Flower Kings

The Flower Kings - New Compilation CD out on Inside Out - June 26th.

6th May 2007 @ Flower Kings
The double CD album will be released on June 26th in USA and probably around that date in Europe too. The title of the album is "Road Back Home" and it contain 27 songs, spanning from 1995 to 2006. It focus on the more melodic and groovy or shorter tracks, means less fusion and more melody and moody tracks. All songs are transferred carefully to 24 bit digital, remixed, quite a few of them have different solos and some added backingvocals and there's even a totally unreleased track, plus the full version of our take on Genesis classic "Cinema Show"

It comes in a nice slipcase and there will be a 20 page booklet that have archive photos, comments on each song, recording data and anekdotes by yours truely.

All remixed, re-arranged, remastered and I might add, with quite a nice result on most and even a stunning sonic result on a few. Prepare with a good set of headphones and your favourite tea. (This one might even appeal to your wife or mother in law or the guys at work)

The Flower Kings - Road Back Home (2007)
Disc One (77:49)
1. Cosmic Lover
2. A Kings Prayer
3. Stupid Girl
4. Cosmic Circus
5. Babylon
6. Paradox Hotel
7. World Without A Heart
8. Church Of Your Heart
9. Vox Humana
10. What If God Is Alone
11. Starlight Man
12. Grand Old World
13. The Road Back Home
14. Cinema Show

Disc Two (75:59)
1. Ghost Of The Red Cloud
2. Painter
3. I Am The Sun (p2)
4. Different People
5. Little Deceiver*
6. Chickenfarmer Song
7. The Rhythm Of The Sea
8. Touch My Heaven
9. Life Will Kill You
10. Monkey Business
11. Compassion
12. The Flower King
13. Stardust We Are (end section)

* unreleased track from Rainmaker sessions.

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Studio Report from Roine Stolt

Flowerkings have started the recording of new album on March 26th, ol' time drummer Zoltan Csörsz have recorded with the band and we are all very excited about the quality and the sheer committment that Zoltan have put into this recording. The recording week have been a great experience for us all, we've been in a great studio facility that have tons of vintage gear and we've had it 24/7 so we've lived there and we've worked with our trusted team of Petrus Königson as engineeer and we've had Per Nordin there videofilming the sessions, so we have hours and hours of filmed material.

The result is as far as we can see a great symphonic & progressive rock album that have more of the Retropolis/Stardust/Flower Power vibe but perhaps a bit more "progressive" in the sense there are no short easy listening songs, however there are very melodic and likewise catchy sections integrated in these epics.

A few of these songs were really difficult to play, the intricacy of time signatures had us on our toes, but it was great fun. Yes there are similarities to songs like Stardust We Are or Garden Of Dreams but perhaps even as much to the Transatlantics epics.

The sound quality is head and shoulders above what we got from the Medley on Paradox Hotel, Petrus is a genius and the Varispeed studio with it's 3 NEVE desks and old U 47 Telefunkens, old Neumans etc. is the coolest and the best studio I've ever recorded in, the result is top notch and the vibe there was all late 60's and early 70's.

We had the pleasure to use lots of vintage keyboards, a custom modified ( by expert Brian Davenport) Hammond B 3 that sounded just fabulous and along with that we will, or have used real Minimoogs, Wurlizer, Fender Rhodes pianos and a Grand Piano.

This means that this album will see more of the vintage keyboard sounds than on any other TFK record, I feel it goes well with the songs that have great melodic and warm melodies that take me back to the glory days of Procol Harum, ELP, Genesis, Yes, Focus, Gentle Giant, Jethro Tull, Deep Purple and The Beatles.

I have tried to remember the feeling of standing on stage when the band sound great and we really feel like we're moving air and we're moving peoples hearts and I've tried to write from that perspective, perhaps with a less intellectual style and more of a direct soulful vibe.

Now we are a few weeks into overdubbing vocals and percussion, extra guitars and keys and hopefully by mid June we have delivered a steaming hot new CD album to Inside Out that we're proud of and that will take you back to the glory days of prog.

In my opinion TFK have never sounded better and never delivered such a compact collection of melodic symph/prog, what we do best, I admit we took a few (interesting) detours but this is what defines the band, this is as close as it gets to what I set out to do 12 years ago.

Roine. =>>>>>>>>>>>

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@ Wiki
The Flower Kings are a Swedish progressive rock band. Formed in 1993 by veteran guitarist Roine Stolt as a touring band to support his solo album The Flower King, the band stayed together after the tour and have gone on to become one of the most prolific studio recording units in rock music of their era. In ten years they have released nearly 18 hours of music.

