Arena - Contagion (UK release 2003)
Arena - Contagion (UK release 2003)
You know how it is. Something that, previously, hadn't quite gelled suddenly clicks - hits you "like a two ton heavy thing" as Queensryche once remarked - and you spend the next week thinking it's the best thing you've heard in your entire life. Arena's most recent studio album Contagion is just such a beast - a fine work, but ultimately one that didn't connect with me in the same was that it's predecessor Immortal? or the live Breakfast In Biarritz did. Or at least it didn't until the small hours of last Sunday morning, when I must have dislodged a chunk of earwax and all of a sudden the world made sense.
It's got soaring guitar. It's got walls of swirling keyboards. It's got lots of other bits, too - in fact it's got all the ingredients of a classic album. There isn't a less than excellent track on it, but if I had to pick out a couple that are currently holding my attention, I'd go for "Witch Hunt" (rapidly attaining anthem status, chez Jones) and the gorgeous "Spectre At The Feast". If the latter doesn't give you goose-pimples then you need a new Hi-Fi. Or possibly a completely new head.
The prog-dog's danglies :-)