The Flower Kings Discography: Desolation Rose (2013)

[hefdaddy42]

Just finished up Sum of No Evil.  I get why some people wouldn't hold it in as high esteem as some of the earlier albums, but I found it to be very enjoyable.   

[hefdaddy42]

And it's been a productive morning, as I have just finished listening to Banks of Eden.  Very, very good stuff, a true return to form for the band!

[KevShmev]

Good job, hef.

I should have the write-up for the most recent album up sometime today.

[KevShmev]

Desolation Rose (2013)



Tomas Bodin - keyboards
Hasse Fröberg - vocals, guitars
Felix Lehrmann - drums
Jonas Reingold - bass guitar
Roine Stolt - vocals, guitars

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1.   "Tower One"
2.   "Sleeping Bones"
3.   "Desolation Road"
4.   "White Tuxedos"
5.   "The Resurrected Judas"
6.   "Silent Masses"
7.   "Last Carnivore"
8.   "Dark Fascist Skies"
9.   "Blood Of Eden"
10.   "Silent Graveyards"

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We now move to the band's 12 studio album, Desolation Rose, which is also their most recent album.  I am still trying to wrap my head around what I really think of this record.  On the one hand, it is another relatively short album, by their standards, sitting at right around an hour, and is easy to get through because it flows so well.  On the other hand, it lacks anything I would call truly awesome, and even the songs I think are the best - Tower One and The Resurrected Judas - both have some sections I think are less than great and make me think, "Dang, if this part were better, this could have been an all-time great TFK classic!"  However, both songs are still pretty great for the most part, even if there is a part of me that thinks, "This could have been even better," about both.

To touch on Froberg vocals, which I've admittedly been overly critical of at times, I've always found it amazing that on some albums, I love most of his vocals, and then on others, I find them a bit mediocre, almost to the point of annoying.  Sadly, on Desolation Rose, it seems to tilt more towards the latter.  I remember the first time I heard Desolation Road, and I was so happy to get a piano-driven TFK song again, and then he started singing and I was like, "Oh, crap."  It doesn't help that his voice sounds kind of hoarse more often than not on this record.  Not sure if that was by design, or if he is simply losing some of his voice as he gets older.  Silent Masses is another good example, as I love the verses, but merely kind of like the chorus, where Froberg really sounds hoarse.

Aside from all of that, this is a record that is quite good.  I love the creepy vibe of Sleeping Bones, all of that organ stuff at the end of Desolation Road is killer, that middle section of Tower One is crazy good ("I might have turned away from wonder..."), I love the acoustic work in Resurrected Judas as well as that killer instrumental section in the middle of the song, White Tuxedos sees the band effectively visiting some dark moods and lyrics once again, and the bonus CD is chock full of killer instrumentals, many of which sound like they would fitted in perfectly on some of the early TFK records.  There is a lot to love about this record.  It's just missing that extra spark or two that would tip the scales to make it great, IMO, but hey, it's their 12th studio album, released in their 19th year, and I suspect it is far better that most bands' 12th album or whatever albums they released in their 19th year.

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EPILOGUE

I have to say, this was a lot of fun, as it gave me the chance to run through the band's discography on my own again, and I was pleased to see that not only were some new fans gotten, but some who had gone a while without listening to them kind of jumped back on the TFK train and rediscovered some or all of the albums. That alone made this worth while.

Here's to more Flower Kings music in the future!!

[The Letter M]

As I have done with most other TFK albums, I went ahead and mixed in the bonus tracks for this album as well, and the final running order I now listen to is pretty fantastic. I've included all the tracks, and kept most of the original album's tracks in their original order, just with the bonus tracks in between.

Tower ONE
Burning Spears
Lazy Monkey
The Wailing Wall

Dark Fascist Skies
Psalm 2013
Sleeping Bones
Desolation Road
White Tuxedos

Resurrected Judas
Silent Masses
Last Carnivore
Badbeats

Runaway  Train
Interstellar Visitation
Blood Of Eden
Silent Graveyards
The Final ERA

I always felt like "The Final ERA" was the perfect way to end the album (also reflecting the capitalized three-letter word in "Tower ONE"), and it fit well with a crossfade after "Silent Graveyards" with the snare drum roll near the end of the track as the final instrumental comes in triumphantly! In the order, "White Tuxedos" and "Dark Fascist Skies" are switched, but as part of "Side 2", they bookend each other well considering in this order, the guitar solo in "White Tuxedos" is now a nod back to "Dark Fascist Skies". "Psalm 2013" also reprises "Burning Spears", which works well right after the ending of "Tower ONE" especially since it's title is taken from the lyrics of the opening epic. After all of that, everything else just sort of fell in to place and each side is about 20-24 minutes long, with each disc at about 45 minutes long. It's a great mix and I get to enjoy ALL 18 tracks of the album in an order that sounds more akin to classic TFK albums like SWA or UTF, with reprisals and recurring themes/motifs, as well as sprinkled instrumentals.

This album sunk in deeper for me a lot sooner than its predecessor, but I think having gotten used to their sound with a new drummer, I was more willing and able to dissect this album than BOE. I guess this sort of mirrors what had happened with PH/TSONE for me. I liked the former but it didn't really click for awhile, but the latter was an instant love! I hope that TFK's next album is another instant gem for me, and I eagerly await their work!

