A review from Ron Fuchs ProgNaut.com.

I reviewed the separate releases that encompass The Key To Perception, Continuum (2006) & Space Between Us (2007) plus 12 bonus tracks, which is the complete history as of it’s release in 2009. There’s also an in-depth booklet which tells the story of Karfagen.

The man behind the scenes is multi-instrumentalist Antony Kalugin, a Ukrainian rock artist, who’s also responsible for two other projects Sunchild and Hoggwash, that were released during the time of the Karfagen recordings. Antony is quite a busy musician that juggles three projects. Sunchild was reviewed by one of the staff writers at ProgNaut.com.

Karfagen’s music captures the spirit of classic progressive rock such as Camel, Focus and UK. The bonus tracks are demos and previously unreleased material. You can read my separate reviews of the Continuum and Space Between Us for the music content.

Whether you have the first two releases or not, I would recommend getting The Key To Perception for it’s great value musically. It’s also for those on the fence about the band plus better value money wise. This also marks the first chapter, hopefully in a long career, of Karfagen.

Reviewed by Ron Fuchs on July 23rd, 2010

A review from Hans at Progwereld.
(kindly translated into English for us by Hans)

Karfagen - The Key To Perception (2009)

With "The Key To Perception" you hit three birds with one stone.

Bird one is the fact that you purchase with this double album the complete Karfagen works including 2009 in one time. Bird two are the numbers of previously unreleased tracks and demo tracks you got and finally bird three is that the complete double album (totally clocking 160 minutes) is remastered and comes with a beautiful and synoptic booklet containing some liner notes from Antony with each track.

With "The Key To Perception" Antony Kalugin closed chapter 1 of the Karfagen book and also the period in which he composed and released "Continium" and "The Space Between Us". Because Antony was not fully satisfied with the sound quality of both the albums he decided to remaster them and release them as a double album. As a matter of fact you can read this in my interview with Antony in 2009.

Camel, Focus, Pat Metheny and UK are the main influences you can hear in the music of Karfagen. The almost complete instrumental music has many influences of jazz and fusion music, while also classical influences can be heard. Especially jazz is a very popular genre in the Ukraine. So it was not hard for Antony to find some good skilled musicians for the Karfagen albums.

Both "Continium" and "The Space Between Us" are reviewed earlier. So it is more interesting to shine a light upon the bonus tracks and tracks that were previously unreleased. It is prominent that A Winter Tale is cut into three pieces, whilest the original track is labelled as one track. On disc 1 you can find three unreleased tracks, like the very short and Focus influenced E2 - E4. This track is more like a short organ tune and sounds like an intro. For The Friend is a smooth and cheerful sounding piece of music. This track has a catchy melody with some dominating keys and guitar. The Key To Perception sounds very classical and consists of nice piano playing by Antony. He composed this track in 1998 when he was 15 years old.

The other disc displays besides the demo-version of Labyrinth two previously unreleased tracks. Night Flight Jam dates from 1997 and is a smooth track mainly consisting of nice organ playing and striking drums. Some nice violin and guitar solo's gives this track the necessary interruptions. You can hear obviously that Antony was still a beginning guitar player. It was one of the first tracks he composed by the way. Sun Valleys continues in the same atmosphere as his predecessor but has some nice folky sounding pieces.

This album is mainly interesting for the ones who lack Karfagen music until date. If you got both ones "The Key To Perception" is a very welcome supplement due to the improved sound quality, demo tracks and previously unreleased tracks.
Further more you have to wait for Karfagen chapter 2.