Great Wide Nothing - The View From Olympus (2019)

The debut album from this US band.

The band is a trio with a lineup of guitars, keyboards, bass, drums and vocals.

The prog rock scene in USA too is very much alive and brings us new bands all the time.

Great Wide Nothing is one of these bands.

The basis in their take on progressive rock is neo-prog. Add some US college rock too and some Americana influences.

This is in short a typical US prog rock album, soundwise.

The album consist of two x ten minutes long suites, one three minutes long song and one eighteen minutes long suite. Despite of this, the music is not anywhere near being symphonic prog.

A verse of  "What A Wonderful Life" by Louis Armstrong starts the second suite and that feels a bit strange, that opening. It does not add anything either to his song and album.

The music on this album is medium complex and has no real killer tracks or any good tracks. It is a decent to good album which fails to impress me. But check it out.

2.5 points

Jinetes Negros - Tawa Sarira (2013)

The fourth album from this Argentine band.

The band is a quintet with a lineup of drums, bass, keyboards, guitars, percussion and Spanish vocals.
They had help from four guest musicians who provided winds, accordion, backing vocals and narration.

I am no fan of progressive metal and that is why I have so far chosen to give this band and their albums a wide berth.

Somehow, their last two albums landed in my inbox and my curiosity got the better of me. I put them up for reviews.

Tawa Sarira has indeed some progressive metal stuff...... but not that much.

What we get here is a mix of progressive metal, good old Argentine symphonic prog and good old South American folk rock.

There is a lot of flutes here and piano. The vocals are rather good. 

It is not an easy listening album either. Some of the music is really complex and requires a lot from the listener. Other pieces again is rather more melodic.

The end result is an album as lush as the cover art-work. There is no real great songs here. Nevertheless, this is a good album well worth checking out.

3 points

Styx - Cyclorama (2003)

The 14th album from this US band.

Styx were a sextet on this album with a lineup of guitars, bass, drums, mandolin, piano, organ, synths, loops, percussion and vocals.
Numerous other musicians contributed with vocals. Lots of well known names.

I am no fan of their AOR era. I am even a lesser fan of what they have come up with here.

Cyclorama is an album meant to please everyone at the same time. You get Def Leppard like metal, Mr Big like acoustic guitar ballads, some pop music, a lot of rock music, some hard rock, a lot of AOR and lots of vocal harmonies.

The vocals is OK.

The music is pretty much close to a disaster. It is dull, far too commercial and far too much dominated by hair spray infections which has had an adverse, totally damaging effect on the small grey between the hair pieces who is there to write good songs.

There is no good songs here and the sound is not good.

This is a turkey. A true turkey and an album I cannot stand even after some extended listening sessions.

1 point

Cosmograf - End Of Ecclesia (2009)

The debut album from this UK band.

The band was only Robin Armstrong on guitars, keyboards, drums, bass and vocals on this album.
He had help from a guest musician on one track who added guitars and bass.

I interviewed Robin for ProgArchives right after the release of the second Cosmograf album When Age Has Done It's Duty in 2011 and got the feeling that End Of Ecclesia was a bit of a touchy subject.

When Age Has Done It's Duty is a superb album though and the subsequent album has also been very good. I am reviewing some of them this summer.

End Of Ecclesia is the one hour long album and it is a debut album. Ideas is tested and discarded. From listening to the other albums, most ideas from this album has been discarded.

This one hour give us a mix of neo-prog, harder prog and more art rock.

You can to a large extent hear that this is a Cosmograf album.... and then again, you can't. But the DNA is here. There are some prog metal stuff here who does not really flies.

The worst song here by miles is Cosmograf's version of the hippie flower-power evergreen San Fransisco by Scott McKenzie. It is renamed Flowers In The Hair on this album and it is a really bad song in Cosmograf's hands.

The rest of the album is somewhat better. But not by much.

This is a decent album which is nowhere near as good as the other Cosmograf albums.

