The idea isn't bad, the result is rather convincing, and the added incentive is enough to make The Road Back Home a worthy addition to a Flower Kings fan's collection, but do read on, because you should know what you're getting. This two-CD set is a compilation album – a theme compilation album, in fact…

Another stroke of genius. Vastly different from their darker and highly melodic Paradox Hotel and a nod to the jazz of Space Revolver, the happiness of Stardust we are, and the positive melody-writing of Adam and Eve. This album completely kicks out their tendencies to make an album-flow with short songs, intermissions and interludes…

The ever prolific Roine Stolt brings his Swedish prog-rock monolith the Flower Kings back into the studio for a double-disc outing created around the notion of existence. Light stuff, eh? It is, actually. For those who are wrapped tight in prog rock's knotty, twist-and-turn melodies, quick-change tempos, harmonic extensions, eloquent, guitar pathways that are only topped by keyboard excesses that display acumen and prowess, and glistening production – and production where it takes eight hours to get a guitar solo right in the studio – Paradox Hotel will seem a tad foreign, and perhaps even strange…