Within Temptation - The Silent Force

Although we are already in the year 2010, only now does the Queens of Symphonic Metal band, Within Temptation are really getting a lot of attention. And since their third album, The Silent Force, which was released in 2004, often the Celtic Orchestral Rock album or a sequel to their classic album, Mother Earth, they are never selling out to any mainstream bullshit crap, it has to be the music rather than big gigantic money. And while the artwork looks very spacey, the music is very charismatic.
So Within Temptation steps up to the balcony and hits the pitch with a homerun and heirs to the Kate Bush meets Metallica meets Rush throne. Is Within Temptation really going to run the gamut of Symphonic Metal? For the fans myself included, we’ll see. It does, however gives us a chance to approve on how the Dutch band have reached so far. Since forming in 1996, the train of Within Temptation has never stopped. But as Enter and Mother Earth – whether the fans considers them a masterpiece – there’s always a surprise in what The Silent Force which may have been intended for a Horror Love Story inspired by Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
The dramatic haunting ballad hit single, Stand My Ground, could have been a TV theme song for the Controversial Anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion and Hellsing while Jillian (I’d Give My Heart) sounds like it was recorded in a Gothic Cathedral with the operatic choir to give it that real killing introduction as Sharon Den Adel brings the house down with her vocals as the band are following her as a leader to give it that explosive roar on their instruments. Adel gets very emotional on the lukewarm calmness of the Celtic Folk sound of Pale and the eerie darkness Fantasy-inspired Forsaken with the lyrics dealing with searching for new land. See Who I Am is an juggernaut rumbling introduction and Ambient Classical Metal sound done by guitarists Robert Westerholt and Ruud Jolie while drummer Stephen Van Haestregt is pounding madly on the drums as if it was very Militant ala Mad Scientist style.
Angels and Memories are the best numbers, at most times it is very much bringing the mind of a Symphonic Rock sounding as if Uriah Heep teamed up with Renaissance to do these numbers today in the 21st century and at others, the Death Magnetic-era of Metallica as if they had brought Adel to do some backing vocals on the album. The sinister heartfelt of betrayal Aquarius, is about the woman’s life of her love of the man he felt is very dangerous and the tension is at it’s boiling point between the two of them and then all of a sudden, the Woman commits suicide. Everything builds up to the final last tracks to the charismatic rocker, It’s The Fear, a truly combination of orchestral compositions and the duo guitarist battling it out in the ring as if they were an answer to Maiden’s Adrian Smith, Dave Murray, and Janick Gers. Somewhere is again a calm after the storm about a loss one disappeared, but still in the woman’s heart as Adel sings ‘I’ll find you somewhere/I’ll keep on trying until my dying day/I just need to know whatever has happened.’ Think a Rock Opera version of Titanic. The Silent Force, love it or hate it, it is Within Temptation’s finest album of the noughties.

