Germany’s Sieges Even released «The Art of Navigating by the Stars» on 30 September 2005 through Inside Out Music — their sixth album and the point where their progressive rock found its most mature and complete form.
“`Country: Germany
Style: Progressive Rock
For fans of: Subsignal, Riverside, Porcupine Tree, Rush
The album opens with a baby’s laughter and then spreads across eight tracks that run past the hour mark. All of them have titles built on the word «Sequence» and a Roman numeral, without forming a continuous story: motifs return from track to track, but each one stands on its own, and still a listen from start to finish feels as solid as a concept album.
On «The Weight» the motif that comes back in the middle and at the close of the record is heard for the first time, under Arno Menses‘s line «the view from here is frightening». The guitars of Markus Steffen have a clean, reverb-filled tone, with heavy surges wherever the song demands them. Underneath, bassist Oliver Holzwarth and drummer Alex Holzwarth play with measure and precision, letting themselves loose only when it is needed — as in the chorus of «Stigmata», which brings Rush strongly to mind.
The band moves with ease between complex metres and natural tempo shifts, without losing its melodic line. The long instrumental passages — four minutes in «Unbreakable», the middle section of the closing «Styx» — never tire the ear, while tracks such as «The Lonely Views of Condors» and «To the Ones Who Have Failed» always keep a singable point. The acoustic moment of «Blue Wide Open» stands out too, with Menses‘s voice completely exposed.
The album’s line-up is Arno Menses (vocals), Markus Steffen (guitars), Alex Holzwarth (drums) and Oliver Holzwarth (bass), with Walter Dorn on the flute in «Lighthouse». After one more record, 2007’s «Paramount», Sieges Even broke up; Menses and Steffen went on to Subsignal, while the Holzwarth brothers passed through many bands, best known for their stints in versions of Rhapsody.
Our take
Twenty-one years on, «The Art of Navigating by the Stars» remains one of the most carefully built albums of modern progressive rock. It never shows off: every difficult metre serves a song, every long passage has a reason to exist, and the production leaves each instrument clear without losing its weight. It is one of those albums you do not put on for a single track — you play it whole.
See also
The Emerald Dawn – The Land, the Sea, the Air (Volume II) and Karcius – Black Soul Sickness.
Source: https://theprogressivesubway.com/2026/10/04/lost-in-time-sieges-even-the-art-of-navigating-by-the-stars/
