Artist/ Band: Half Past Four
Title: Rabbit In The Vestibule
Label: Self release
Year of Release: 2008
Offical Artist/ Band Link

The Review:

Half Past Four hailing from Toronto, Canada and brings a fresh sound via musical experimentation and it draws its inspiration from band like King Crimson, Rush, Jethro Tull, Kate Bush even Frank Zappa as well as newer bands like Emily Bezar, Bubblemath, Changing Modes, Fluttr Effect and many others. The band began in 1999 when Dmitry Lesov (bass) and Constantin Necrasov (guitar) joined together with a common bond to create new music without boundaries. The band went through some line-up changes (what band doesn’t?!) with current members Kyree Vibrant (vocals), Igor Kurtzman (keyboards) and drummers Art Pisanski (studio) and Ann Brody (current) joining Dmitry and Constantin to flesh out the sound.

They released their first full album in 2008 (just before Halloween) called "Rabbit in the Vestibule", which has Kyree, Dmitry, Constantin and Igor listed as producers. The style is hard to describe since there’s really no restrictions or boundaries on the direction. This allows the band to explore, sometimes within the same song. In fact, each song goes through many changes from melodic to complex and back. Never the same combinations. It’s almost as if the band, while having influences, set them aside and created 13 tracks that make up the album.

My favorite tracks are opener “Missing Sevenths”. “Strangest Dream”, “Biel” and closer “Rabbit”. I always come back to these songs every time I want to be taken on a surrealistic journey with Half Past Four. I would strongly recommend the listener to set aside the 63 minutes without distractions, preferably with headphones to experience the magic.

Half Past Four and it’s debut, Rabbit In The Vestibule, shows that modern progressive rock bands can still be inventive and not pigeon-holed in any of prog’s sub-genres. This is by far one of the better releases from 2008, that truly needs more exposure outside their native land.

Reviewed by Ron Fuchs on April 30th, 2009

Tracks:

01. Missing Sevenths
02. Johnny
03. Poisoned Tune
04. Southern Boogie
05. Twelve Little Words
06. Underwater
07. Lullaby
08. Strangest Dream
09. Biel
10. Dwayne
11. Salome
12. Bamboo
13. Rabbit

Reviewed Discography

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