Delain - April Rain

Symphonic Metal may have been the cream of the crop with; Nightwish, Within Temptation, and After Forever since it’s beginnings in the ‘90s but for this upcoming band who formed in 2002 in their hometown of the Netherlands, Delain who are carrying the torch of classical metal, will have full high voltage in dynamic supreme.
April Rain is the 21st century of the band’s full hard rock fantasy charms; Charlotte Wessels angelic vocals, Sander Zoer’s drums are pounding like a machine gun that won’t stop, Martijn Weterholt’s keyboard adds the tension throughout each track, Ronald Landa’s guitar work is electrifying while bassist Rob Van Der Loo is bringing Delain’s music to a glorified skill that veers between a masterpiece and retro on your asses. If Symphonic Metal is growing stronger than ever of the Progressive Death Metal sound with Opeth, then April Rain is the kid brother/sister of Symphonic Power Death Metal: It’s the band at their best with orchestral, piano-crisp, Celtic, and yes, operatic from Charlotte’s voice. Not that she’s trying to rip off former singer of Nightwish, Tarja, but to pay tribute to the queen of metal and Sharon Den Adel of WT, here you get the full treatment of a Metallic sonic-sounding force.
It kicks off with the big explosive titled track that will blow you away, but it has sort of the early power rock sound of the ‘90s (imagine if you will that Charlotte is singing this in a Gothic Cathedral with the line; ‘How does it feel when all you’re counting on is scatterbrain/Every wind that you have sailed upon a hurricane/every summer you have seen was filled with April Rain/It doesn’t get easy don’t you know’ she is really spot on with the nervous breakdown boundaries of the song) Then everything becomes very strong with the duet between Marco Hietala who is sort of the Netherland’s answer to Bruce Dickinson with the Iron Maiden-esque, Control The Storm. But what the hell, I really enjoy the track.
An homage to Opeth and the Death Metal scene gets some recognition with the pseudo-viola haunting beauty of Virtue and Vice, has the album back on it’s knees before we go into the speed metal bat out of hell race track with Go Away as it dives back into the ocean of the Soft side of Delain’s background. Start Swimming is very Alternative Celtic Folk, a 4-minute calmness that sounds like something Steve Harris’ daughter, Lauren Harris would’ve have created a beauty with this if she had toured with them rather than being at a gigantic stadium opening for his father. Again with the pounding beats, Lost references running away from a loved one who has a dark secret to reveal your secret side; I’ll Reach You which sounds like Magenta’s Christina Booth meets the metallic version of the Fish-era of Marillion’s Misplaced Childhood being a perfect match made in Heaven.
Closing track, Nothing Left, is very power pop again with the duet between Charlotte Wessels and Marco Hietala as if they were trying to go for the Judas Priest softer side sound along with Maiden’s dynamic power metal technique.April Rain is the most underrated album Delain ever made. It’s interesting and perfectly heart-stopping majestic.

Second Hand - Death May Be Your Santa Claus

“Understand, Love If You Can/It May Be Your Santa Claus” Ah, yes, the political lyrics of the late ‘60s band whose music was completely ahead of their time and expect to either be scared shitless or be taken away by the lyrics that make it very strange poetic beauty that seemed to be perfect to win the Pulitzer Prize award for best writing of 1971.
The second and final album from the late ‘60s/early ‘70s, which was originally recorded for a soundtrack to an independent short film which appeared at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 1969, but suddenly disappeared. However, this band who formed in the late ‘60s in the South of London at the time influenced by Creation, The Who, and the Small Faces, Second Hand’s Death May Be Your Santa Claus is a lost classic prog/psych collection from a band whose musicianship still sounds weird, bizarre, and most of the time interesting to listen to. Today, it still sounds outstanding around the time the album was ahead of its time in 1971.
From the kind of Psychedelic rock sound, you’d be hearing with the whirling keyboard introduction opener of the first part of the title track, through the magnetic mellotron fantasy of Hangin’ On an Eyelid while they go through a Fugue of the 7-minute track, Lucifer and the Egg, to the Krautrock orientation of Can meets The Soft Machine meets Osibisa fuzz tone boogie of African Tribal drumming section of Somethin’ You Got, they go for the haunting dooming prog sound for a mourning of a best friend with the eerie 6-minute avant-garde epic, classical treatment of Cyclops. Death May Be Your Santa Claus may not be for the fainted heart, sure it may sound a little disorientated, but the more adventures and styles the band may find very fond of to hear this from start to finish. The CD which was reissued by the people at Sunbeam Records, features liner notes by Richard Morton Jack and interviews with Ken Elliot, Vic Keary about the making of their swansong masterpiece before becoming the Sci-Fi band, Seventh Wave.
Throughout the 9 tracks including the monk-disturbance of Sic Transit Gloria Mundi with the Moog going apeshit and then with an explosion that is very post-apocalyptic as it segues into the bible of Revelations Ch. 16 vs. 9-21 with it’s haywire sound of the keyboards going crazy of the overtones of The Faust Tapes and the Beatles avant-garde trip of Revolution 9 then becoming a dooming glorified beauty that is very ear-bleeding while Take To The Skies becomes an electronic rollercoaster ride with its synthesizers and mellotron’s carrying the flag of the early heyday of Tangerine Dream’s pre-Phaedra sound. While the last track is the second part of the reprising title track with a slow beat and then carrying the space signal or the heavens to give a calming reaction and then a sinister wake-up call, the three bonus tracks are the beginning of the end for Second Hand. Funeral is very much an homage to The Who as if they were a classical rock band while Dip It Out of the Bog Fred is ragtime western avant-garde madness as for Baby RU Anudder Monster? Let’s say their having a quirky sense of humor of the ‘50s rock sound ala Captain Beefheart-style. This band were way ahead of their time, they deserve a second chance with a helping hand.

