We all remember the string of plans that got cancelled at the beginning of the Covid outbreak – the holidays we didn’t take, the celebrations that couldn’t take place. For me, the first casualty was the Prognosis festival in Eindhoven – an emergent festival of all things prog, international borders everywhere shut down only days before it was scheduled to hold its second ever edition. More than two years later, having overcome postponements and numerous enforced changes to the line-up, Prognosis festival kicked off on a sunny April Friday. Spread across two stages in the Effenaar concert hall, Prognosis 2022 represented a two-day feast of progressive music – and for the fans that had travelled in from all over the world, a celebration of the return of live music.
Double back and check our review of Day 1 if you haven’t already! Otherwise… Read on!
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Day 2
The prog-ramming resumed in the early afternoon of the next day, with a familiar face welcoming the gathering crowds on the smaller stage. After last night’s set with Novena, Ross Jennings presented an acoustic set with songs from his lockdown solo record. The songs sounded personal and affecting in their stripped-down form, and showcased yet another string in the bow of the prolific musician. Ross was joined by Novena bandmate Harrison White for a rendition of their song ‘Disconnected’, and an impromptu cover of Peter Gabriel’s ‘Solsbury Hill’ (with Harrison quipping about the division of labour in their duet – ‘You forget the lyrics, I forget the chords’).
The main stage curtain-raiser is Norwegian quartet The New Death Cult. Donning skeletal face masks and fluorescent face paint, their technicolour look sat well with their lively performance. Emphasising the ‘rock’ in prog rock, their songs ran hard-rocking riffs in the vein of Foo Fighters and Muse through a psychedelic filter, and helped warm up the neck muscles, sore from the previous day, of the gathering crowds.
Cobra the Impaler from Belgium delivered a crushing set in the small room. With heavy downtuned riffs and bulldozing rhythms in the spirit of Mastodon and Nevermore, and an infectious stage presence to galvanise the crowds, they won over many new fans in the smaller room and were one of the best new discoveries of the festival for me.
Norwegians Magic Pie are up next, their music rooted in the traditions of classic prog with a tinge of heavy metal. They played an expansive and instrumentally impressive set that brought to mind pleasant associations with the golden era of Genesis, Yes and early Marillion.
Scarlet Stories are another Dutch band to grace the small stage, and a well-supported one judging by the number of people wearing their t-shirt. Their dramatic prog metal combined heavy riffs in odd-time signatures with beautiful gothic-laden melodies on violin and synths, resulting in a refreshing and varied mix which can be equally enjoyed by fans of Nightwish and Machine Head.
German post-rockers Long Distance Calling impressed with a cinematic show on the main stage, delivering a set full of highlights from their career. Although they incorporate vocals in some of their studio output, this set was completely instrumental save for some vocal samples providing colour. The memorable lead melodies more than fill the aural spectrum, and the large hall is a fitting venue for their atmospheric light show.
Cellar Darling from Switzerland (made up of former members of Eluveitie) took over the second stage with their combination of folk and technical metal. In addition to displaying a stunning vocal range, multi-instrumentalist Anna Murphy threaded beautiful melodies on the hurdy gurdy, keyboards and the flute. Their new 10-minute epic ‘Dance’ showed the promise of new music to come, and their set was one of the highlights of the day
Dutch veterans of the prog rock genre Focus celebrated their 50th anniversary on the main stage, playing staples from across their career. Their iconic bandleader Thijs van Leer, in addition to singing, dazzled with his ability to simultaneously play the organ with one hand and the flute with the other. Still as colourful and eccentric after all these years, Focus reminded us that the bloodline of experimentation and eclecticism runs deep in progressive rock.
Wheel from Finland are a name which has been making waves in the prog metal world with their excellent two albums. Closing the second stage, their performance was full of dynamism and subtlety, pushing the mental calculators of progheads in the crowd to do some quick advanced maths in order to keep count with the fluid time signatures. Often drawing comparisons to Tool but much more than mere copycats, if you are looking for thoughtful, technical and layered music, look no further than Wheel.
Soon it was time for the closing act of the festival – Norway’s Leprous were here to play a fan-voted by-request set. With their line-up completed by a cellist, they played a pitch-perfect set that proved why they are one of the leading lights of progressive metal in the last decade. The performance had an added poignancy as vocalist Einar Solberg had only arrived 2 hours earlier, after many days of driving across the continent to help his Ukrainian partner’s family who were fleeing from the war. Despite physical and emotional exhaustion (and joking complaints that the fans chose all the long and difficult deep cuts), he was an absolute powerhouse on the stage, reaching soaring falsetto highs and stomping around the stage to the heavy breakdowns, like Godzilla over an unsuspecting city. After a two-hour set full of highlights and deep cuts, the apocalyptic climax of ‘The Sky is Red’ drained the last remaining energy from our limbs and hearts, and brought the festival to a close.
Over its two days, Prognosis was a showcase of progressive music from all spectrums of the genre, a celebration of musical and compositional talent, and a place to meet like-minded fans in a friendly atmosphere. The set-times and organisation ran like a well-oiled machine – making it possible to see all 16 bands with minimal overlap, and then easily catch them for a chat next to the merch stand – and the sound was great throughout. The wait may have been very long but it was all worth it – the second edition of Prognosis was an absolute triumph.
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Prognosis will return in April 2023, and bigger than ever – expanding to a three-day format in Eindhoven, and an additional two-day UK edition in London. I, for one, cannot wait.
All photos by Emmelie Herwegh, supplied by Prognosis Festival