The Flower Kings have seen frequent personnel changes. The original line-up for Stolt's solo album consisted of Stolt (vocals, electric guitar, bass, keyboards), Jamie Salazar (drums), and Hasse Fröberg (vocals). When the full band was formed, they added Michael Stolt (bass) and Tomas Bodin (keyboards). Michael Stolt and Salazar have both left the band since its formation, replaced by Jonas Reingold (bass) and Zoltan Csörsz (drums). Other contributors have included Hasse Bruniusson (percussion), Ulf Wallander (saxophone) and Daniel Gildenlöw of Pain of Salvation (vocals, guitar, keyboards and percussion). Zoltan Csörsz has recently been replaced by new drummer Marcus Liliequist. Daniel Gildenlöw recently left because of personal issues. According to a Myspace blog posted by Roine Stolt on April 2, 2007, Zoltan Csörsz will be the drummer on the upcoming record, and perhaps reclaim his spot permanently.

Roine Stolt has written the vast majority of the material the band has recorded, with Bodin contributing most of the rest. The music is perhaps best described as "symphonic," bearing a strong resemblance in many instances to that of Yes, and yet there are also hints of strong influence from the jazz fusion genre. The band's lyrics are almost uniformly positive, affirming such values as love, peace, and spirituality.

Their 1999 album Flower Power contains one of the longest progressive rock tracks ever recorded, the eighteen-section, nearly 60-minute "Garden of Dreams."

Roine Stolt recorded two albums with supergroup Transatlantic, with members of Dream Theater, Spock's Beard, and Marillion, in 2000 and 2001.

Discography
Studio albums
* The Flower King (1994) (Roine Stolt solo album, regular and artwork editions)
* Back in the World of Adventures (1995)
* Retropolis (1996)
* Stardust We Are (1997) (double CD)
* Flower Power (1999) (double CD)
* Space Revolver (2000) (regular and digipack editions single CD, Japanese edition double CD)
* The Rainmaker (2001) (regular edition single CD, special limited edition double CD)
* Unfold the Future (2002) (double CD, limited edition contains bonus track)
* Adam & Eve (2004)
* Paradox Hotel (2006) (double CD)

Live albums
* Alive on Planet Earth (2000) (double live CD)
* Meet the Flower Kings (2003) (double live CD and DVD, available separately or together)
* Instant Delivery (2006) (double live DVD concert, limited edition includes double cd and booklet)

Limited Edition Official Bootlegs
* Édition Limitée Québec (1998) (unreleased and live tracks)
* The Rainmaker Tour 2001 (downloadable from website, not commercially available)
* Live In New York - Official Bootleg (2002)
* BetchaWannaDanceStoopid!!! (2004)

Fan Club Albums
* Fan Club 2000 (2000)
* Fan Club 2002 (2002)
* Fan Club 2004 (2004)
* Fan Club 2005 / Harvest (2005)

Compilations
* Scanning The Greenhouse (1998)

Related Discographies
* Circus Brimstone
* Roine Stolt
* Tomas Bodin
* Transatlantic
* The Tangent
* Kaipa =>>>>>>>>>>>

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The Flower Kings Stardust We Are

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Flower Kings Interview

Hot On The Star Wars Trail With The Space Revolver Of Flower Kings
Interview by John "Bo Bo" Bollenberg

@ Progressive World
"We started writing the new material in February and entered the studio at the end of that same month", says guitarist Roine Stolt. "The writing went so easy, and for the very first time in the existence of the Flower Kings I really felt good about what I heard. Don't get me wrong, I like most of the stuff we've written over the years, but when you're in the middle of a recording session sometimes it gets too much, so you'd rather end it all there and then. Sometimes a break during the recording session wouldn't be a bad idea. Yet this time everything went so smooth, and in the middle of April I told Tomas Bodin that I really liked the new material, that it was very strong."

What was the difference than with the other Flower Kings material? "First of all, some of the money I earned with the Transatlantic thing I invested in new equipment for my studio. This resulted in a better production throughout. Just listen to that drum sound on Space Revolver. The studio is basically the same but I just added a couple of extras and that can be heard on the final album. Also the new album is more like a collection of all our various influences. This time we added Beatles, Doors, Zappa, Hendrix, ELP, Genesis, pop and fusion to end with what really is the Flower Kings."

Space Revolver (2000)I hear you mention The Beatles. Didn't you say to me once that Revolver was a big influence to you? So is Space Revolver your answer to this influence? "Full marks! Exactly! The way Revolver hit me when I first heard it, I wanted our new album to hit other people. The idea went even as far as suggesting we should make the cover a pastiche of the famous Klaus Voorman classic. Luckily we didn't do it. Furthermore 'Space Revolver' is one of three instrumentals I recorded during a two-day stint in the studio. Our record company in Japan requested this and I believe a special CD was made with 'Space Revolver,' 'Jupiter Backwards,' and 'She Carved Me A Wooden Heart,' which was handed out when people bought a ticket to come and see us when we over there to perform. I invented those titles as I went along. In fact they are only some demos with everything handled by myself. It might be some of these ideas end up being used on a forthcoming FK album but then re-modeled and probably retitled as well."