Heart of Cygnus - Tales From Outer Space

Centered around their love of Flash Gordon, Sci-Fi comic books, the original Star Wars trilogy and admiring the love of Rush, early Queen, and Iron Maiden, Heart of Cygnus have acclaimed in the underground metal community and myself included praised this band to be the progressive metal band to come out of the Los Angeles area as a the bands I’ve mentioned in the introduction. In fact, their first album Utopia is defintely their dramatic masterpiece. However the most important part, Heart of Cygnus which is named after a line on the track of Rush’s classic epic Cygnus X-1, they have achieved story-telling metal music rather than showing off, they are the followers of Progressive Metal for the 21st century.
Fortunately on their third album, Tales From Outer Space, the band have made usage of the Rock Musical format of the mind from Freddie Mercury as they leap forward to overcome fresh new challenges that defintely awaits for them. While their first two albums have been layered with a lot of shredding guitar sounds and epic tolkien-related song scriptures, they boldly go where no metalhead has gone before in the planet solar system’s and beyond the inifinte where the listener goes on a spaceship with Heart of Cygnus. Which, surprisingly gives the concept album a more depth storyline – a big surprise that awaits the fans to see what they’ll come up with.
This is unbelivably, symphonic metal, classical orchestral homage to Brian May’s guitar sound that gives it the Queen treatment as if it was a speed metallic sound, best known example is In The Days of the Galacitc Alliance, a number that is out of this world with a song that deals with leaving their home planet after being forced to leave by the Alliance which is very similar to an episode of the Transformers or the cult-classic steroid hero, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. Guitarist,Keyboardist, and vocalist Jeff Lane, drummer Jim Nahikian,
and newcomer guitar player Aldo Galatioto, their performing is very virtuoso and very humble to their heroes of the metallic sound of the ‘70s and early ‘80s mixing New Wave of British Heavy Metal meets Prog Rock in all of its glory not to mention the keyboard ambient folk glory of Starship Troopers, which has an atmospheric glorified beauty that sends goose bumps all over your body thinking these guys are not screwing around. Not to mention the three-part epics that makes your blood pumping.
On Space Trilogy, Jeff Lane sounds unbelivably like an american version Bruce Dickinson as he narrates the battle of fighting for freedom as the band become the space rock opera sound proving themselves there are no strangers with heavy guitar licks and eerie synths that are similar to the ‘50s B-Movies that are set in outer space while on the third part they are chugging to the cores of hell and then becoming more of the atmospheric sounds similar almost to early Tangerine Dream’s Electronic Meditation and then becoming into the Nektar sounds of a Tab in the Ocean metal style. The result is a disturbing rocking adventure as the whole piece affairs to a magnificent climax that is one hell of a track to listen. Heart of Cygnus are still getting there, buy the three albums and you’ll see how good they really are.

