A PERFECT MIX OF SKILL AND CAMP // Haken - Visions // Composer Reaction & Analysis

Bryan reacts to and talks about his thoughts on Visions (remastered 2017)
ORIGINAL VIDEO // • Visions (remastered 2017)
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0:00 Intro
00:59 Reaction
23:57 Analysis - It's Perfect But Tough To Listen To
27:21 Analysis - Musical Painting
31:06 Analysis - So Good At Mixing Styles and Sounds
34:43 Analysis - Overly Technical
41:28 Analysis - Some Quick Thoughts
44:42 Analysis - It Can Be Kinda Campy, Right?
48:35 Analysis - Lyrical Dive
56:51 Outro
#reaction #haken #progressiverock

[@jonathangeiser1265]

I'm I'm not mistaken, Visions is a concept album. The rest of the album provides a lot of context for this song. Some of the lyrics in Visons are pulled directly from other songs which I didn't notice until now. If you listen to the first track, Premonition, you'll definitely recognize a few musical themes. A lyrical analysis of the whole album would be interesting but would probably take way too much time.

[@robertmunroe9635]

Yes whole thing is a story in a dream Ross had

[@cheesecube1486]

The album is a concept album, and the story is a loop, so when this song ends, the album starts over again. At the end of this song we get hints of the very first track.

[@KwongoFoam]

Has noone mentioned doing Crystallized next? It showcases Haken's knack for incorporating unexpected sounds and ideas incredibly well.

[@paradoxofgodexisting]

Crystallized is a remake of their demo album Enter the 5th dimension and the demo album is much better, the idea is complete and its the original lineup that played it. The production is worse, but i dont care, i will never again listen to Crystallized, since i get annoyed every time they cut the part from the original album and the guitar doesnt sound so raw like on the original.

[@JVR10893]

Visions is a concept album, and this title track is the grand finale. A lot of the “out of place” sections you’re hearing in this song are lifted from other songs on the album, and so they don’t have the same impact if your first listen of this song is separate from the album.

[@DiegoDeschain]

Probably my favorite Haken record. It's just so insanely fun. I love the newer Haken album, but I always get kinda sad when bands that used to have fun like this in their sound, eventually seem to feel "obligated" to remove the more campy side of their sound as to demonstrate "growth", "maturity", or whatever. Critics usually tend to dunk on those facets of bands like Haken, dream Theater, etc, but it's a side of their sound that I love, I mean, not everything needs to be the Rach 3, let's have some fun, people! :)

[@skullium]

Never clicked on a video so fast, this is my favorite Haken album.. Just love the concept and how fun it is.

[@ShadinCore]

43:46 future bryan projecting incomprehensible visions of catastrophic future into his past self with only one clear message: "krallice must win"

[@ChrisChoi123]

This is my favorite song from haken. I was so fortunate to see it live 2 months ago when they played at pittsburgh and they played this in the encore. Probably my favorite performance i had ever seen. This song has everything, goofy parts, serious parts, a beautiful solo, orchestral parts, weird time sigs and interesting chord progressions, i can go on.

[@EiriUesugiKun]

Oh I so hope they would play this in September when I'm going to see them in a "An evening with Haken" concert.

[@sunsteels]

Haken are a must as modern progressive rock, very valid song! As modern progressive rock I'd suggest you to check "Thank You Scientist". You can choose between "Leave your light on", an absolute gem of poppy prog rock/metal, or "Suspicious Waveforms" as a jazzy math rock/prog metal with 3 surprising solos (and even more).

[@mikegLXIVMM]

A 22:27 minute long musical journey.

[@misterlobsterman]

16:55 It's awkward, because you don't see the whole picture. It's a hard concept album. If you feel weird about it listen to it from start to end, read the lyrics and it will make sense. Well, most of it will. The rest is just Haken-isms.

[@FeRReTNS]

Bryan I could listen to you react to every Haken song.

[@askbjornmusic]

Great reaction as always :) Loved Pacific Rim of prog rock. Laughed out loud. And I really really do love the cyclical campy nature of the lyrical thematic loop in this song. It's there musically all along and makes you wonder where it's going and then once you get it... it's like "oh... wow". Plot twist. Campy. But twisty. Generally speaking all the parts in this song for me are just so catchy too.

[@doobsmcgee]

This was my first experience with Haken all those years ago. Great track!

[@Arrow2theACL]

Going along with the campy idea which I do agree with and really do enjoy myself, and now that you have heard a good bit of Haken, I think a better choice would be to have seen Haken perform this live. I don't think you have seen anything from them live yet. There is a great video of them performing this live and showing their quirkiness which I think is just part of being them.

[@charliebrayson]

Crystallised has to be done! It's just about my favourite Haken song, such an amazing track with more to offer than Visions I believe. With that said, Visions was my favourite song for a long time.

[@mikegLXIVMM]

16:23 I think of Frank Zappa for some reason in this part.

[@muskett00]

Well I loved this song so much. I really need to give Haken more of my time! My only disappointment was the brass featured only at the start.

[@geirgaseidnes7809]

The sudden transitions and world-hopping musical traditions in this remind me a lot of Mr. Bungle's California...

[@Meowmeow0506]

You've reacted to some Haken over the years, I hope one day you do Charlie Griffith's Tiktaalika album, a concept album on the tetrapod ancestor that had a moveable neck and spent some time above water near the shoreline. Very very good album and features many progressive vocalists and musicians such as Tommy Giles Rogers of BTBAM, Neil Purdy of Luna's Call, Daniel de Jongh of Textures, Jordan Rudess of Dream Theater, and more. But as for this specific theme please listen to some of The Ocean Collective!

[@TheoByTheSeao]

Oh man.....I really hope there's some BTBAM and Leprous in the week to come!! The next great Haken song you should check out is Celestial Elixir! It's not quite as long but it's still a cinematic masterpiece of music!

[@PaulHilburger]

Haken's best long epic

[@JVR10893]

Visions is a concept album, and this title track is the grand finale. A lot of the “out of place” sections you’re hearing in this song are lifted from other songs on the album, and so they don’t have the same impact if your first listen of this song is separate from the album.