back to the album's centerpiece, if
I were the producer of
this album I'd replace Mirror Site's second part with the third and, of course,
rename both the parts
accordingly. Then there wouldn't be such an unbalanced situation on the album
when two instrumentals
run one after another. All the rest songs, being on the whole arguably quite
corresponding to the firm
Cliffhanger sound, actually were created in such a simple way I didn't even
expect from these guys.
The majority of vocal parts here are as simple as by no means
long-as-it-was-before arrangements.
Though all vocal and instrumental parts on the whole are nice at least from the
point of view of
a Neo-lover, there's not too few of guitar and keyboards solos that sound
especially primitive. While the
6th instrumental track is arguably good concerning Neo, I am especially
disappointed with the last
instrumental, especially since it's going right after one the best and the only
interesting 'separate' songs
here. Thus, from the point of view of an experienced Prog-lover "The Mirror
Site" represents not just
creative stagnation, but a very unexpected fall right into one of the lowest
category of Prog called Neo.
But, fallen into the Neo sub-genre, Cliffhanger with "The Mirror Site"
has become one of the Top-20
bands there. It seems the band members, however, understood that with this album
they've lost their
esteem at least in the face of 'classic' Prog-heads, so they disbanded shortly
after that album was
released.
2001 - "Circle"
Tracklist:
Limits 4-37 (Huigen)
Autumn 7-22 (Koopman)
November 2-56 (Heijboer)
Port-Voyage of the Soul 7-09 (Heijboer)
Gigolo 6-47 (Koopman)
Moving In Circles 5-21 (Huigen)
The Birthday Party 6-09 (Heijboer)
One-track Mind 6:40 (Huigen)
Chateau Jam 8-38 (Cliffhanger)
Cliffhanger was in the status of "disbanded" during a surprisingly
short period of time - just about
a year. For all I remember, these guys reunited already in the first half of
1999 and shortly after that
event they announced the next Cliffhanger album saying of it that, being crafted
in the vein of their
debut album, it will be as strong as "Cold Steel". While I really
consider the "Cold Steel" album
almost a masterpiece, I still pick the second Cliffhanger album as their best in
all senses. I think,
the band members have been in a hurry to announce the following album as a
proper part of their
cliff-hanger-discography, as while this new one is slightly better than their
more than three years
standing previous album, both the first Cliffhanger albums surpass
"Circle" in many respects.
This time all the good-to-excellent tracks are concentrated in the middle of the
album. More precisely,
these are tracks 4 to 8 and at least three of them were composed and performed
in Cliffhanger's best
traditions. The weakest of these best (huh!) compositions is an instrumental
one. Actually this is an
excellent, totally keyboard-driven piece with cascades of variegated
arrangements, speedy solos and
tasteful passages - all done masterly to the accompaniment of a diverse and
powerful, always tight
rhythm-section. The major imperfection here is more than just the lack of
guitar. The track sounds as if
Cliffhanger are just a (wonderful keyboard) trio, but not a quartet. Now it's
time to talk about the album's
real weak points (i.e. compositions). First of all I am very disappointed by the
leading track, on which
Reine's singing is as simple as his own semi-acoustic rhythm guitar chords, to
the accompaniment of
which he mostly sings here, as the instrumental 'help' from the direction of his
bandmates is too inert to
improve it (is this a potential hit since the most accessible song with quite an
obtrusive refrains opens
the album?). The second song is, maybe, a bit better, though both of them were
created the way
Cliffhanger never did before. The third track is a very simple instrumental, and
the closing ninth track,
which is also instrumental, has a few more or less interesting episodes. (Hey,
Gijs, where have you lost
your wonderful "side-long", epic, thoughtful and complex
compositions?) Please note: there are too
many unvocal tracks on the two last Cliffhanger albums and each of them contain
just one really decent
instrumental, whereas all others were as if played to reach the usual time
standards. Again, as if
following "The Mirror Site" album's scheme of contents, almost a half
of materials featured in "Circle"
is nothing if not examples of Neo. Thus, presently the name of the band doesn't
correspondent to the
'classic' sense of a cliff-hanger. Though, bearing in mind that the so called
soap operas are the same
cliff-hangers for lots of Earthly people, too, then Cliffhanger can be the
cliff-hanger at least within
Neo Progressive. But if the guys were brave enough to release a version of
"Circle" that would be
shorter than their traditional "56 to 60 min" (about 45 min without at
least the three first tracks that
are the weakest), then we could seriously talk on the theme "Cliffhanger
are back to their roots" and
give an excellent rating to "Circle". As for this album as it is,
looking back at "Mirror Site" I would
name it "The Fool Circle".