2 points

Tillian - Lotus Graveyard (2019)

The debut album from this band from Israel.

The band is a sextet with a lineup of cello, guitars, keyboards, drums, bass and female vocals.

It is nice to see that Israel has a growing amount of progressive rock bands. It is very nice to see the growth of progressive rock.

Tillian is not purely a progressive rock band. They are a progressive metal band with a lot of neo-prog influences.

And they are lead by a female vocalist and her vocals.

Their sound and music is very commercial with nice guitar hooks and riffs. There is also a lot of keyboards here. On the top of this, the female vocals dominates.

The cello adds another dimension to their music and a very good one.

All of this is very well done and the vocals is very good. What is missing is a couple of killer tracks or even some great tracks.

The music nice and good enough. And being a debut album, this is an acceptable debut album. I am not entirely won over, though.

But this is still a moderate good album.

3 points

Triode - On N'a Pas Fini D'avoir Tout Vu (1971)

The one and only album from this French band.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of flute, guitar, bass and drums.

Next to nothing is known about this band and album. An album released on an obscure record label and later re-released on CD through Mellow Records. A fully deserved re-release !

It is not easy to label this album. The music is very eclectic and dense. But.....

...Take Focus and Jan Akkerman's guitars. Take Focus again and Jethro Tull's flutes. Put that into a jazz, folk and psych rock landscape. The result may be this album.

The forty-three minutes is an eclectic experience, indeed.

The music has a lot of quirky melodies and lots of flutes. Some very good flutes too. The jazz is also everywhere.

It is not an easy listening, this album and I have been scratching my head a lot over this album.

The quality is not bad at all. This is indeed a good album and a hidden gem from the 1970s which deserve a lot more attention.

Check out this album if this sounds like being down your alley..... Eclectic prog, that is.

3 points

Amazing Blondel - Blondel (1973)

The fifth album from this British band.

The band was a duo with a lineup of flute, percussion, crumhorn, piano, guitars, recorder and vocals.
The band had help from numerous musicians who provided drums, bass, harpsischord, strings and backing vocals.
Steve Winwood, Simon Kirke and Paul Rodgers is among these guest musicians.

I was impressed by their previous album England and was looking a bit forward to this album. An album reviewed far later than I had hoped due to work pressure and other things.

The band has stripped back their sound and has returned as a more folk rock band than on England.

There is still a lot of melodies here and some good harmonies. And the music is not primitive folk rock either...

Blondel sees the band also take on board a bit pop music and adding a bit simplicity and rampant hooks and melodies to their brand of folk rock.

The music is pretty laid back with lots of good vocals harmonies. The instruments has been stripped back to being pretty much minimalism.

The result is forty minutes of accessible folk rock. The songs are decent to good throughout. There is not much for the brain here although the heart will like this uncomplicated music and the strings.

This is an album well worth checking out.

2.5 points

 

Spirit - Feedback (1972)

The fifth album from this US band.

The band was a quartet on this album with a lineup of drums, keyboards, bass, guitars and vocals.
Some female soul singers also contributed on this album.

Randy California had departed the band and the band was a bit adrift.

In fact, there is only one original member left of the band playing on this album. They had another album to deliver to their record label and hastily got together a lineup and some songs.

The result is Feedback.

Feedback is an album with no real connection to the previous four Spirit albums. It is a big disappointment from their previous album.

The music is not too bad. Take hard rock anno 1972 and add some Tamla Motown. Then add some southern rock too and you get this album.

The vocals is OK. The songs are OK, although very mainstream. It is not an album worthy the Spirit name though.

This is a fairly decent enough album though. But nothing more than that.

1.5 points

Collage - Baśnie (1990)

The debut album from this band from Poland.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of guitars, percussion, drums, bass and Polish vocals.
A guest musician provided keyboards.

It is fair to label Collage as one of the pioneers, if not THE pioneer of Polish neo-prog. A very big scene these days. And a healthy one.

