Band : P:O:B

Album title : Crossing Over

Label : Fish Farm Records

Distributor : Private

Release date : 04/06/2007 (Norway)

Release : CD

This Norwegian band with the very strange bandname Pedestrians Of Blue (shortened to P:O:B ) operates form out of their own studio in Haugesund, which they dubbed Fish Farm Records . They already recorded and released 2 EPs (actually the early full-length Circles Of Butterfies demo-CD and the 3-track 2005 The Second Monologue EP) which not only got great reviews but also spawned interest from several labels around the world. Still, the band prefered to finish their debut album without signing to anyone, releasing the Crossing Over album on their own label. Having sent out promo copies all over Scandinavia, they decided it was time to promote their music in the rest of Europe, and we were sent the little jem in the last week of August.

Line-up on the album is centered around the lead singing/ keyboard & pipe organ player/ programming Jahannes Stöle , guitar playing & programming Torfin Sirnes , and bass playing Rudolf Fredly , with Daniel Flores playing drums on 9 of the 12 tracks. I'm guessing Harald Havang , who played drums on the other 3 songs, is now currently the band's official drummer. The album has several guest appearances, like an orchestra on album opening track "Father & Son" (which also has Kjetil Lundö playing double bass and Thomas Nilsson playing cello – another guest appearance of the latter on same instrument come on the album closing "Out Of The Rain" ). Although one Paul Hansen is credited for the harmony vocals during "How Much More Than A Dre am" , the other songs have very nice backing vocals as well (and those were probably done by Sirnes and/or Fredly ...although Stöle might just as well have done them himself, of course). Last guest appearance comes from Daniel Palmqvist , playing the second guitar solo during "The Other Side" , and acoustic guitar on "Out Of The Rain" .

In their biography, the band describes their music as having developed a unique style by mixing modern grooves with the sounds of classic bands like Queensrÿche , Black Sabbath , Dre am Theater , and Toto . Sounds weird as a description when you're listening to the music a first time, because what you can hear is actually a slightly magnificent mixture of great Melodic Rock (say AOR) with Progressive Metal, blended in a modern sound. Oh well...that's exactly how they described themselves, isn't it? I mean, it sure sounds about right! The singer may not be remeniscent to any of aforementioned bands' singers, but that only hightens the originality factor of this Norwegian band! Somewhat heavier songs are alternated against more balladesque ones, again adding to the variety of the album. The funny thing is that the heavier songs always have a touch of mellow in 'em due to the vocals, and that the calmer songs still have great heavier guitar in 'em as well! With a track length varying between 3:03 ( "How Much More Than A Dre am" ) and 5:06 (album opening "Father & Son" ), album closer "Out Of The Rain" is somewhat of an outsider with its epic 8:24, but in spite of its "double playing time", the track will keep you interested throughout as much as any of the other songs on the album. The arrangements and musicianship of the members make sure of that! And the Finnvox mastering of the album asures a top quality sound to boot! For a taste of P:O:B music, surf to myspace.com/pedestriansofblue, or to pedestriansofblue.com/music, where you'll find soundclips of several songs.

To conclude this review, I need to stress that some repeated listening sessions are needed to truely get into and appreciate this band's music to the fullest, as it is chuck-full of layered things to analize. You could of course simply drift on the overall melody of things, but I've always found it much more rewarding to unravel a band's music to the bare essentials...and P:O:B sure has added uite a bit of details to their music! I won't go as far as to put this recording in that "Best Albums Of 2007"-list of mine, but it sure comes in a high second-best!

95/100

Tony.