2026 March 22, by Greg Cummins.

Lunar Clock is yet another band whose music was unknown to me until the physical CD landed in my letter box. The band is lead by Robin Boer (keyboards, lead vocals), with Achille Regazzoni (12-string guitar, keyboards, bass, FX) and Karsten van Straten (drums, percussion, keyboards, backing vocals, FX). Being from The Netherlands was a bonus for me as I have often enjoyed plenty of great music from this region including Ayreon, Kayak, Focus, Finch, Earth & Fire, Knight Area, Lady Lake, 5 Bridges and plenty of others.

This is a band that knows how to create atmosphere, and they do it exceptionally well. The opening textures feel suspended in reverb, as if the band are testing the acoustics of a cathedral on the moon. There’s a clear confidence in how the record unfolds with long-form structures, patient harmonic shifts and an almost cosmic sense of space.

It is quite an introspective album and does not contain very much in the way of built up aggression or complex time signatures. If anything, it probably suffers a little from too many soft interludes and could possibly benefit with a few sections where the band let loose with some muscle. The keyboard work however, is exceptionally good and the guy is a monster on the widdly widdly bits which I happen to always enjoy, if done well. No complaints from me! The overall mood and ambience from the keyboards is really what makes this album shine and is one area, any potential listeners should concentrate on first, as your future enjoyment of this album will surely be well directed by those initial impressions.

On early listens, I found it genuinely absorbing. The band’s use of layered synth pieces and subtly shifting rhythmic figures creates a kind of slow gravitational pull. The arrangements feel deliberately expansive — phrases stretch out, motifs recur in altered form and themes evolve rather than repeat verbatim. It’s the sort of album that encourages you to sit still and let it wash over you rather than cherry-pick tracks.

However, after about six dedicated listens, a curious thing happened: some of the magic receded. The album’s immersive quality — initially its biggest strength — became something of a double-edged sword. When you hear compositions with such consistent atmospheric density, the peaks and troughs begin to feel more like gentle gradients rather than the previous dramatic climaxes that stay lodged in your memory.

It isn’t that the music becomes bad — far from it — but moments where I was expecting structural tension or harmonic surprise often resolve in ways that feel a little predictable if you’re listening analytically. Allegro sections that once felt expansive now hover, somewhat suspended, without the payoff I subconsciously hoped for.

For example, Life Through Corridors has rich textural work and some lovely counter-rhythms, yet its cyclical progressions begin to blur together across repeated walks through the track-list.

If you’re the sort of listener who loves progressive transitions, ambient layering and moments where mood outweighs a formulaic verse/chorus structure, II will feel like a late-night conversation with your own imagination. Fans of art-rock, slow-burn prog, and bands that let timbre and space do the heavy lifting, will find plenty to savour.

However, if your musical appetite leans toward catchy hooks, dramatic rhythmic shifts, or jaw-dropping moments of genre blending (say, sudden time-signature flips or high-contrast climaxes), you might find the album deliberately subtle — great for introspection, perhaps less so for repeated hit-play sessions.

Lunar Clock sit somewhere between progressive art-rock and ambient-inflected post-rock, but they’re not derivative. The very melodic synth sections also create a strong symphonic, almost pastoral effect which really suits when in a pensive mood. Under decent headphones and a glass or three of your favourite poison, the effect is really enhanced.

Technically, the album is impressive. The production is polished without being sterile and there’s careful attention to dynamic contour. The band clearly understand tension and release — though sometimes they seem almost too polite about it. It’s not that the album loses quality — it’s that it reveals its blueprint. And once you see the scaffolding, a bit of the mystery evaporates.

I certainly enjoyed this band’s music for the most part but the overall excursion has been a little bit lost on me and it’s definitely not the fault of the music. I will simply put it down to discovering yet another otherwise unknown band whose magic needs to keep working its way through my grey matter. I’m sure it will eventually penetrate deep into the darkest regions of my data processing confuzzler.

Overall, I genuinely enjoyed II, especially in those early listens where its sonic world felt fresh and immersive. It’s a carefully constructed, sonically rich album that shows real compositional maturity. But after six spins, I found myself wishing for sharper contrasts, a few more unexpected harmonic detours, or a moment of unapologetic boldness — something slightly messy or risky to offset the elegance.

Still, it’s an album I respect. And on the right evening — lights low, distractions gone — it still has the power to pull me back into orbit.

Visit website DPRP.