Is this the album that sparked of this scene ? It probably is. When Collage broke up after four albums, Satellite was formed (see my reviews of their albums).

The music here is a mix of Marillion, IQ and Pendragon. I find a lot of stuff here who reminds me about Clutching At Straws, my favourite Marillion album. There is some melancholy here. Melancholy which sets this country's neo-prog scene apart from the other scenes.

The music has a lot of guitars and keyboards. It is at times very bombastic. Nothing and no one is spared on this album. 

This album has Polish vocals throughout the album. That is a nice difference from most other bands.
The vocals are good, btw.
Ditto for the rest of the musicians.

The general quality of the songs on this fifty minutes long album is very good throughout. It is a highly remarkable album and it is up there among the better neo-prog albums this planet has ever spawned. It is highly recommended.

3.5 points

Red Sand - Forsaken (2019)

The eight album from this Canadian band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of drums, bass, guitars, piano, keyboards and vocals.

I have reviewed their previous album for this blog and two other records for # 1 of this blog. I have been satisfied with their albums, but not impressed.

The band gives us again some pretty epic neo-prog bordering to symphonic prog.

There is a lot of epic and tender guitar solos here. Ditto for the keyboards solos. The vocals are really good too.

Those who Red Sand knows the formula and this album is in the same formula.

That is a good thing as the band is true to themselves and gives us what the trademark says we will get.

And the music is really good here...... for those who likes epic neo-prog. It is by no means the invention of the wheel, this album. But the band knows what they are doing and is indeed delivering the goods.

Three quarters of an hour worth of this and I am not complaining. I still want them to give us a great or even a classic album. Their next album ?

3 points

Brand X - Unorthodox Behaviour (1976)

The debut album from this British band.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of marimba, piano, moog, electric piano, guitars, bass, drums, percussion, tambourine and vibes.
A guest musician provided soprano saxophone.

Brand X saw Phil Collins from Genesis (and later a hugely successful solo career) branch out and try something else. Jazz and fusion, that is.
An ex Atomic Rooster member also became member of this band (and still is).

In short, I have had to re-evaluate my views on Phil Collins after listening to this album.

The music is a mix of fusion and jazz. The music is playful at all times and really challenge the listener. It is called progressive fusion by a couple of websites and I can understand why.

There is a lot of intricate details and fills on this album where piano, moog and guitars are finely combines. The bass is like thunder and the drums is really cool.

I am planning to review most of their albums this summer and this is a good meeting with the band.

It is also indeed a very good album who always comes up with some new details.

It is a must-check-out album from a band, minus Phil Collins, who are still playing gigs.

3.5 points 

Black Oak Arkansas - Ain't Life Grand (1975)

The sixth studio album from this US band.

The band was a sextet on this album with a lineup of guitars, bass, keyboards, drums and vocals.

The band from Black Oak, Arkansas was continuing down the southern and hard rock alley on this album.

The album starts pretty badly with a sub-standard version of Taxman, the Beatles and George Harrison classic track. This is a great song, murdered by Black Oak Arkansas on this album.

It's inclusion on this album is a mystery to me as it is easily the worst track on this album.

The rest of the album continues with the normal raw vocals and the mix of southern rock and hard rock.

A lot of country'n'western has also sneaked into this album. There is some steel-guitars and vocals harmonies in the direction of Nashville, Tennessee on this album.

Americana is the label fitting this album.

The album is pretty decent, but does not offer up much joy for those not into the music genres mentioned above. This is not their best album.

2 points

 

Crea - Dwarves & Penguins (2019)

The debut album from this Swedish band.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of keyboards, bass, drums, guitars, e bow and vocals.
The band also had help from an extra vocalist.

This is new Swedish progressive rock band. There is a lot of them around as new bands takes over from the older bands.

Crea is more in the neo-prog vein than in the usual Swedish symphonic prog fare. There is no symphonic prog.

Neo-prog is the base camp in their music. They venture into the new romantics vein too. Duran Duran springs to mind.

