‘Parting is such sweet sorrow’, wrote Shakespeare in the tragic love story of Romeo & Juliet. Much the same could be construed from the autobiographical references made by Justin Furstenfeld, when he created the music and lyrics for his band’s seventh album, ‘Any Man in America’, which arose from his marriage break-up and an unfortunate custody battle for his young daughter.

Blue October, formed in Texas sixteen years ago, enjoyed a typical, prog-rock gestation period of playing the college circuit for much of its first eleven years, before making a serious impression on the US Billboard album chart with their fifth oeuvre, ‘Foiled’. The next album, ‘Approaching Normal’, confirmed its status with an even more significant top-20 placing.

Yet, this is a band that flies in the face of convention. Owning up to being strongly influenced by Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd and Flaming Lips, the interconnection between each of the 13 tracks on ‘Any Man’ could be easily considered as saccharine melodrama. The blending of a modern rock sound with distant echoes of hip-hop results in a disturbingly infectious run of occasionally melancholic music that follows a true-life concept.

If there is one stand-out track, it is definitely ‘The Chills’, which was a pretty good choice as a single release, not least for its radio-friendly smidgen-over-three-minutes airplay, as none of the other over-embellished tracks deliver such a straightforward, if abrupt message. From what the listener can gather, the lyricist (Justin) is trying very hard to make an impression on his departed wife, who has given him the cold shoulder, hence the surprisingly up-beat ‘The Chills’. However, like many unfortunate prog-rock standards, the rest of the album is simply over-inflated, fairly pretentious and self-indulgent.

Track lengths are a case in point, with several running to well over six minutes. Yet, where Genesis, Floyd or Yes would fill that time with atmospheric and often delicious musicality, it is almost as though Blue October was just trying too hard to fill a space allocated uncertainly. The substance is sorely lacking, even though marital disharmony and those kinds of personal experiences could have been chronicled with so much more colour.

The overblown production quality (by Grammy Award-winning, Tim Palmer, with U2, Bowie and Robert Plant, among his stellar clients) has the negative effect of drowning out any creativity, which leads ultimately to a lack of sincerity. Too many of the other twelve tracks appear to lack direction in favour of pursuing what the band thinks its audience wants to hear. The dichotomy is that this album sounds, in some ways rushed, yet also exceptionally laboured, an issue that arises time and time again with choral repetition to the point of tediousness.

Apart from fractured relationships, it is also incredibly sad that this multi-Platinum band simply fails to build adequately on what has been a fairly meteoric rise into the American mainstream. Its limited following in the UK (two concert dates at London‘s Islington O2 Academy, 3rd November, and Birmingham‘s O2, 4th November) may demand more of ’the old stuff’, rather than the latest material. 

It has always been my belief that, as long as a moderately educated raft of musicians continued to percolate into the market, progressive rock, despite its detractors (of which I am not one), would continue to survive. While the golden days of pomposity and blatant arrogance may have dwindled somewhat, an audience still exists for musically-sound story-telling. Blue October needs to return to the drawing-board.