Touchstone - Wintercoast

With their follow up to Discordant Dreams, the five-piece Hertfordshire band may have delivered the 2007 release like a bullet train that won’t stop. And being acknowledge from Classic Rock Magazine’s writers Dave Ling and Geoff Barton along with musicians including Rick Wakeman and Jeff Wayne, they are never going to stop any time now. Now with Wintercoast, which was released last year, they may have gotten something here to deliver a big surprise among the Progressive Rock fans. And adding a prelude narration done by award-winning actor, Jeremy Irons who’s best known for his work on David Cronenberg’s Dead Fingers, The Lion King, M. Butterfly, and Reversal of Fortune, Touchstone are thinking big by going Arena Rock style. Loud symphonic rock, lukewarm melodies, shattering guitar riffs, and flourishing keyboard sounds, Touchstone’s music gives you a real kick in the gut by the time you listen to Wintercoast.
Following in the footsteps of Female Prog queens and the new bands like; The Gathering, Mostly Autumn, Within Temptation, Nightwish, and the old school sound of Progressive Rock Female queens, this album is defintely worth the wait to be on the magic carpet ride of the new wave of Progressive Rock for the 21st century.
It may sound cheesy for me to say this, but female singer Kim Seviour defintely brings the house down on her vocal arrangements and there is her retrospective childhood momentums that seemed very touching and has the listener grab her attention. Tracks like; Joker in the Park, the hard rock almost-hit-single of Strange Days, Voices, and the 10-minute title track which is very Symphony X meets Rush’s Snakes & Arrows-era sound ala Celtic Style. Kim and guitarist Adam Hodgson make a great team along with keyboardist and founding member of Touchstone, keyboardist Rob Cottingham bring the pieces of the band’s music on the table and finding out which piece goes where and how the time changes would work on the compostion’s. The lyrics here are magnificent – I always imagine how this band would hit the Stadiums like Wembley Arena, Toyota Center, and offering Touchstone to give to that top notch. On the album’s temperature process, it really feels that the band that really can bring the musicianship up a level to an underground scene like nother. Alongside the four tracks that are mentioned here on this album, there are three highlights that really grab my attention.
Original Sin, a very haunting number with the help of Rob’s keyboard solo which is similar to Patrick Moraz and the Tales From Topographic Oceans-era sound to make it a wonderful power prog metal ballad (probably the first time they ever done this in this style) as Seviour soars through the heavenly sky while Adam does some guitar work that is very Van Halen meets Alex Lifeson sound. Zinomorph which is a killing number featuring a jazz fusion bass work done by Andre Moorghen, it has a mind-boggling hard rock riff that makes the song very fantasy-like while the two-part epic, The Witness represents Touchstone’s sound of a tribute to Pink Floyd and Marillion as it becomes a battling to the death number with phases and a time signature that is up your alley. Touchstone may have a long way to go, but Wintercoast is the elaborate rock opera album.

Pythia - Beneath The Velied Embrace

This could be the most unbelievable debut albums that you are about to embark on for the futuristic ride you are about to explore. Pythia merge Symphonic Power Goth Metal and emotional lyrics in ways that Nightwish could have thought of. Most of the times it sounds like Dream Theater had replaced James LaBrie with a female singer who had an operatic and musical background but with attitude sounding like Epica at times. But sometimes, it’s more of the elements of Metallica and Redemption about this new group who are from London, England. At others, there’s the Deep Purple, Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, and the Iron Maiden edge about Pythia.
From the blistering opening militant rocker sounds of Sweet Cantation and Sarah (Bury Her), to the homage of Symphonic alternate sounds of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal sounds of Judas Priest as if they were formed in the 17th century with Tristian and Ride For Glory, the six-piece really have balls of steel and how Symphonic Metal is supposed to be sound with this, not to mention the cover of the death of a loss one in a pool of blood which is very ‘eavy and very ‘umble. The mix of the crossover takes these two pieces of music up the mountains to climatic mountains that you’ll never expect to hear from start to finish.
But the album isn’t just a simple Heavy Metal album and singing about emotional lyrics and betrayal; there’s more for this English band who formed in 2007. Take for a perfect example of their love of Fantasy and a haunting version that would have make Tolkien scared shitless over: The haunting speeding tempo of My Pale Prince, is embellished by a sublime Kirk Hammett solo and James Hetfield rhythm chugging done by Ross White and Tim Neale while vocalist Emily Alice Ovenden brings the song to a dark table with an edgier Within Temptation sound which is Pythia’s game plan to conquer the Symphonic Metal world. Eternal Darkness is another haunting track, but it has a sentimental, army drum sound done by Marc Dyos and keyboardist Richard Holland does some harpsichord work on the keyboards to set the mood of the song. It really helps a great deal because of what Emily does who has an operatic rock vocal sound similar to Sharon Den Adel and Tarjla Turunen with the band gelling together to give that kick in the gut treatment.
The layered and fast tempo flows of What You Wish For and Oedipus really sucks you in as if you are in the band’s mind while they are recording these songs for a darker version of a love-triangle story from Bram Stoker’s Dracula and a revamped version of Jean Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast. Army of the Damned which features at the end of an outro narration done by Yorkshire actor, Brian Blessed, best known for his booming voice and king-sized work, is a tribute to an unknown NWOBHM band called Legend meets the Dio-era sound of Rainbow Rising and its formulaic and dynamic while No Compromise is closing magnetic track that relies on Heaven & Hell. All in all, Beneath the Veiled Embrace is a magnificent debut album that can be up the top ten list of Symphonic Metal albums in any fan’s wish list.