The songs are short and the sound is pretty light. There are some easy to like songs here who sounds good at first but who overstays their welcome after some more listening sessions.

There are also some questionable ballads here. The vocals is not particular good either.

This is a decent enough debut album. But nothing more than that.

2.5 points

Interpose+ - Indifferent (2007)

The second album from this Japanese band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of guitars, keyboards, drums, bass and vocals.

I reviewed their self-titled debut album some weeks ago and liked that album. Good Japanese neo-prog.

The band released three albums before they gave up. I only have the debut album and this one.

The music is again neo-prog with some eclectic prog and jazz thrown into the mix. Well, it sounds like Canterbury prog at times. Add some symphonic prog too.

There are some rather odd time shifts and details throughout this album. The music is still melodic and uplifting.

The band has again the typical shrieking Japanese vocals, although it has become a lot more muscular than on the debut album. Not a bad thing. The vocals are really good this time around.

The songs are pretty good songs on this album. This is indeed a good album and well worth checking out.

3 points

35 Tapes - Lost & Found (2019)

The debut album from this Norwegian band.

The band is a trio with a lineup of drums, mellotron, guitars, bass, sitar, keyboards and vocals.

This trio contains three well grown up Norwegians and they are signed on one of  the top prog rock labels at the moment; Apollon Records in Bergen, Norway.

They are very much a new addition to the Norwegian progressive rock scene. And a welcome one too.

This forty-four minutes long album gives us four tracks of progressive rock somewhere between Genesis and Camel.

The vocals is very much in the Andrew Latimer's vein. There are also many other Camel influences here.

Ditto for a lot of Genesis references in the form of the melodies and music.

That makes this album a very tasty proposition for a progressive rock fan. And did I mention the mellotron ? There is a lot of it. That and some guitar solos.

The music itself is very good indeed and heralds the debut of a band who may go far.

This is another very promising debut album from Norway and one to check out.

3.5 points

Trikolon - Cluster (1969)

The one and only album from this German band.

The band was a trio with a lineup of trumpet, keyboards, bass, drums and vocals.

This album was compiled by one album and an unreleased track by the masters of hidden gems, the record label Garden Of Delights. They released this package in 2003. As the new version is better than the impossible to find original album, this is the version this review is based on.

The CD is over one hour long, in short.

The album is also live. But it is the only thing we got from this long forgotten band. The sound is more than acceptable, too.

It is almost impossible to understand that this music was recorded in 1969 as it predates the first ELP albums. OK, The Nice had released some albums. But Trikolon was Emerson, Lake & Palmer even before they became that band.

In short, take classical music in the vein of Johan Sebastian Bach, fuse it with rock and early Yes. That is when you get this album.

There is lots of keyboards here and a lot of classical music like fugues and suites. The vocals is rather harsh. The music is loud and brash. The inclusion of a trumpet lead track pretty hilarious... and good.

There is even a good version of Blue Rondo here.

The studio track Fugue is very good and hints that this band could have become something really big. But they did not.

The band split up and then formed the band Tetragon who released two albums. Two albums I have just ordered.

This album though is a hidden gem one to enjoy.

3.5 points

 

Blue Effect - Meditace (1970)

The debut album from this band from Czechoslovakia (as it was called back then).

The band was a quartet with a lineup of flute, sitar, bass, drums, guitars and vocals.

This is another legendary from the shadows of the Iron Curtain. It was also the vehicle of the superb guitarist Radim Hladik who were the mainstay in the band.

To run a rock band in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic and Slovakia) after the sad events in 1968 is an understatement. Communism, stalinism and anti-USA sentiments had been restored after the 1968 spring. I can only admire this band for what they did.

The band is also known as Modry Efect after the Stalinists in their country forced them to change name to a non-English name.

Meditace is a mix of the late 1960s with some beat, pop, prog and a lot of blues. These forty minutes covers a lot of bases and a lot of ground. It does not include anything of what made the band famous later on; fusion and jazz.

