Kingston Wall - II (1993)

After the absolutely remarkable debut album, ‘I” in 1992, Kingston Wall returned a year later with, ‘II,’ another strong album that showed no signs of any sophomore slump.

II sees Kingston Wall really starting to explore there psychedelic & progressive influences more strongly and tends to leave behind the more hard rocking groovy edge that a lot of the songs on I had. A good number of the songs are mellower, longer in length and have all the glorious trippy psychadelia progressiveness of bands from the 70’s. Another new inclusion is a folk influence, which is best displayed on the two instrumentals, ‘Istwan’ and within some of the riffs in, ‘And it’s all happening.’ All together four instrumentals grace this album, and since the songs are longer this time around there are lots of instrumental parts during the songs that do have vocals. As implausible as it is to me Petri’s guitar work is even stronger on this release with just absolutely colossal riffs and solos of grand proportions. There isn’t a moment on this record where this man fails to impress, plus Sami’s drum work is diverse and interesting, and Jukka’s bass lines are thick and heavy; everything just fits in perfectly together.

Some of the strongest songs within Kingston Wall’s short recording career also appear on this album, namely, ‘We cannot move,’ ‘Two of a Kind,’ ‘I Feel Love,’ and ‘Shine on Me.’ Two of a Kind features a lot of those godly epic guitar solos and stunning riffs I spoke of earlier and I honestly wouldn't hesitate to say this song has become something of an all-time favorite for me. Just a colossal song. Meanwhile the cover of Donna Summer’s I Feel Love is probably the most hard rocking song on the album, and certainly shows another side of Petri’s influences and then there’s Shine On Me, which is a lengthy courageous psychedelic/progressive masterpiece. This particular song also features Sakari Kukko on saxophone, and if you’re an Amorphis fan you may recognize that name since he played flute and saxophone on two of their albums.

All in all Kingston Wall delivered another album of monumental proportions with II, and much like their debut it is absolutely essential for progressive/psychedelic/hard rock music fans. One of my all-time favorite albums right here, folks. Check it out.