In the mean time, we know that Karmakanic (and The Tangent as well) have new albums in the pipeline, so I'm all excited for those albums coming in the next year or so.

-Marc.

[KevShmev]

See, I don't feel the need to make a very good, well-flowing single album even longer.  As excellent as the bonus tracks are, they are better listened to on their own, rather than in the context of the album. 

Anyway, following all of this TFK listening, my updated ranking of the albums looks like this:

1. Paradox Hotel
2. Flower Power
3. Retropolis
4. Stardust We Are
5. Space Revolver
6. Back in the World of Adventures
7. Banks of Eden
8. Unfold the Future
9. Adam & Eve
10. Desolation Rose
11. The Rainmaker
12. The Sum of No Evil

I don't think it is a coincidence that my lowest ranked albums (the last four) are the ones with probably the least amount of Roine vocals, percentage wise.

[KevShmev]

Oh, and for fun, I took a crack at listing my 20 favorite songs that are 10 minutes or more, and favorites under 10 minutes.

Favorites over 10 minutes

1. Garden of Dreams
2. I Am the Sun
3. Stardust We Are
4. End on a High Note
5. World of Adventures
6. Devil's Playground
7. Big Puzzle
8. Monsters and Men
9. Silent Inferno
10. There Is More to This World
11. Numbers
12. Circus Brimstone
13. Monster Within
14. Love Supreme
15. Minor Giant Steps
16. Retropolis
17. Deaf, Numb and Blind
18. Tower ONE
19. Driver's Seat
20. The Truth Will Set You Free

Favorites under 10 minutes
1. Blue Planet
2. What If God Is Alone?
3. Silent Sorrow
4. Self-Consuming Fire
5. The Road Back Home
6. Psycedelic Postcard
7. Ghost of the Red Cloud
8. The Man Who Walked with Kings
9. Stupid Girl
10. Different People
11. Lucy Had a Dream
12. Jealousy
13.The Judas Kiss
14. The Merry Go-Round
15. Pioneers of Aviation
16. Rhythm of the Sea
17. A King's Prayer
18. Life Will Kill You
19. Solitary Shell
20. The End of Innocence

[KevShmev]

No one else has opinions on the newest album??

[Nihil-Morari]

Trying to find a moment to properly listen to it, and write something about it. May take a few days. Love the album though. At the moment it's tied with Space Revolver for best single album.

[hefdaddy42]

I will listen through it again in the next couple of days.

[BRGM]

Desolation Rose was actually my first experience with The Flower Kings. I enjoy most of the songs on this album but especially the three-track run of Sleeping Bones, Desolation Road and White Tuxedos. Last Carnivore and Dark Fascist Skies are also really neat, love the chorus of the latter. Overall a nice album that caught my attention and made me wanna explore their catalogue.

[kirksnosehair]

I'm gonna have to agree, Kev, that Hasse sound pretty tired on this latest album.  He almost sounds like he recorded the vocals while he was suffering from a cold or something like that.


It's a pretty good album, but I think it will probably end up somewhere in the bottom 1/3 of my rankings.

[hefdaddy42]

OK, just finished Desolation Rose.  All in all, very good album, but actually, probably my least favorite of the whole bunch.  Highlights for me include Tower One, The Resurrected Judas, and The Silent Masses.

[KevShmev]

One last bump to see if anyone has any more comments or insight on anything Flower Kings-related.

[jingle.boy]

Still have to listen to DR... and now that there are three more discog threads running, my music listening is being over-run by DTF!!!  DR later today.

[LudwigVan]

Early impressions are that Desolation Rose is better than Banks of Eden. I assume that the name is a play on Bob Dylan's song Desolation Row.

[jingle.boy]

I think I'm with Ludwig.  Tower ONE was awesome.  A couple of the middle tracks were forgettable, but this left more of an impression on me than BoE.  Not sure if it'll be purchase-worthy.  Think I'll have a go with each one more time, and grab on of them as my fourth purchase from them.

Well, that's a wrap.

[KevShmev]

Hey, that's my job to say that!

[RoeDent]

I can't find the normal Flower Kings thread, so this will have to go here:

Apparently there are two films on the bonus disc of The Sum of No Evil. How on earth are you supposed to get to them? I've tried both my DVD player and computer CD-Rom drive(s), and both just take me to the three audio tracks.

[KevShmev]

I don't remember anything about those, and I even have the bonus CD version of that record, but that is not a CD that made the cut for me to have on display in my smaller CD rack now, so I'd have to dig it out of the many boxes I have of physical CDs, and that won't be happening, so perhaps someone else knows...

[The Letter M]

I can't find the normal Flower Kings thread, so this will have to go here:

Apparently there are two films on the bonus disc of The Sum of No Evil. How on earth are you supposed to get to them? I've tried both my DVD player and computer CD-Rom drive(s), and both just take me to the three audio tracks.

If you use Windows, did you try opening the disc/disc-drive with the CD in it through Windows Explorer? That way you can actually view the files on the disc? You should be able to open the video files from there.

-Marc.

[RoeDent]

I'll have to try it tomorrow now, but still, it shouldn't be this hard to get to them.