It is an OK start but also an album well worth pursuing. The prog and blues elements are OK. The rest is best forgotten.

The result is barely a decent album. But still a decent album. I am looking forward to reviewing the rest of their albums.

2 points

Steamhammer - Speech (1972)

The fourth and final album from this British band.

Steamhammer was now reduced to a trio with a lineup of bass, guitars, drums and vocals.
Three other musicians provided lead vocals and other vocals. That include the Relf siblings (New Yardbirds, Rennaisance).

The band was a blues band, first and foremost, during their short life. Not a successful, but they made their mark on the music scene.

On Speech, the band goes in a slightly different direction again.

Take some avant-garde metal, add a lot of psych, space and blues rock. That is where you can find this album.... sort of.

I can fully understand why this band warranted an inclusion in ProgArchives and in other prog rock places based on this album. This is a prog rock album of some sort.

The music is pretty harsh and violent at times. The soundscape is jarring and a full attack on the senses.

The attack on the senses is lead by a full assault of the drums, bass and in particular by the guitars.

Somehow, most of this album works and deliver a decent to good experience. This album flies a bit under the radar in the prog rock world but is still well worth checking out.

2.5 points




  

Incandescent Sky - Glorious Stereo (2003)

The second album from this US band.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of chapman stick, bass, drums, guitar, saxophone, synths and some vocal samples.

The band continues on from their 2001 debut album Radiate.

That means instrumental music with some vocal samples.

Their music is a bit difficult to pinpoint. Take jazz and mix it with space rock.

The music is pretty primitive and avant-garde. There is not many immediate melodies here. There is both trip and ambient influences in their music.

The music is pretty trippy.

This forty-five minutes long album is decent enough. I am not really won over by it despite of numerous listening sessions.

But check it out.

2 points

Loonypark - Deep Space Eight (2019)

The fifth album from this Polish band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of banjo, guitar, contrabass, bass, drums, keyboards and female vocals.

This band has been releasing albums through the Polish label Lynx Music since 2008. I have been aware of the band for the last years. But it is only now I have got one of their albums.

Loonypark does a kind of crossover prog. There is a lot of neo-prog here and a lot of female vocals fronted pop-rock. There is also some more goth and country'n'western here.

The music is also  epic and bombastic with lots of dramatic female vocals and guitars.

The vocals are very good and the sound too is very good.

This is perhaps not the most exciting music around. It is still a good melodic commercial crossover prog album.

3 points

America - Homecoming (1972)

The second album from this US band.

The band was a trio with a lineup of drums, guitars, bass, keyboards and vocals.

Their semi-classic self titled debut album did not really impress me and I was not looking forward to listen to the remaining four America albums.

I very much liked Crosby, Stills & Nash in their heydays. I also liked Neil Young too. Even Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. But that was years ago.

The funny thing, and perhaps the most natural thing, is that listening to America has made me longing for those above mentioned artists again. At least for some minutes....

Homecoming is in that same direction. The music is more developed and has moved a lot away from the primitive folk rock formula.

There are some really proper music on this album. Some proper west-coast rock. But it is not progressive rock. It still has some great hippie and flower power vibes.

The album opens with perhaps their best song, Ventura Highway. I really like this hippie song which has some great vocals and guitars.

The rest is not of the same class. This album is still a charming album and one I like a lot.

It is indeed a good album and it is regarded as their best album. I approve.

3 points

Trigemino - Trampas para Engañar (2018)

The one and only album from this Argentine band.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of sitar, guitars, keyboards, piano, bass, drums, mandolin, mellotron, moog and Spanish vocals.

This album was recorded in 2005, released in a small quantity before the Argentine label Viajero Inmovil Records released this album just before the end of 2018 through their Bandcamp page.

Trigemino is regarded as a semi-legendary band and it very nice to hear the music behind a legend.

Which I have been doing a lot in the case of this album.

