1. Oriental Iceman [11:48]
  2. Ice Pie [8:54]
  3. Dancing on Snowflakes [3:07]
  4. Nine Ice Groove [7:03]
  5. In The Frame [3:41]
  6. Harlem Slalom [11:21]
  7. Frost In Space [8:10]



product
info		 Recorded at the Bajonor Studios, between April 1997 - March 1998

Rick Wakeman - keyboards
Brad Waissman - bass
Fraser Thorneycroft-Smith - guitars
Stuart Sawney - percussion

In 1977 Rick composed and recorded the music for the Winter Olympics. The resulting album, "White Rock" made the UK Top 10.
Many years later in 1999, Rick re-scored the music for 4 past Winter Olympics and set about the task of re-arranging and recording them.
The result is "White Rock II".

Press Information



review		 Although the story is a bit unclear to me, it seems the music for this album was composed for a movie called Reflections Of Winter (or at least inspired by it) which features images from four different Olympic games (60, 64, 72 and 76). The music was re-arranged, and then re-recorded with a band line-up. I saw that this is not the first release of the album, Wakeman having released it by himself in 1999.

Oriental Iceman starts out nicely enough with percolating keys and atmospheric guitar playing. Then the Oriental influence sets in and the music becomes rather frolic. The continuation is almost like a Christmas song and not that great. The Oriental part returns, alternating with the other passages until the song concludes with the peaceful guitar. Actually it is this part that I like the most.
Like the opening track, Ice Pie is sluggish and New Age like. The drums are programmed and this can be heard rather plainly by lack of dynamics. Maybe this is fine for music accompanying a movie, but not when the music stands on its own. Melodically the music is fine, but the whole of it is somewhat cliche' and without much appeal.
Dancing On Snowflakes I like much better: elegant piano playing, a really nice theme.
On Nine Ice Groove the groove gets under way. All in all the music does continue to sound too tame, especially for something that is meant to be groovy. The guitar as always gives the music something extra, but it is used sparingly.
The tameness of the music continues on In The Frame, typical soundtrack music, this time a bit in the vein of Yanni.
Harlem Slalom has a particularly good theme with an acoustic nylon string intermezzo and even something threatening in the music. Slickly done, but not without its merit.
The final track, Frost In Space, has a nice second part with the programmed drums taking on a more industrial feel and a bit of mystery added to the music.

On the whole, an album that is maybe too typically a soundtrack meant for a large audience: the music is too tame to impress me. The melodic material is usually fine, but how it all comes out leaves me very much uninspired.

2002. Jurriaan Hage