Label: Music Theories Recordings/Mascot Label Group
Release date: September 18, 2020
Album length: 110.48 min
Genre: Progressive Rock
Rating: 9.5/10
And then came December 14, 2019, when Flying Colors – no need to run your eye down the lineup of this prog rock supergroup – played the British capital, at the legendary Sheperd’s Bush Empire. A theater-style venue, with multi-level balconies, boxes, a stalls floor. Packed to the rafters. Down to the last corner. Warmth, connection, the pleasant magic of closeness. The universal magic of music fused with emotional intelligence, the kind that moves the individual and spreads to the whole crowd, in yet another unforgettable, magnificent concert spectacle. Everyone becomes one, and vice versa. One becomes everyone.
Last year Flying Colors put out the album »Third Degree« (RockLine review). With it they took a new artistic step forward and upward. Truth is, it’s hard to talk about any real evolution with Flying Colors. Run your eye over the names in the band and you quickly realize these guys have so much mileage and experience, and on top of that are armed with such razor-sharp technical chops, that they can show countless faces of one and the same story. And that’s exactly what the live album »Third Stage: Live In London« is. A repertoire from three albums, with the emphasis on presenting the current »Third Degree«, which delivered the most consistent and compact record to date. Defined and brilliantly balanced, too.
Of the three lead vocalists, Flying Colors have one who belongs to Casey McPherson. He’s one in a million and gives the band’s sound a special shade that sets Flying Colors apart from any potential resemblance to Transatlantic, Spock’s Beard and Neal Morse Band. Sure, fans of Flying Colors are also fans of the bands listed above, but still. Guitar genius Steve Morse, the cornerstone of the crew who guarantees the Flying Colors story its artistic detours, isn’t entirely alone in the lineup, then. The other two vocalists are Neal Morse, with that distinctive, pleasantly smoky voice that at times turns mildly Lennon-esque, and the eternal wannabe vocal enthusiast who just loves to “sing-song” even though nobody misses it, drumming wizard Mike Portnoy. The two mostly color McPherson’s vocal with backing vocals. Two Dixie Dregs buddies, Steve Morse (Deep Purple) and Dave LaRue, bring plenty of contrasting playfulness. LaRue coaxes remarkable punch out of the bass – contrasting and building the three-dimensional breadth and depth of the sound picture itself. He shows his best especially in tracks like Geronimo and Forever In A Daze, where he flies like mad, brings in a funk contour and weaves in tasteful passages played with slap technique. .
»Third Stage: Live In London« is a fusion of genres, with the album vividly flowing from playful jam interaction to full-on pop rock and musical catchiness. Through it all, the band sparkles as it toys, with no big fuss, with elements of jazz and even blues, motifs that smell of folk, while the focal point also lands several times on jazz-rock fusion.
The band’s followers are no flash in the pan. When Casey deliberately skips one line of the opening verse of Kayla, the crowd »covers« for him without a hitch, taking over the lines themselves. It’s one of the band’s most beloved songs, which, given its excellent structure that belongs right on the radio airwaves, is no surprise at all. Those of you who might be missing, say, the excellent Cadence from the new album, no need to worry. You’ll be drooling over the outstanding jazz-rock fusion delivered by one of the highlights of this release, the live version of Infinite Fire. The concert closes with Mask Machine. The most wound-up song of the entire show. The crowd is on its feet! A fantastic final crescendo. You simply can’t ask for more. Interestingly, the band doesn’t open the show with any of the new songs. Next to Mask Machine, More would have been the handiest pick. Still, opening the show with Blue Ocean is more than justified, since the song is structured so that it lets the musicians ease gradually into the performance. A calm opening calibration of the sonic characteristics and a gradual build-up of atmosphere.
»Third Stage: Live In London« is a flawless live album. Considering how little Flying Colors actually play together on stage, the superb tightness and execution of the material is all the more fascinating. Why do they play together so little? Because they simply don’t have time. The individual members of the quintet are tied up in a pile of other musical projects. Case in point: Steve Morse showed up with Deep Purple in Klagenfurt barely two weeks earlier (concert review). The answer is simple. The members of the quintet are just so damn good as musicians that they can find a common language and stage magic in an instant. A brilliant release. In every respect. The excellent shots within the film footage suck you right into the venue. As if the band were right there with you. In the palm of your hand. As I said. They’ve seen and tasted too much for anything to go wrong. If you don’t happen to know the band and you’re the kind of listener who isn’t satisfied by three-chord minimalism sitting on a simple ‘thump-thump’ beat, and you don’t own any of the band’s three albums, then this live album is an excellent guide into the Flying Colors story. And fans of this kind of progressive rock? They’ve been keeping this album safely in their private collections since mid-September.
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Track list:
1. Blue Ocean
2. A Place In Your World
3. The Loss Inside
4. More
5. Kayla
7. Geronimo
8. You Are Not Alone
9. Forever In A Daze
10. Love Letter
11. Peaceful Harbor
12. Crawl
13. Infinite Fire
14. Cosmic Symphony
15. The Storm
16. Mask Machine
Line-up:
Casey McPherson – vocals, guitar
Neal Morse – keyboards, vocals
Steve Morse – guitar
Dave LaRue – bass guitar
Mike Portnoy – drums, percussion, vocals