The genre is clearly symphonic prog and there is a lot of references to the good old Argentine symphonic prog band. Yes, the music has a local flavour.

There is also clear references to both Yes and Gentle Giant here. Ditto for Emerson, Lake & Palmer. Add some fusion and Canterbury prog influences too.

There is in other words a lot of variety and different things on this seventy minutes long album.

Some of it is not so good. But there is also some great stuff here. The vocals are very good and the other musicians is doing a very good job too.

This album will surely be regarded as an Argentine semi-classic album in years to come. It is also a very good album well worth checking out.

3.5 points

Gaspard - La forêt de Gaspard (2019)

The debut album from this band from Montreal, Canada.

The band is a quartet with a lineup of guitars, piano, synths, drums and bass.

There is a lot of instrumental bands around now. The post-rock and post-metal scene has revitalized instrumental rock.

Gaspard is from the French speaking part of Canada, the Quebec province. It is tempting to say that they are in the Quebec prog scene. The good old one who gave us the likes of Harmonium and Maneige.

But the music has not much, if anything, to do with that scene.

Take post-rock and combine it with some harsh post-metal. Add some psych rock too and you get this album.

The music is mostly pretty harsh with some ebbs and flows too. There is a lot of chugging guitars here.

The music on this fifty minutes long album has some really good parts and is mostly good. There is also a couple of very good themes here too.

This is an overall good album and a more than welcome debut album. I hope we will get more albums from this band.

3 points

 

Satellite - Nostalgia (2009)

The fourth and final album from this Polish band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of bass, drums, keyboards, guitars and vocals.

Satellite developed out of the fathers of Polish neo-prog; Collage. And they released four albums and a DVD before they too split up.

All albums are solid neo-prog albums. Some are even a lot better than good.

Satellite was in other words a great band.

Nostalgia follows the Polish neo-prog tradition... or perhaps even establishing the Polish neo-prog tradition and sound.

There are a lot of melancholic melodic neo-prog here. Most of it is also soaring majestic and symphonic. The original version has seven songs ranging from seven to ten minutes each.

In other words, each song has plenty of space to work in.

And work they do.

Not all here is great and there is a couple of songs who falls a bit short. Nevertheless, this is a good album and one every neo-prog fan should check out.

3 points

Eris Pluvia - Tales from Another Time (2019)

The fourth album from this Italian band.

The band was a quartet on this album with a lineup of flute, keyboards, guitars, bass, drums, programming and male vocals.
A female vocalist contributed too on this album.

I have had the pleasure of reviewing their previous three albums for # 1 of this blog and has liked them pretty good.

The band is from Italy but their vocals is English. Their music is progressive rock, but that does not mean their music is RPI.... well, a big part of it.

There is a lot of RPI (Rock Progressive Italano) on this album. More than usual from this band. That has added a lot of value to their brand of progressive rock...... neo-prog.

The band's platform is neo-prog with some art-rock inbetween. And now RPI too.

There is a lot of old RPI meets new neo-prog on this one hour long album.

And this mix and the music works well. There is no real very good or great pieces of music here. Nevertheless, this is a good album and one fans of both neo-prog and RPI should check out.

3 points

Nektar - The Prodigal Son (2001)

The ninth album from this UK band.

The band was reduced to a trio with a lineup of guitars, bass, keyboards, percussion, drums and vocals.

Roye Albrighton was back again on bass, guitars and lead vocals. That is the big positive on this album.

The band had been running around in the AOR land for the last albums. The Prodigal Son is another run around in the same landscape.

The music here is a mix of AOR, a bit harder rock and some hints of neo-prog. There is no references to the good old Nektar though.

I understand that bands want to earn some money after some hard years pleasing the critics, but not selling many albums.  I am not convinced that making albums like this, an album among many similar sounding albums, was the right way to go.

Nektar has made a decent album. But it is still just that. A decent album and an album which deserve to be forgotten.

