Trace - Birds (1975)

The second album from this Dutch band.

Trace was a trio with a lineup of bass, keyboards, guitars, percussion and vocals.

I reviewed their 1974 self-titled album back in March 2009 and found that a good album, somewhere between Ekseption and ELP. You can read my review here.

I was meant to review all their three albums in one go....... but more prog got in the way and I forgot. Their third album will be reviewed next week/you can read my review of their third and final album somewhere else in this blog.

Trace is again very influenced by ELP and Ekseption. Add in Triumvirat too and you get the picture.
This is symphonic prog with a lot of classical music influences.

Johan Sebastian Bach has a lot to answer for and that includes Trace as a band and their three albums too. What a charge-sheet....

There is a lot of good symphonic prog and neo-classical take on Bach, Beethoven and old baroque music here. The keyboards plays the biggest part on this mainly instrumental forty minutes long album.

This album is an improvement and a development from their debut album which was barely a good album. The music here is indeed very good. Yes, it is very like ELP and a tad less good than their best albums. Nevertheless, this is a very good album.

3.5 points