Caravan – If I Could Do It All Over Again, I’d Do It All Over You

With their follow up to their self-titled debut album, Canterbury band Caravan’s second album had opened the flood gates. The reissue of If I Could Do It All Over Again, I’d It All Over You originally released in 1970 which featured nine tracks now with three bonus tracks which is leveled up to twelve on the demise Eclectic label. At times it laid back, calm, cool, and very Soft Machine orientated like the first two albums. With long titles, fuzz tone organ sounds, jazz fretted bass solos, quirky lyrics, and all of the other magnificent, it definitely showed Caravan’s musical qualities of an excellent album; It is very weird and hard to understand what the hell are they doing but listening to it, you can definitely understand why they meant to be so damn good.
The album is well known to be the Canterbury scene to be opening the door for others to come out with a lot of the solos from the organ thanks to Richard’s brother, Dave Sinclair who gave the album a twist and the vocal arrangements of being typical from the previous psychedelic sounding of the debut album. The title came from Goon show member, the late great Spike Milligan, and I bet Caravan was making this album a tribute to their comedic hero and the Goon Show. Their second record showed the Caravan sound that was meant to be heard on albums and singles and creating a body of work, but go beyond the jazz sound into unexpected long pieces like a flaming fire that won’t burn out.
Sure the title is long, but it’s a hell of an opportunity to get immediately attached to the Scene of Prog-Jazz Rock.
Of all of the sense of humor, the bouncy opening titled track and the mellowing crisp calmness of And I Wish I Were Stoned capture the right notes, as lead vocalist and guitarist Pye Hastings allow the Sinclair brothers both David and Richard esteemed themselves with a lot of time changes that isn’t lacking techniques of music. But if you are here to listen to the long instrumentals and epic pieces as the band go ape shit, then look out for With an Ear to the Ground you can Make It medley and Can’t Be Long Now are Canterbury pieces that definitely don’t seem out of place with some Psychedelic quirkiness which seemed very pre-Hatfield and the North and an homage to the Wilde Flowers.
Hello Hello, which was released a single on the DECCA label along with the titled track, has an upbeat tempo and a capacity to the Jazz psych wah-wah beauty along with a beautiful percussion sound homage to Jimmy Cobb and Elvin Jones for which Richard Coughlain does to get the sound in this nice little ditty.
As I Feel I Die, a constructive ambient moody number that senses some calm after the storm into a John Coltrane meets The Beatles crossover of My Favorite Things and the Revolver-era. The short numbers, Asfoteri 25 and Limits are very tribal and most of the time with a waltz beat while the three bonus tracks get the listener going for more of the Adventures of Caravan. A Day in the Life of Maurice Haylett which will be a fan favorite among the fans with its bizarre tensions which starts off calm and then with a dramatic anti-climax done by Coughlain as it goes into the sneering territories thanks to David’s haunting organ solo. As for the demos of Hello Hello, Stoned, and Die, they’re breathtaking. It’s positively an album that you need to buy from start to finish.