Going back to the new album, wasn't "I Am The Sun" intended to be one long epic of 25 minutes? "Of course it was. But we wanted to kick off the album with a true Flower Kings sound and end the album with a bombastic song. When we looked at 'I Am The Sun' we found we had the first song in the beginning and the final song right at the end so we opted to break it up into two parts. Of course live we'll do it as one long song."

So there will be live dates then. I heard the rumour there would be a double bill together with Spock's Beard in Europe. "The Spock's thing certainly won't be happening. Spock's wanted to headline and they are looking at shows of 2 to 2 and half hours so we would only have about 40 minutes time to perform. Furthermore we wouldn't get paid at all. Only the expenses would be covered but all of the takings would be for Spock's Beard. Needless to say we couldn't agree on those terms. We have, however, signed with Derek Kemp management in Britain. They are the same people who also handle Dream Theater and who landed DT with dates in Eastern Europe. So both Flower Kings and Transatlantic are now with Derek Kemp. Flower Kings will tour Europe somewhere in November this year and of course the set will now feature a lot of new material. There are also strong possibilities to tour Europe with Transatlantic. After all, we feel it wouldn't be fair seeing we sold more Transatlantic CD's in Europe than in America, yet the band has so far only done some shows in the States. The difficulty here is to see when Mike [Portnoy] is available. I know he'll be in the studio January/February 2001 to record the new Dream Theater album."

Transatlantic - SMPTe (2000)Was any of the Space Revolver material written with the intention to use it for the first Transatlantic album? "Yes it was. Both 'Monster Within' and 'Slave To Money' were written for the project but were rejected. I thought they were good songs so I used them for Flower Kings. As soon as I had some promo copies of the album I gave one to Pete [Trewavas], Neal [Morse] and Mike. I remember Mike putting it in the stereo of the tour bus and as soon as he heard 'Monster Within' he shouted 'that was a song you promised for the second Transatlantic album, Roine!' Of course I did, but I thought I could write an even better song for the new album. So far I know Mike has reserved about ten days in January 2001 for us to get together after which we'll do the necessary overdubs."

I'm convinced the second Transatlantic will be even better than the first if we can compare this with the second offering of projects such as Liquid Tension Experiment, Platypus and Bozzio, Levin, Stevens? "Definitely. I mean [that] when we got together for the first time we hardly knew each other. Now we know more about each other's personality, about what we like, what we dislike. Also I find that the first album sounds a bit too much like Spock's Beard. In a song like 'In Held ('Twas) In I' you hardly notice the unique skills of Portnoy. So this time I think we have to leave the covers for what they are and only record original material."

Is recording with the Flower Kings an easy thing to do? "Most of us live close to each other so it's easy to communicate. Over the years Tomas Bodin has also become my very best friend. Sometimes he calls me six times a day so I can hear bits and pieces of what he's composing. Our new bass player

Jonas Reingold lives in the south of Sweden. He doesn't have a prog background and is more jazz oriented yet he's highly skilled and has no problem to adapt [to] whatever style [he is soon to play with the Pär Lindh Project - Bo Bo"]. We just give him the basic information and he'll conjure up the rest. The same thing happens when we go out on tour. We just call him, let him know the songs we're about to play and he does the rest by himself. On stage there's no panic button to be seen as he just plays on 'automatic pilot!'"

When Roine released his solo album The Flower King in 1994 could he ever have dreamed he would be where he is right now? "I hoped I could one day perform the music I really loved. I was convinced that, as long as bands like Yes, Jethro Tull, Genesis could go on, even if they no longer sold millions of albums like they used to, I could make a go of it as well."

So you started your own record label Foxtrot and took it from there. "Exactly and that's the main reason why the early albums don't sound the way they should sound simply because I didn't have the money to build my studio the way I wanted it to be. Now that we've signed to Inside Out and also Inside Out America things go much smoother. You see, it's impossible to be creative, run a record label, sort out the management side of things, plan your own tours and be a father all at the same time. Sooner or later this had to clash with the creative process so I'm glad we signed with a bigger label and to a bigger management. Finally we're able to live better lives plus we can fully concentrate on what we know best and that's create innovative music. Even before we had composed one single note for the new album we already received an advance. So I asked Inside Out why they did this and they told us they had enough confidence in us. They knew it would be good."

I'm glad the sun finally starts to shine from behind those dark clouds that have been blocking your view all those years! "Yes, we finally can lead a decent life and what's more there's also interest in the domain of endorsement. I can't really tell you anymore details but it regards both guitars and pickups and it is a very interesting offer indeed."

