Friday 8 September 2017

Corima - Amaterasu (2016)


The third album from this US band.

Corima is a quintet on this album with a lineup of saxophone, violin, keyboards, synths, organs, glockenspiel, bass, drums, guitars and vocals.

Their previous album, the 2012 album Quietzalcoatl floored me back in October 2012 when I reviewed it. A great album and you can read my review here. I also liked their self-titled debut album a lot and you can read my review here

Corima is something as rare as a zeuhl band. And a zeuhl band in the more Japanese tradition. Koenjihyakkei is a good reference for their Quietzalcoatl album. Corima has also blown away those of my friends who has attended one of Corima's gigs.

So I was a bit miffed when I started to listen to this album. The first half of this album is jazz-zeuhl in the vein of Zao. Very good jazz, though. This is the kind of jazz that plays on all my heartstrings.... well, most of them. And it is a bit zeuhl too because the jazz is hyper-active and dynamic. That opus is called Tsukutomi I-III.

That track glides over into the title track Amaterasu I - VI. And we are really back into classic zeuhl territory again. There is a lot of violins here as there was a lot of violins on Tsukutomi I-III too. The bass, organ, drums and glockenspiel is working like maniacs and the vocals too comes in as instruments. This is zeuhl and do we love it ? Oh, yeah.....

This album is forty-nine minutes long and this great album serves to confirm that Corima is one of the best progressive rock bands around right now. It also proves that there is life in zeuhl too.

4 points




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