Neal Morse
Live Momentum

He is a busy man this guy called Neal Morse who once founded the band called Spock’s Beard with his brother and then he turned mentally ill which means that he found christianity and left to pursue a musical crusade. One might imagine when looking at the discography that he is a very creative man and in part that is correct but when looking back at his career I don’t think he has really evolved at all in a musical sense. I think when looking from the debut album of Spock’s Beard called the light up until now the only thing that has changed is the offensive christian messages he sometime just pushes down the throat of the listener who has never asked to be preached for, at least not I who get the albums for free, buyers can of course avoid it.

I direct you to the earlier reviews we have done of Morse albums to get a description of how it sounds because in text all albums we have reviewed are the same, so follow a link in the discography to the left to know how it sounds. Another thing bothersome with this album is that it is another live album, a three hour one, he released Testimony 2 Live in LA in 2011 so it is another 2 DVD live thing in just strange and feels pointless. Then of course we can’t fault the musical quality itself because he is a brilliant musician and has brilliant musicians at his side. The sound and production is also excellent so at that point there is nothing to complain about, but then we have the playing time of near three hours and that is very long especially when there are some religious crap thrown in there, but who am I to judge what some misled people believe?

Musically this is quite good but then again I am beginning to be quite fed up with copies of The Light which is what Neal has written ever since that album was released back in 1995. That is why I think we can call Neal Morse the AC/DC of progressive rock as his albums sound more or less the same every time, just like AC/DC. So if you have anything by Spock’s Beard with Morse or his solo works you know what to expect and if you like it you will like this and nothing that I say will change that even if this is a completely unnecessary album for anyone who already have anything Morse has written and recorded. He is a high class musician though but maybe he should take a step back and try to think of new ideas rather than just throwing out millions of albums that sound the same.

I cannot give an amen or say hallelujah for this album as it is kind of pointless and it is the same thing Neal has done since he debuted, not very progressive is it? I think Neal leaving Spock’s Beard was the best thing that could happen to Spock’s Beard as they at least evolved since he left while he himself hasn’t although he has started a musical crusade. To be honest though, this is too good to just kick and say it sucks but at the same time it isn’t very exciting in my opinion. Four points, just.

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