Finally, would you say that prog today is still for "old" people? "Strange you should ask this because recently we had to ask someone's dad [for] permission if he could become a member of our fan club. The guy was only eleven years old! Enough said!" =>>>>>>>>>>>

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Jonas Reingold

Jonas Reingold is a 32-year-old bass guitar player from Malmö, Sweden. He started to play bass in 1986 when he subbed for a friend who was the bass player in the local famous act WIRE. The band was happy with his performance and offered him the spot. From 1988 until 1994 he studied music and achieved a master degree of fine arts in 1994.

Busy working as a session player between 1994 and 1996 he finally released his debut album as a band leader in 1995, which was called Sweden Bass Orchestra. It was a bass big band consisting of 5 bass players and a drummer. They also had a guest performance by Niels-Henning Orstedt Pedersen on the disc. Between 1996 and 1999, Reingold was busy recording with various artists and different projects, such as Midnight Sun, Reingold, Sand and Gold and a few others.

In 1999 he started to work with The Flower Kings, replacing Michael Stolt who moved on to other things, and is still a permanent member in the group. Right now he is involved with the Kings, Opus Atlantica and his own band; Karmakanic. Furthermore, he was involved with Time Requiem.

2002 had Reingold release the first album with his project Karmakanic; 'Entering The Spectra'. In 2003 Karmakanic released their second album 'Wheel Of Life' which was composed (again) completely by Jonas.

Reingolds unique composing style is main subject of critics. His music contains a unique mixture of pop, jazz and hard rock without becoming 'artificial' like many other acts in the 'prog rock' genre.

Karmakanics 3rd release is planned for 2006. =>>>>>>>>>>>

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@ myspace.com

Jonas Reingold is a multi-talented music man from Malmö, Sweden. He's a bass player, producer and composer who started his career in 1986 in a local band. He got his master's degree in fine arts in 1994 at the Malmö Academy of Music and has recorded with numerous musicians since then.

From fretted to fretless bass, from melodic symphonic / progressive rock to classic rock, sophisticated jazz rock and fusion, Jonas brings all styles to a level where his bass goes beyond simply being a rhythm instrument. He brings his bass up front to be a lead instrument. To date Jonas has recorded over 40 studio albums, produced tens of albums/singles for other artists and performed over 2,500 live shows.

Jonas has worked with artists like Roine Stolt and Tomas Bodin (The Flower Kings), Göran Edman, Krister Jonsson (both in Jonas’ own band Karmakanic), Zoltan Csörsz (Flower Kings, Karmakanic and Jonas Hellborg Trio) Niels Henning-Orsted Pedersen, Hans Lundin and Morgan Ågren (Kaipa), Richard Andersson (Time Requiem), Pete Sandberg, Andy Tillison (The Tangent), Hasse Bruniusson (Flower Kings, Samla Mammas Manna), Jocke JJ Marsh (Tomas Bodin, Glenn Hughes) and many more…

At this moment, early 2007, Jonas has finished recording bass guitar for the new Kaipa album, he is finishing producing the debut album of dutch progrock band Splinter and he is finishing recording and producing his new Karmakanic album. =>>>>>>>>>>>

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Monitors: Genelec 1031, QLN 102021, PVC control

Console: Yamaha 01v

Outboard: Focusrite ISA 430 dig exp., Focusrite ISA 220, Focusrite octapre 8 channels, DBX 586 2 channels, MDI- 400 2 channels preamp from a MCI mixing console, Tube Tech CL 1B, Alesis 3630

Microphones:
AKG c12v, AKG Solid tube, 2x Nueman TLM 103, Groove tube am 61, 4x Sm 57,
2x Beta 57, Beta 52, EV 737, 2 X AKG 414, AKG D 12,

Audio Interface and converters:
MOTU 1296, MOTU 2408 mk3, Apogee PSX-100, RME Hammerfall 9632.

Computers:
Mac G4 2x1.25 ghz, Mac G4 450 mghz, 2xViewsonic 17", Lacie electron blue.

Software: Logic 6.4 pro

Plugins:
2x UAD 1, Tc works, Atmosphere, Moog modular V, The Grand,

Keyboards:
Yamaha DX7, Novation K station, Novation Bass station, EMU E6400 ultra, Roland FP-5 digital piano.

Instruments:
Yamaha BB 3000 bass, Fretless custom made, Tanglewood ac. guitar, Ephiphon electric guitar.

Piano
Pearl export 8,10,12,14,16,22
15 different effect pedals for guitar and bass
Line 6, EBS etc.

Headphones:
Beyer dynamic, Sony, etc. (7 different)

Amps:
EBS Fafner 800 w, EBS 1 preamp, Evulotion 4x12 cab, Hartke 2x10, Hartke 1x15

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Jonas Reingold bass solo

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