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Plaster
Power of Omens Rhapsody Gianni Rojatti |
In this page |
| Plaster "Electric Point of View" (promo) | |
1.electric point of view |
Let's mark right now two electric points of view about this self-produced (10000
lire in cd): it has been recorded in just 3 days, and you notice that; then Plaster is a
not yet close trio, and you notice that. But the 27 minutes of Electric...you
hear them and you notice that. And so even the florentine underground, though they come
from south, can offer a thorn within a tuneful, sad, noir at intervals, in the
alternative/noise hip, that can be so noisy, a little self-congratulating, always on
search for an "intelligent audience". Bass, drum, guitar, voice, everything
flows on his way, even too much, in the Plaster cure, because of the hurried production,
too. Bass lines sometimes are too much loaded, vocals sessions ain't convincing, even
considering the musical kind, drum choices sometimes give the impression to be not the
right ones for the track. But the liquid and melodical flight, that can become some really
amazing progression as in "Liquid sun" or in the title track, are very
appealing; there are brilliant highlights; it would be worth working on some vocal
intuition too. So Plaster are walking on the surest roads at this momoent: Jo44, Seam,
Promise Ring, but maybe would be enough to name the more decent Smashing Pumpkins. Sour tasting! |
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| Power of Omens "Eyes of the Oracle" (Elevate) | |
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Skill and pasion. Frequently they're alot easeir to say than to actually put together. Born in an embrionic stage in '94 from a rib of the band "Nightwatch", only between '97 and '98 the project of this quartet starts assembling. The singular skill abilities of the band members are incredible and if taken one by one these guys are outstanding. Clearly inspiring themselves to the Holy Trinity "’Theater-‘Warning-‘Ryche", every component of this combo developes his own "specialty": Chris Salinas –vocals- is in certain phases astonishing in his emulating the best Geoff Tate you ever heard with his incredible solo's, such as astonishing is Alex Arellano's jazzy drumming, phrasings, stops e controtempo's, that has to remind you of the genius of Mark Zonder in "A Pleasant Shade Of Gray". Their american Heavy-Prog, seams to stumble a bit with the album cover, the band's logo and the groups name that seem more like somthing "defender" sounding; who knows, maybe Epic Metal has really been their first passion ?… tell you the truth, in some bits and pieces, axe-man David Gallegos's riffing reminds me of some classical Heavy Metal bands (the ones with HM !) or some tunes that are very close to those classic metal stereotypes, but don't misunderstand me, the notes of this "Eyes Of The Oracle" result incredibly fresh to the listener also thanks to a great job done in sound engineering. The cd runs through it's countless tempo variations, with more or less explicit quotations and technical boosts, but after the umpteenth time listening to this album, the three songs that really give life something worth living for are: "Word On A Line" elegant, sexy, sinister and somewhat evil, the seventh trak "Time" that, with its intro in expanded delay seems beating along the ticks of time in a etherial way until the crescendo of the song explodes into a caleidascopic masterpiece of 10.19 and last but not least "Test Of Wills", over 19 minutes of intense tecnicism ed emotions (spanish guitar and e piano included too !), For the rest though, sometimes I feel sort of like run over by all those tempo variations risking in a few passes to seam sterile and a little loose; rich and perfect but in separated blocks. The magnitude of the three "Holy" bands that have guided these Power Of Omens sets in the fact that they show their incredible ability as musicians within the song and they're great knowledge in songwriting, meant as composing the whole song (maybe best of all Fates Warnig before "Pleasant Shade ..") making sure that, even after hundreds of beat variations, the main theme of the song was surely set to burn into your brain and stay there forever, meanwhile our "Power ..." lacks in this aspect probably for their minor experience. Anyway the whole album is very rich (too much ?) and full of ideas that are sewn together somtimes in a patchwork manor, but maybe the fellows have a thing or two yet to acquire in composing maturity.Surely a record to have. |
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| Defenders | Rhapsody "Symphony of enchanted Lands" (Lucrezia) |
Tracklist 1.Epicus furor |
Here we go, the revenge of new wave Italian bands. has begun ! At last we have an album that will kick ass anywhere and on any metal chart. They're the right band with the right sound at the right time. Obviously, this ain't the whole story and their explosive success ("read all about it ... read all about it !!!" their last album "Lengendary Tales" has sold over 100 thousand copies) is due to many factors. With their incredibly sounding simphonic influenced speed-power, a superb singer (Fabio Lione) already appearing on the "defenders scene" with Labyrinth and lately with Athena (he is probably the best metal-singer around with Morby) and an at last competitive production (Sasha Paeth docet) Rhapspdy have conquered the cold hearted hearts of Teutonic and Japanese kids. This incedible Italian band has unaspectedly toped every European Metal Magazine "year chart" as best-newcomer bandm ex equo with nostalgic Hammerfall. They also have some pretty strange rumors lurking around them. In the udergroung scene some say that Rhapsody are simply a result of a sort of side-project joke band and that the former band members aren't the ones that actually play on their alnums. All this gossip has been in a certain way confirmed by the fact that the band has NEVER been seen on-stage, but since Italy is the land of the never beaten envious, I wouldn't bet that all this is true. The album, nevertheless, begins with an intro "Ira tenax" and it's powerful chorus that then developes in a great speed twirl that blends crystal clear vocals, razorblade guitar-work, magnificent keyboards and sting section. Fantastic strumental break haveway through the album in "Land of immortals" where a harpsichord and a flute create melodies that send us time riding. Before i heard this record, I thought that Rhapsody were just another "big thing" that the Italian press was building up, but to tell you the truth every track here has something special to remark. Over all "Legendary Tales" is a great album. This is they're first album, and another one should be out these days, lets hope they won't let us down. |
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| Gianni Rojatti "Matita" (promo) | |
1.Scatoletta |
It's
a 3-tracks demo, shorter than 10 minutes. Scatoletta. This piece has a fade-out on the end; 4/4 base like all the work, it's no fusion at all, maybe somwthing between Masi and Gambale, and in the second way he keeps two different moments in the composition: the rythmic one and the other soloist. Roma 12/12. It sounds like boogie-oriented Satriani; the initial theme is taken from Tafolla. Good, very good and chaining to the listener is the solo that runs from 1'20" till 2'00" about. Devastazione Globale. The start is too much close to Alex Masi's "Attack at the Neon Shark". Sometimes it remembers the earlier Mc Alpine. The accompany doesn't fit in there, in our opinion, and it's boaring too. However Matita reveals a guitarist searcihng for himself, too much Satriani here, Tafolla there, Masi later.But I am convinced that this guy can pull out pretty nice things, like in the second track, where he is fluider, not intending to mantain separete two soloism moments; because you can feel that when he writes a solo he hardly tries to complicate now the handle session and then the bridge one.Anyway, he could be anybody's session man. |
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