2 points

Tree Of Life - Awakening Call (2017)

The debut album from this US/Venezuela band.

The band was a trio with a lineup of drums, bass, guitars and keyboards.

The band and this album was an idea two friends from Venezuela got before they relocated to Miami, Florida and enlisted a member of Neal Morse Band to contribute to.

The result is this album.

The trio and instrumental rock format is not my favourite format and I always draw an extra breath of air before reviewing albums like this. It is not the most exciting and interesting music around.

Tree Of Life plays some pretty hard progressive metal. This albums reeks of molten lava. And that is not a bad thing.

The album is guitar solos and guitar licks orientated with some keyboards filling in on the front of some merciless pounding bass and drums.

The music is very technical.

It also has a lot of good licks and some very interesting details. This one hour long album is a bit of a revelation.

This is indeed a good album and one to really check out. I hope more people get their ears and eyes open to this band and album.

3 points

Interpose+ - Interpose+ (2005)

The debut album from this Japanese band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of drums, keyboards, bass, guitars and vocals.
A violinist and a computer wizard added their stuff to this album too.

Neo-prog from Japan is pretty unusual. So I jumped on the chance when offered their first two albums. Two out of in total three albums.

Neo-prog........ well..... that is not the full story here.

The songs are pretty long, over ten minutes long and there is a lot of symphonic prog influences here. Ditto for eclectic prog influences. Both Gentle Giant and King Crimson has been influential when they carved out their niche and the music on this album.

Some of the music are indeed melodic here and is touching neo-prog. There is also some Van Der Graaf Generator vibes over their music as the soundscape is pretty dark.

The vocals are the typical shrieking thin Japanese vocals. They are good though. No problems there. The other musicians does their job very well.

I really like this fifty minutes long album as the musicians really know what they are doing there. The music is majestic, eclectic and melodic at the same time. Brooding too.

This is another good album from Japan and a reminder that this country has a lot of good bands well worth checking out.

3 points

Hawkwind - Doremi Fasol Latido (1972)

The third album from this British band.

The band was now a sextet with a lineup of audio generator, electronics, flute, sax, bass, drums, synths, guitars and vocals.

Ian "Lemmy" Kilmister debuted on this album and so did Simon Philips. Nik Turner, Dave Brock and Robert Calvert were also involved.

So the classic setup, from what I have heard, is here in place.

The music is a lot more accessible here than on the previous album X In Search Of Space from 1971. There are even some melodies here. But pop music it is not.

The music is still dominated by dirty, muddy space rock with lots of bass and electronics. Space rock in other words and a lot of the space rock here comes from the outer space.

The saxophones and guitars also makes the music pretty grotty and barbarian. The vocals is as far back in the sound as it should be.

Pop music, it is not.

This album more than proves how effective and how good space rock can be if played by the masters of space rock. Hawkwind is the masters.

This is a very good album and one of their better ones. Space rock fans need this album.

3.5 points

Spirit - Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus (1970)

The fourth album from this US band.

Spirit was a quintet with a lineup of piano, moog, keyboards, guitars, bass, drums and vocals.
Guest musicians provided woodwinds.

Spirit was one of those bands who took what The Beatles gave them on Revolver and flew in all directions.

Spirit was from the west coast of USA and were also influenced by the local hippie and surf scenes.

All this can be found in their albums. This one is no exception.

Take pop music from The Beatles. Add some surf and hippie music. Add a lot of psych rock. Add some rock music and some fusion. That is where you get this album.

The music is very quirky. It is also melodic and dynamic.

This forty minutes long album also got some really good music. Well, all of it is good. It sounds a bit dated, this album. But it really has some original take on pop and rock.

This is another good album from a band who need to be explored by all progressive rock fans.

3 points

Maybe - Maybe (2019)

The debut album from this Argentine band.

The band is a trio with a lineup of drums, guitars, bass and keyboards.

The band has released this album as a Name Your Price album on Bandcamp and has got some attention.

