Porcelain Moon - As It Were, Here and There

Finnish up-and-coming prog rockers Porcelain Moon, have something mysterious up their sleeves with their debut album. It has a combination of the 1970s rock feel of the golden-era almost a combination of Earth & Fire meets early Floyd meets Cristina Scabbi of Lacuna Coil and their album, As It Were Here and There, is one their finest achievements to open the door to give the retrospective rock sounds a mellowing yet haunting sound that you could have imagined it was recorded back in 1971 as if it was unreleased and then taken out of the shelves to finally given the treatment it deserves.

Having seven musicians in the band, seems unlikely, including a female vocalist whose voice sounds like Jereny Kaagman and a little bit of Annie Haslam meets Sonja Kristina on top of whipping cream while featuring a dooming organ sound that is in the realms of Black Widow and Blood Ceremony to name a few, is quite a soaring yet unbelievable album that carries the tightrope tight and hoping they don’t fall down towards their doom. The sound almost has this Middle-Eastern rock touch in this sci-fi affair to where the band would take the music into another direction as if they were recording for a film score for Alejandro Jodorowsky’s The Holy Mountain.

Sometimes retro rock bands want to stay true to the original 1970s rock sound and don’t mess and flunk it around, and they get it right or don’t, with Porcelain Moon, they got pitch-perfect and they have finally got the touch going like finding a rare diamond in the rough. Interestingly, the Prog-Doom-Organ Rock sound is the real magic including the mellowing moog turned nightmarish beauty on Caught in a Dream while the homage to the Doors sole self-titled debut on Parts, is twisted but a rumbling rocking dance that is touching.

Meanwhile they go into the thunderous powerhouse with the opener Lost in Haze and the crisp angelic Rainbow with a folk rock twist, is quite mind-blowing. The homage to Czar’s Beyond the Moon combined with a soft-spoken word about going out gone wrong a-la Horror mode style in a ballad vocalizing mode on Someone and Love as the sinister futuristic twist of Lard Free on Markens Grode featuring a haunting Rhodes and organ solo that sends chills down your spine.

The hard rock homage to Uriah Heep’s Look at Yourself-era comes in full swinging on Vinden as they sing in their own language. The Guitar uses a fierce rhythm and solo section as the organ uses some fierce crunches in their own mix in a combination of Thijs Van Leer, Manfred Wieczorke of Eloy, and Jon Lord as it goes into a jazzy waltz that has a Thelonious Monk psych feel to close the album out. Quite mind-boggling that when a new band comes out to make something explosive is beyond the beyond, but this band have got a long way to go and this could be a huge start for them.