Riverside
Second Life Syndrome

THE REVIEW

Imagine sitting on the edge of a river, watching the placid succession of dark clouds on the horizon, the slight sound of the water passing in front of you, indifferent to your melancholy. Night is about to fall, and you are alone with your thoughts. Riverside: "Second Life Syndrome".

This is the image evoked by this album and this band in my mind. It's hard not to think of this, I believe, after listening to the music of this Polish band. The album starts with "After" in which the bass player's voice painfully whispers to us: "I can’t take anymore I can’t breathe I’m sick of this goddamn darkness, Sick of sadness and tears I throw it all up every single day...". The protagonist is a man discovering himself, at the same time forced to relive a painful past, trying to shake off an unbearable weight from his shoulders.
The music is heavy, oppressive, tormented but velvety like a breeze. The airy keyboards accompany the singing along with the rhythmic session, releasing the guitar imbued with feeling (with some Floydian reminiscences). The second track is "Volte-Face", where the energy rises without becoming furious or violent. Great space is given to the guitar, and the voice becomes tormented, touching on screaming several times, leading to a pianistic digression, and then leaving space for one last explosion.

The third track, "Conceiving You", where melancholy and nostalgia assault us, brings up the memory of a woman, her sight blurred by time past like Beatrice was for Dante. The piano accompanies Mariusz Duda's warm voice on his journey through memory. A new journey, entering the second life syndrome, the title track. Here the echo of Pink Floyd is present and hangs over the group heavily, pressuring them without crushing them.
There's a desire to turn the page: "...I erase you now with all of my past", but there's also the anger of having lost time (or perhaps this "wasted" time might have enriched us?). We move on to "Artificial smile", one of the most driven pieces from the band's composition, with a reflective insert before the final explosion where Duda bursts out with a visceral and tormented scream.
The atmosphere becomes lighter with the semi-ballad "I Turned You Down", where the usual guitar feeling reappears, accompanying us so far, holding and warming us as it gets very cold outside.

"Reality Dream part III" is a typically prog-metal instrumental track that continues the conversation that started on the band's previous record with the first two episodes. The guys let loose, showcasing good technical skills. "Pull myself together – holding on Standing at the point of no return Keeping on the right side of my heart And the moment of truth is falling on me now" With these words, "Dance with shadow" begins. Once again, emotion takes the lead, accompanying the inner journey of a person seeking freedom from what has affected them irreparably. "..I can almost see the light Feel its warmth And touch the moment I was waiting for so long I carried all before me Now the die is cast With open arms I’m standing out against my past".
When we reach certainty about something, there's the fear of seeing it crumble. It seems we've reached the light, the freedom. But the melancholy of the music doesn't subside; we haven't reached the end. Something is still missing to be free from "ourselves", we've turned the page, but the page in front of us is frightfully blank. We face "Before", the last track of the album. The journey is concluded, and I let what I think guide my fingers.

We are faced with an emotional album, but not an original one. A less straightforward and more personal drumming would have been beneficial, and in some cases, there is a slight heaviness. As their second work, a step forward has been made compared to the past, and I believe the peak to reach is near. Anathema, Pink Floyd, a pinch of Porcupine Tree, a dash of Pain of Salvation, but a vast and immensely deep carpet of emotions to give you an idea of what awaits you. I conclude this review with part of the words from "Before".
"I’ve become resistant to myself To my weaknesses and pain I’ve become the one who wants to live And just feel alive again.... I feel safe Is this What I Really Wanted? "