QA'A - Chi'en

Among the influences of Krautrock and Experimental Music, QA’A are one of the most newest bands to come out of Barcelona, Spain to bring this music into unbelivable territory that would make Faust very happy with. The band mastered their debut album in Germany at the Faust Studios with a little help from Hans Joachim. Listening to this album three times, it is quite understanding why Hans wanted to work with this band from the start. Chi’en is weird, but an astonishing album that captures the golden-era sound of ‘70s Germany.
This is a very high voltage record. QA’A doesn’t pull any punches into the musical territory that seems it was recorded in the Mental Institue with Avant-Garde shrieks, Radiohead guitar sounds, bizarre tribes, or just mindfucked to put it into words about Chi’en. It is very twisted having 10 and 27-minute compositions that are lengthed from the ground up. Each of the numbers have a lot of uncharted territories that will make your eardrums bleed and thinking to yourself ‘What the hell did I just embarked on here?’
Take for example, the opening track, Eastern Westdown, which starts off as an ambient adventure at the bottom of the sea filled with whispering background vocals. The chanting and the synths going off the roof while the guitar and vocal lines just sends a massive jolt of Amon Duul II’s Phallus Dei. Beginning with an acoustic folk finger picking technique and then it goes into the sinister sounds of Indian Tribe Raga-Rock. I love the ending where they go into a massive attack mode with having their instruments with a wide arranging of feedback to close the piece up.
Other centerpieces include the Can percussion and funk chugging on the guitar similar to Michael Karoli and the bass doing a jazz fusion take on Speakerbox and the reminscient of NEU and Faust with the 14-minute magnetic hell of She Provides with a deafening shrill on the guitar along with the bass going haywire along with the vocals doing more of chanting by giving it the Thom Yorke/Jonny Greenwood treatment with a thunderous chaotic sessionthat would have made the hippies run for their lives. The 24-minute epic, Peeling Off, is as weird that you can get. Here now, you get the feeling that the band are not making any excuses with a sax wailing out for mercy that is almost out of Van Der Graaf Generator along with the guitar about to be malfunction with eerie noises.
Imagine a band coming up with a weird magic carpet ride that is compelling and bring the music to you similar to the sounds of Sonic Youth coming up with some weird sounds that would make you feel right at home. The two tracks, the 17-minute track, Time Is Key is a wildy experimental remisicent of a crossover between Cluster’s Zuckerzeit and Ash Ra Tempel’s Schwingungen as if they were playing this on a metronome ala acoustic folk style while the closing title track is a calm after the storm to show their tribute to Kevin Ayers in a lukewarm pastoral cathedral background as to give the frenzy a little nap. An album like this can make it worth the wait in the headphone album tradition, but not only the pieces are damn good, but the tracks are combined as a force of vision. It’s a scary, shattering, and magnificent album to listen to that proves that Krautrock is going strong today in the QA’A universe.

Barclay James Harvest - Live

After BJH were dropped by Harvest Records in 1973 and moved to Polydor Records in 1974, it was time for the band to do their first take of a live album. It was released as a double album at the time they were promoting, Everyone is Everybody Else. They recorded these performances at London’s Theatre Royal, Liverpool Stadium which Rare Bird opened for them, which in the liner notes features a ticket stub for 88p, and Drury Lane. The band was having a hard struggle because of a debt to EMI along with a disastrous orchestral concert with help from Robert John Godfrey who would later become the leader of his own band, The Enid.
Also, already a target for music critics as being considered a “Poor Man’s Moody Blues” tag they had to face. But they knew they could not back down without an album that was the biggest selling record to reach number 40 in the UK album charts and drawing increasing numbers to be their first charted successful records in Progressive Rock history. Live definitely offers the listener a front-seat row to hear the band perform in all of their glory.
Beginning with the two 10-minute live epics of the atmospheric glory of Summer Soldier and the space traveling rocker of dramatic tension with Medicine Man, which features a floyd-tinged guitar and mellotron sound done by John Lees and Woolly Wolstenholme while the late Mel Pritchard is pounding away on the drums to give it a huge glorified sound on the drums to give it that Outer Space adventure in an homage to Arthur C. Clarke. Crazy City has the elements of the Who meets a Space Rock version of Canterbury’s Caravan as for After the Day has a warm and Genesis tone is built around Woolly’s keyboard sound and Les’ firm bass lines while John Lees is fingerpicking on the guitar to give it that calm breeze for a whole view after the apocalypse of the only survivor that stands on the planet earth. And then it gets really astonished with a lot of goose bumps of the live version of The Great 1974 Mining Disaster.
On this beautiful live version, the band are coming together as one as they bring the number to a glorified production of this emotional song paying homage to the Beatles A Day in the Life and the Bee Gees New York Mining Disaster 1941 as they sing about Mister Groan being an outsider after what had happened to his policies and couldn’t stand the thought of being arrested again. As for the Tolkien-inspired beauty of Galadriel almost could have brought the audiences into tears, the blues-funk values of Negative Earth is very raunchy and down to earth while the breath-taking chiller of She Said is mind-boggling. The ambient live take of Paper Wings, about a suicidal man who doesn’t have a dream, but wants to fly to escape his views of hell.
The closing live number, Mockingbird, definitely is one hell of a track and is a fan favorite among BJH fans as it becomes intense, emotional, and dramatic interplay than the original studio track as they come to give the fans what they want to hear. Their only take of a Live album is a masterpiece, capturing them at their peak and definitely one of their magnitude and power they capture of Live and the parts just keep on going.