NEVERDREAM is an Italian band. According to their sales/promo sheet they are supposed to be a progressive Metal band. After repeated listening to this album, I honestly don't know what to call it. I say this because I don't see the word "painful" under any existing musical genre. Make no mistake about, you will wish the word "painful" was a musical genre so you could appropriately list this band.

The first song starts out with some electronic elements and then fades into a mess. The lyrics throughout the entire album are spoken and whispered, not sung, with an effect on the voice the entire time. It never lets up or changes at all. The question I kept asking myself is "how did they get signed"? Obviously if I had to ask myself that, I don't have the answer, and I defy anyone else to answer it for me. I have never written an entirely negative review before because I know how hard it is to make a good album. There are thousands of bands out there and only a handful are lucky enough to make it. The question is: who got passed over so that NEVERDREAM could get signed? It is a rhetorical question, but the fact is, God only knows.

The whispering of the vocals totally befuddles me. I can only guess as to why they would want to do this. Maybe they couldn't find anyone that could sing? There are six members in this band and all they could manage was a whisper and spoken words vocals? The effect on the vocals doesn't help them any. The song "Voodoo" is the only song with some harmony vocals, and you guessed it, whispered harmony vocals. This album is supposed to be a concept album about Africa. That's a very nice concept, but I simply don't hear it. A lot of the songs simply have no cohesion to them. The pattern to the songs is all over the place. There is no steady beat to be heard, just random drum beats. I have heard progressive Metal music a thousand times in my life and this simply doesn't fit that definition. Note, they do manage a bit of singing in the final song of the album, but you have to sift through over fifteen minutes to hear it.

My recommendation is to stay away, far far away from "Said". I hate to say it, but I can't imagine there is any sizable fan base for this type of music out there.