| ......................................THE BAND AND RECORD OF THE MONTH |
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| . | MARCH 2009 |
| Comments:
Vangough is a young group with an incredible amount of energy, full of diverse styles such as, Melodic Metal, Neo-Progressive, Progressive Rock and Progressive Metal with many musical references, a quartet that plays a modern and actual kind of Progressive Rock, with amazing musicians fully engaged in the creation from their own musical style. Vangough has a big heavenly orchestral music, with symphonic keyboards, dominated by distorted guitars in the most of arrangements, some times the guitars have a symphonic sound, including thunderous drums, with high range of tones on vocals, amazing arrangements divided among heavy and melodic at the same time, with a lot of sentiment, a band of incredible depth and strength that certainly will delight all prog listeners worldwide. Their musical style, sometimes, remind of the highlights of "IQ", "Marillion", "Pain of Salvation", "Yes", "Dream Theater", "Pink Floyd", "Epica" and "Fates Warning". "Manikin Parade" is an excellent concept album, contains 75 minutes of amazing musical creation, starting with the track "Estranger" following the line of the Neo Prog with heavy drums, "Manikin Parade", "Christmas Scars" and "Disorder Quotient" in the field of the Melodic Metal style, although very Progressive and especially with the work on the guitars and drums, "Handful Of Dreams" and "Bricolage Theater" are symphonic and melodic. But, the best songs on the album are "Paradise For The Lost (The Twilight Part I: Deception)", "Gabrielle (The Twilight Part II: Love)", "Dance Of The Summer Mind", "One Dark Birthday", "Etude Of Sorrow (The Twilight Part III: Oblivion)", "Halcyon Days" and "The Cosmic Bus Stop" all them are vibrant songs, full of symphonism in all moments. Brilliant, fantastic, and amazing work, highly recommendable... The
present line-up of the Vangough are:
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VANGOUGH
Originally from Oklahoma, USA, formed around Clay's solo debut Dissonance Rising (2007), the band came into contact with each other through mutual friends. Clay first discovered drummer Brandon Lopez working in the Oklahoma City Guitar Center where the two immediately hit it off and agreed to start on a new project. Within a few months the entire line-up was formed, which now includes Abe Hartley on keys.
Their showcase performances at Dfest 2008 and Play: stl 2008 solidified the band as a unique combination of musical theater and classic prog rock. Mainly influenced by video game music and the odd European metal band, Vangough wears their influences on their sleeves when they perform. This tends to manifest itself in the form of video game cover tunes like Wily's Castle from Mega Man or Corneria from Star Fox. Vangough combines the heavy guitar-driven rock of 90s progressive metal bands like "Dream Theater" with the vintage synthesizer sound that hearkens back to "Yes", "Genesis" and "Styx". If all of those bands fell into a blender, it would sound something like Vangough-Gilmour-esque guitar solos, silky smooth Gildenlow-vocals, soaring keyboard melodies and tight double-bass drumming reminiscent of Portnoy.
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New
Release
"Manikin Parade" 01)
Estranger
"Manikin Parade" was produced and engineered by Clay Withrow. Mixed by Sterling Winfield at Nomad Studio and mastered by Garrett Haines at Treelady Studios. Visit Vangough
at
To get in contact or, If you would like any other information, please visit Vangough's friend via their Myspace site. |
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For
more information and every thing about the band, please visit VANGOUGH
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Clay
Withrow - Guitar/Vocals - Originally formed Vangough with Jason
May back in 2005 under the name "
Chancellor
Ruster - Bass - Joined the band in 2007 after Clay parted ways
with bassist Will Davis. Having heard a track from Clay's upcoming album,
Chancellor jumped at the chance to be a part of this massive undertaking.
He perfectly blends his precise and aggressive bass lines with Clay's more
bluesy guitar licks.
Abe
Hartley - Keyboards - Joined the band in January of 2008. Having
briefly played together in 2005, Abe was a perfect fit for Vangough, combining
his masterful composition talents with the eclectic style of Clay's guitar
playing.
Brandon
Lopez - Drums - Stepped in last year to help track drums on Manikin
Parade. Since then he has been sitting in with the band from show-to-show.
