A Contender for
Album of the Year 2024
Many lead singers in pop and rock have forged their own solo careers with varying and surprising degrees of success. Think Morten Harket (A-ha) and his handful of solo albums since Wild Seed, Roland Orzabal (Tears For Fears) who pretty much created his three albums from the 90’s on his own, Geoff Tate (Queensryche) who collaborated with various musicians over the years to amass an enviable body of solo musical work. And of course the great David Gilmour who’s still very much active with his own new solo record coming out later this year. Following these mighty footsteps is now Marco Gluhmann lead singer and frontman of the German progressive rock (and sometimes metal) band Sylvan. This year he just released his solo album A Fragile Present, three long years after his stellar singing on Sylvan’s last album One To Zero.
For this first solo album, Marco collaborates with some good musicians with a prog rock background – Kalle (guitars, bass), Yogi (keyboards) and Markus (bass) from RPWL, Tommy Eberhardt on drums, and Sylvan’s own Johnny Beck on guitars + Billy Sherwood from Yes and Steve Rothery from Marillion on the bookended songs in the album. Now that’s a strong lineup there! But it’s really the chemistry of all these musicians coming together in different ways that makes the album of 12 songs so special start to finish when layered with the incredible vocals of Marco Gluhmann. Marco’s unique gift as a vocalist is his ability to weave in and out of falsettos, create moods and hit emotional highs and lows with his formidable range and vocal timbre.
The 12 songs are quite varied in nature and flow together very well as one entity – from the acoustic to some heavy riffage from the dark to the hopeful. Right here you get a wide spectrum and range of songs that is more so than any one given Sylvan or RPWL album. The lyrics are very introspective and philosophical while the album title itself – A Fragile Present – is a clever duality of speaking to the fragile times we live in and this album itself as being a gift for lovers of thoughtful and melodic rock and metal music. The album is perfectly sequenced with a strong ebb and flow giving it a unique identity.
Production of the album is polished while balancing the need to incorporate a variety of instruments and effects. Marco, Yogi and Kalle are credited as producers, making this a self-produced album. Yogi mixes the album well and masters it at a high enough resolution that allows for the dynamics of the album to shine through on the CD and yet keep the sound crisp and modern without being loud even on streaming platforms – well done! This album has so much commercial potential -it is very accessible and something that should belong to the music collection of every fan and admirer of good pop, rock and metal music prog or not. I rate it a 10/10 and a strong contender for Album Of The Year 2024.
The beautiful artwork for the album was created by Sebastian’s brother, Tobias. Tobias has done some wonderful artworks for recent Sylvan albums, and his talent truly shines through on „A Fragile Present,“ adding a visual splendor that complements the album’s musical brilliance.
For those who want to dig deeper, here is an analysis of each song:
- Hear Our Voice: A perfect opener, with Billy adding a heavy Yes flavor to the choir and choruses of this song. A beautiful guitar solo finishes the song pensively. This really sets the tone well for the rest of the album.
- Never Say Goodbye: This song builds up slowly with a chorus right out of Steven Wilson’s Insurgentes. It commands your attention until Marco hits you a sucker punch around the 3-minute mark with agonizing screams supported by heavy rhythm guitars. An outstanding guitar solo serves as the outro to this song.
- Reach Out: Starts off acoustic and pensive, then opens up into its majestic chorus that would have filled a stadium had Radiohead made this song. Marco’s low end vocal range is on strong display here. Yet another great guitar solo ends this song too! Are we sensing a master plan here?
- Faceless: Musically one of the heaviest songs on the album and Marco is no slouch either with his strong menacing style adoption especially when asking us, „Are you faceless?“ Some melodic and haunting (think Kevin Moore of Dream Theater) keyboards carry the song through. Nothing will prepare you for the Middle 8 right in the middle of this song „Feel on my shoulders all this life…“.
- Look At Me: One of the most cinematic and emotional songs in the album opens up slyly with beautiful atmospherics and a stunning „look at me now and follow me“ proclamation from Marco. Another stunning Middle 8 in the second half of this song makes this one of my favorite songs on this record.
- At Home: A purely acoustic song with soft vocal patterns and melodic keyboards infuses this album with strong variety and repeat value. And a break from the more intense songs behind and ahead of this song.
- For A While: Wow – did Marillion write this song as a hit single for their next album?! Listen to the amazing vocal gymnastics by Marco on this song over and over again!
- Black The Shade Out: We now come close to industrial territory with another heavy song which lets up in the verses which actually follow the chorus that kicks off the song. Now just when you think this is a standard song you realize a new idea introduced in the last 35 seconds with a stunning drum fill leading to an angelic choir finishing the song with whispers and panache.
- One Last Hope: Very much a Sylvan song in spirit and structure. No more to say here.
- Life Is Much Too Short: Another ballad that starts of as if it’d finish up like a standard ballad until the 2:55 minute mark when the song introduces a new idea and propels forward with yet another great guitar solo!
- Running Out Of Time: My absolute favorite song of this album is a standout stunner in every possible way – music, lyrics, mood, melodies, vocals. The chorus is set up beautifully and literally glides through your mind over and over like waves crashing against a restless seashore. The last two minutes moves to heavy riffs which only make the return to the chorus all the more painful. Ending the song is one of the most wonderful guitar solos of all time by none other than our very own (for Sylvan fans) Johnny Beck! If nothing else, this song proves that Marco is one of the greatest singers in the music industry today, regardless of musical genre.
- My Eyes Are Wide Open: A perfect ending to this album filled with emotional singing and reflective lyrics that resonate well with the Marcus Aurelius quote in the CD artwork for the album. Steve Rothery adds his master touch of emotions with severe guitar string bending that tugs at the heart strings.
Lax Madapaty is a Marketing executive based in Austin Texas. He’s an ardent admirer of Sylvan and many other progressive Rock and Metal bands past and future. His favorite Sylvan albums are Presets and Artificial Paradise.