The scene in Argentina is alive and well. And that is off course a good thing.

Maybe is a band who plays instrumental music inspired by the likes of Genesis, Yes, Rush and those old progressive rock greats from the 1970s. They claim their music has a classic 1970s symphonic prog sound too.

Well............

The music is progressive rock with some hard rock and fusion influences.

The music on this one hour long album is also dynamic and very lively. There is some guitar solos too and some good keyboards.

The quality is decent enough. But there is nothing here who elevates this album to a good level. There is nothing here I will remember for a long time.

This is therefore a decent album but nothing more than that.

2 points

Far Meadow. The - Foreign Land (2019)

The third album from this band from London, England.

The band is a quintet with a lineup of keyboards, bass, drums, guitars and female vocals.

The Far Meadow is one of those new lush neo-prog bands who has come out of Great Britain in the last decade. That to the joy of myself and many others.

I had the pleasure of reviewing their 2012 debut album Where Joys Abound for # 1 of this blog. Actually, I did not like that album at all.

That is why I gave their second album a wide berth and only caught up with them again on their new album based on positive reviews in ProgArchives.

And I am glad I did.

The band delivers some really lush neo-prog with some hints of folk rock and symphonic prog. There is also some hints of Magenta here and some hints of US pop rock.

There is no real great tracks on this fifty minutes long album. Nevertheless, the music is very colourful with some very good vocals and solos.

This album is a joy and a very good album.

3.5 points

 

 

Trama - Prodomi Di Finzioni Sovrapposte (1998)

The debut album from this Italian band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of keyboards, drums, bass, guitars and female Italian vocals.

Trama released two albums before they gave up the ghost.

The band is from Italy and played neo-prog. Despite of being an Italian band, there is not many similarities with Rock Progressive Italiano (RPI) on this album.

The band is pretty close to the British neo-prog scene. This despite of the Italian female vocals.

There is also pretty much progressive metal and downright heavy metal on this album.

The vocals are OK. The sound is not good.

This fifty minutes long album has some half-decent songs. Most of this album is pretty dire though and this album is sailing pretty close to being a turkey.

Sorry.....

1.5 points

Aquelarre - Aquelarre (1972)

The debut album from this band from Argentina.

The band was a quartet with a lineup of clavinet, Hammond organ, bass, drums, guitars, ukulele, percussion and Spanish vocals.

This band was formed on the ashes of Almendra, another great band from Argentina.

The band released four albums and were active in three periods before they gave up the ghost. One member later formed Tantor, a great band from Argentina.

The band debuted with this self-titled album who has it's roots in blues. There is in fact a lot of blues on this forty minutes long album.

There is also some local colours here with some Latin American psych and rock music. The album is not a run-of-the-mill blues-rock album. Far from it.

The psych rock here is really very much present here too. That helped by a vocalist who master both genres and surely some other genres too.

There is even some southern rock here too. That to top off this album. 

There is a lot of good things here and some not so good things one these forty minutes. It is though an album which should be checked out.

2.5 points

Conqueror - In Orbita (2019)

The sixth album from this Italian band.

The band was a quintet with a lineup of flute, keyboards, drums, percussion, saxophone, bass, guitars and female Italian vocals.
A violinist added her violin sporadic to this album.

I have reviewed their first five albums in # 1 of this blog. These are good, solid RPI albums. A bit different, though....

This band is fronted by a female vocalist and their take on RPI coloured by that.

Their take on RPI, Rock Progressive Italiano, has some cool, almost detached vocals. Add some warm saxophones and keyboards plus some guitars too. That makes a special sound. A lush sound.

The music is a mix of RPI with some jazz. The jazz is pretty laidback and almost lounge-jazz at times.
There are also a lot of folk rock in their music. That too adds to their take on RPI.

There is again, as on their previous album, a lack of great or even good songs. Well, there are some good songs on this fifty minutes long album. But not many.

This is barely a good album, but I am still not won over by this output.

3 points