It took me several months to form an opinion on this debut album of Cleveland based Temple 8. Why? Because I was both excited as surprised by Enter The Temple and I wanted to do the album justice. So I left it for a while and decided to write the review later. One of my conclusions was that what When Dream And Day Unite meant for Dream Theater, then this album could mean the same for Temple 8.
The songs and music all breath something fresh but also familiar. You can detect bands such as Rush, Pink Floyd and Marillion in the music, well at least I do, but it never sounds copied or borrowed. Remarkable considering the fact that this band consists of only two members; Kurt Tischer and David Clark. Tischer is singer/songwriter/musician and Clark the drummer/percussionist. Except for the cheap sound effects used to create a narrative voice the vocal offerings of Tischer holds the attention. The only other vocal contribution is a certain G.W. Bush, who makes a guest appearance in ‘Turn Left’, but I doubt if he knows that himself.
The production of the album isn’t bad but could have been given more balls - but understand that it isn’t bad at all. Maybe someday a remix will be done, like Dream Theater did with the aforementioned album.
There’s no need to go into separate song details, there just aren’t any weak spots, except for the narrative voice. That could and should have been done better, more impressively. So now I’m curious to see if and how Temple 8 can translate this album and music into a live performance.
Conclusion: 8 out of 10