Album review: 3 – Revisions

3 (also known as Three, and certainly not to be confused with the eighties-vintage progressive rock band of called Three) are a progressive rock band. Helpful, right? Well, they’re on Wikipedia if you want to research the difference, and they’ve just released a record called Revisions, their fifth studio release (if said Wikipedia article is to be believed, which I’m fairly sure it is).

The tunes on Revisions are re-workings or first official releases of older material which the band apparently decided “deserved a second chance”. Given, however, that a new album of original material is in the offing from new label Roadrunner, Revisions has all the hallmarks of the contractually-obligatory B-sides and/or Best-Of album pushed hastily out of the Metal Blade door to allow it to snap shut on a finished relationship. Not being very familiar with 3’s other output, I’m in no position to judge whether the tracks on Revisions are up to their usual scratch; however, I can say with certainty that, while 3 are a very talented progressive rock band indeed, I’m not going to be going out of my way for any of their other stuff.

That’s because most of what we have here sounds like Stephen Wilson covering (or maybe producing) The Rasmus and Queensryche; it’s all soft-rock tones and tropes in elegant and carefully complex song structures, performed with consummate musicianship throughout. You’ve got soaring and earnest choruses, rich classic amp tones, understated and careful guitar effects and production flourishes; it’s restrained, urbane, debonair. It’s brimming with craftsmanship… but it just doesn’t move me.

Sure, I can listen and appreciate the composition, the virtuoso performances, the meticulous production, but I’m never inspired to sing along, tap my foot, play air guitar. It reminds me of the beautifully-crafted but empty demo tunes that synthesizer modules used to ship with in the late nineties; full of contemporary and polished ideas, but devoid of that human edge, that voice of authenticity. A steady rate of momentary musical diversity starts being perceived as homogeneity, and that’s what’s happening to me here: I have to keep referring back to the track list to remember how far I’ve gotten through the album this time round. The one reliable and enduring landmark is at the middle of the album, in the form of the frantic almost-flamenco instrumental whirlwind of “Lexicon of Extremism” – tellingly enough, the youngest track of the lot (credited 2006, at least on Wikipedia). Perhaps the others should have remained on the cutting-room floor after all? Though I might also put in for a stay of execution for album closer “The Game”, a folky mandolin strum beneath a darkly funny tale about burying an ex band-mate… and then his replacements.

But as I said earlier, this isn’t really the sort of thing I usually listen to – and I dare those with a taste for the lighter end of progressive rock will wonder what the hell I’m on about. But you gotta call it how you hear it… and to me, 3’s tunes as heard here are like spun-glass ornaments: pretty, delicate, empty and pointless. The one thing that we can probably all agree on is that Revisions probably isn’t the best introduction to the band, and best left for the collectors and completists.