As soon as this arrived I couldn’t wait to get it onto the player as this screams class. The care that has gone into the booklet is incredible with the lyrics and artwork combining in 28 pages to provide an experience all on its’ own. Unfortunately I know nothing about the band, but assume that the trio is Russian (with a couple of guests). Musically this is incredibly complex, and hearkens back very much to the Seventies and obviously brings in influences from Yes, King Crimson and a host of other British prog bands. There are six main songs, stretching from nine to fourteen minutes in length, with short transition pieces in between.
But, and it is a big ‘but’, these guys should have stayed as an instrumental group. One of my daughters walked in when I was playing this, looked at me, and said “this guy can’t sing”. Oleg Anurin is a great keyboard player but he also feels that he is Jon Anderson in the way that he goes for long notes, scats down etc, and he really isn’t. Having played this a few times I don’t feel that I am being unfair, but it hurts me so much to say it as the rest of this album is just so good! There are some great intrumental passages with Oleg and Mike Zonov (guitars) swapping licks and Mike Heifets (drums) really driving them along. So this is a work of great ambition which achieves on so many levels yet really lets everything down on the vocals. If the guys had brought in a singer, or had even delivered this album as an instrumental work then everything would be singing it’s praises and I really regret that I can’t.
www.mals.ru
