b o b

Gary's review (see below) sums this album up pretty much perfectly - a generally pastoral (although it does get a bit heavier in its second half) and baroque album that reminds me a lot more of Bo Hansson's Lord of the Rings than any Pär Lindh Project album (unsurprising, given the similar thematic material of both albums). The lyrics are kind of hard to take, reaching levels of cheese that are high even for a Tolkien-inspired album. But other than the awful "Rivendell", they're not unlistenable, and fortunately most of the disc is instrumental. As you might expect, keyboards tend to dominate the music, with the guitars coming in a close second. Some of the electric guitar playing sounds surprisingly sloppy, for example on tracks eight and nine (I can't believe they didn't re-record those). Overall though this is a nice CD. I enjoy it more than the imitation ELP of Lindh's other albums. This isn't a disc that I pull out to listen to very often, but it's enjoyable enough when it does get played. review by Bob Eichler — undated —

g a r y v

Those who approach Bilbo expecting the ELP-inspired keyboard bombast of the Pär Lindh Project will doubtless be surprised. Though some obvious ELPisms do materialize, this release for the most part assumes a folky, low-key, "pastoral" air, at times even reminiscent of vintage Camel. And Bilbo does share some obvious parallels with Camel's The Snow Goose, as it serves as a kind of musical soundtrack to a novel. The compositions are shaped by events in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, and characters are assigned musical themes. Bilbo is reasonably varied in mood, but in texture especially so ­ as one might imagine given the wide array of instrumentation on hand. Though some may bristle at the liberal use of sound effects sprinkled throughout, they are appropriate given the aim of the work. The twittering of sparrows in the Shire, the howling of the Wargs, the clattering sound of the One Ring dropped by Gollum in the dark ­ these all lend a certain intimacy to the piece. The rhyming lyrics ­ which hew very closely to Tolkien's poetic style ­ are sung in English, though Magdalena Hagberg's Swedish accent is more conspicuous here than on subsequent PLP releases. There are a couple of surprises here. One is that Lindh is a remarkably accomplished drummer! He's no Nisse Bielfeld perhaps, but he can certainly hold his own on the skins ­ enough to impress me anyway. Also, an embryonic form of a well-known PLP song is tucked away in the middle of the disc; it will sprout a few years later into a full-fledged "Baroque Impression No. 1" on Mundus Incompertus. Understandably, some prog fans maintain that a Tolkien-based work is unsalvageably cheesy. Yes, the juvenile "Rivendell" ("Your ponies need resting/Your tummies need filling/...the dwarfs are so grumpy/So grumpy humpy dumpy") may wear out its welcome after repeated listenings, but it is faithful to the spirit of Tolkien's elves after all, so I'm willing to overlook it. On balance, this was a pleasant find, and I don't hesitate to recommend it to fans of gentle symph-prog. A final note: the woodwind melody opening the disc is not that far removed from the Rolling Stones' "Paint it Black". Since the latter appeared on the soundtrack of a certain Stanley Kubrick movie, I'm now stuck with a bizarre Bilbo/Full Metal Jacket association which I'm hoping the passage of time will quickly erode... review by Gary Varney — 8-10-00 —