Ayreon, Transitus

Any Ayreon release is a highly anticipated event, and of course Transitus made no exception. But unfortunately this album was met with disappointment. I can’t say The Source was Arjen’s best record, but it had some great tracks and a lot of qualities. Transitus, however, is just mediocre through and through. It’s obviously not a bad album, because Arjen is a genius and he could write decent music even in a coma, but it’s definitely not impressive in any way.

The expectations are also set high right from the beginning, as the record opens up in an ominous and grandiose way, but then slowly starts to lose momentum and deflates. There are of course interesting moments. Listen to my story is tongue in cheek and lot of fun, while Two worlds now one is gorgeous, with touching instruments and emotional vocals, precisely what this record is otherwise lacking. Talk of the town is also a good one, that has a catchy melody, but loses points for repeating it a bit too much for my taste. The great beyond the most Ayreon thing of the release and it’s, fittingly, a duet between the best artists of Transitus, Tommy and Cammie, that transforms into a revisitation of the main themes, before ending on a triumphal note. It doesn’t exactly tell the tale that goes horrifically wrong announced in the beginning, but at least it’s got something that catches attention.

And now off to the less than stellar parts. Arjen has never been a master of poetry, his lyrics always had a mundane feel to them and sometimes they were downright silly. However, the stories he presented were always intriguing and the Forever saga, spanned across multiple albums, is some of the best concept music I heard. But with Transitus not even the story is very captivating. It’s some sort of cosmic Romeo and Juliet that meets Ghost Whisperer, and the only thought-provoking side of it is why did Abby say she killed Daniel when Daniel says she didn’t do it (provoking until you read the extra materials, that is).

The album reminds me a lot of The Theory of Everything. Story-wise, you have Tommy as the misunderstood protagonist, some jealous dude trying to break him up from his love, a father who thinks he is living in his own world and the supernatural twist. Structurally, the release is divided into a million short tracks and has a musical red wire that tries to connect them all. And this is where Transitus fails, because it’s only tries and I don’t think it’s really succeeds. The overabundant narration fragments the melody and what starts as an interesting gimmick becomes the main method of telling the tale. By the time we reach the middle, I’m already more than sick of the constant interruptions and feel like I’m listening to an audiobook more than an actual music release.

More importantly, while The Theory of Everything has multiple tiny tracks only on paper, and in reality the songs flow into one another and create four major parts, in Transitus the division is real. Having such short moments, there’s no room for development or variation. Even after multiple listens, I can hardly find the depth and richness that Ayreon has gotten me used to. Sadly, most of what makes progressive music amazing is absent from this record. The way Transitus fails in regards to continuity and transitions is most obvious after Get out! Now!, which is so engaging and captivating, only to be abruptly cut short by the misplaced narration that leads into Seven days, seven nights, the cheesiest Ayreon song since Web of lies. In fact that is where the album breaks. The first half is quite good, but then it devolves into a screaming fest (more on that later) that alternates with insipid and uninspired moments, like Daniel’s funeral, where all the lyrics seen ham-fisted in rhythmically, or The human equation which… exists.

The melodies did get stuck in my head, but I feel like it’s mostly because of the constant repetition of relatively simple moments, rather than having a good hook. For example, the “She’s guilty/ she’s not guilty” part simply drives me crazy with the never-ending reiterations. And worst of all, this is a love story that transcends death, I should be feeling a lot more emotion and intensity. Maybe I wasn’t in the right head space, but I don’t empathise with pretty much anything that is going on and the music rarely touches me. You could say the lack of sensitivity works when exploring new planets and having supernatural rational beings trying to understand human feelings (although Beneath the waves has more sensitivity than the entire Transitus release put together), but if you’re going for eternal romance, you’d better be more believable and less cold.

Not even Ayreon’s usual highlights are truly shining on Transitus. I have to say that I’m disappointed by the performances of the vocalists chosen for this record. Of course Tommy is great as always and you can easily understand why Arjen keeps using him, and Cammie Gilbert is a wonderful new addition, but that’s pretty much it. Simone Simmons has a few cool moments as the Angel of Death, Mike Mills reprises his role as the talented inanimate truth speaker and Dee Snider does his thing on a classic rock track, but it’s too little for an entire album. The rest are generic vocals, with too much screaming and too little emotion. Condemned without a trial is the exponent of this trend as well (in fact, name anything bad in Transitus and this song will have it).

Again, you have to understand that it’s not a truly poor album, it’s just way below standard when it comes to Ayreon. The vocals are too loud (and I’m not talking about mixing), the instruments lack the beauty and richness that Arjen is known to create, there’s not enough nuance and progression and for the most part none of the interpreters are very believable in their roles, at times not even Tommy and Cammie. I can listen to the record and say “oh, that’s cool” or “this is a cute moment”, but I don’t truly feel connected to it and I don’t feel like there is much to discover. Since I had a similar problem with Pain of salvation, maybe it has to do with my state of mind rather than the album, but I always said that these are not objective reviews, but rather personal opinions, so this is it: Transitus just doesn’t do it for me. It’s a nice listen, but for the first time it’s an Ayreon release that doesn’t make me fangirl.