Country of Origin: USA Format: CD Record Label: Adrenaline Records Catalogue #: ADR0011 Year of Release: 2000 Time: 72:57 Info: Aztec Jade

New York based group Aztec Jade now presents its new album through the Italian label Adrenaline records. Aztec Jade is not new on the scene (the bands first album dates from 1994) and it shows that they have recording experience. The album is well produced with a good vocalist.

Based in the firm roots of prog metal artists like Dream Theater and Queensrÿche (with respect to the vocals) and bands like Rush in terms of some of the compositions and tempo changes, the band produce a nice, but too lengthy album. Due to the fact that the album contains 17 tracks, of which the longest one is 6:31, I will not put you, distinguished reader, through the ordeal of a track-to-track walk-through. Let me just pick out some highlights and setbacks of the album.
The first highlight is the first track, Regatta Fugue Part I, which starts very Dream Theater-like, but later reminds me strongly of some other prog (metal) band, I think it may be Everon, but am not sure. A track like Mad Not Crazy, is quite ambiguous. On the one hand it presents itself as pure power rock, nothing special, but then the second 2 minutes are filled with intricate rhythm changes, melodic tricks, solo's and haunting keyboard work alá Threshold.
Finally, a ballad to break the power with Nosferatu, and quite a good one, a bit in the vein of the Scorpions (with respect to the guitar) and Queensrÿche (Mindcrime). Well, actually 'ballad' is an incorrect description of this track. Let's just say it's not as uptempo as the rest....

Some of the tracks are overdone, for example Atlantis features an intro that is too obviously engineered with respect to the rhythm, and the same goes for some other tracks as well (e.g. Stained).

The major drawback of this album to me is that even after 10 listenings, there is still no song or melody that stuck in my mind, since most of the tracks, although individually none of them have obvious flaws, are so similar in style. Combined with the sheer length of the album, I had the impression of constantly hearing the same track (or variation on it). That also made it a difficult album to review (not much to tell about) and to grade (no bad tracks, but nothing spectacular either).

If you really like prog metal and can listen to it for over an hour, maybe give it a try. The vocals are quite good (something I do not often find) and the instruments are played well. The compositions, on the other hand, lack originality, I have heard this style many many times before. That is why I always wonder with bands like these why they present themselves as "highly innovative".

Conclusion: 6 out of 10.

Country of Origin: Australia Format: CD Record Label: Musea Records Catalogue #: FGBG 4273.AR Year of Release: 1975/2000 Time: 39:43 Info: Musea Records

'Four Moments' is the album that brought symphonic rock as a genre to Australia. The quartet Sebastian Hardie bring a highly melodic Camel/Caravan-like progressive rock on this 1975 re-release of the Musea label.

Country of Origin: Argentina Format: CD Record Label: New Mellotron Records Catalogue #: New Mellotron 1 Year of Release: 2000 Time: 56:29 Info: Andres Valle

Questions Inside The Picture is the debut album by Argentinean progressive rock band Chaneton. The band is named after its founder, guitarist Alex Chaneton, who is also the former guitarist of Argentinean art-rock band Mandragora. Since he wanted to focus more on progressive rock than they were doing, he left that group to found his own.

On Questions Inside The Picture, one can easily hear which bands are Chaneton's main influences: early Genesis (Gabriel and Hackett-era), Camel, Rush and, most importantly, Marillion (Fish-era). The band consists of Alex Chaneton (electric, acoustic and classical guitar and backing vocals), Adrián Marqués Gómez (bass, bass pedals and electric guitar), Carlos Kleppe (piano, synthesiser, organ and backing vocals), Jano Pérez Sermenti (drums and percussion on tracks 1, 8, 9 and 11), Patricio Villanueva (vocals) and Kike Gentile (drums and percussion on tracks 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 12). Guest musician on this CD is Germán Lami (keyboard, piano and synthesiser on tracks 5, 9 and 11).

Heroes' Graves is a short instrumental track and the first of three songs which are interconnected. It very clearly states that this band is part of the neo-progressive movement. The electric guitar plays a very prominent role on this track, filling almost its entire length with a long, emotional solo. A very nice opener.
Track 2 consists of two parts, the very short instrumental Bridge and the much longer Tears In The Rain. In the latter part of the track, we hear Villanueva's voice for the first time. Not surprisingly, it basically sounds like a mixture between Fish and Peter Gabriel, but (and this sadly seems to be exemplary for most prog singers) lacking much of their ability to really get across various emotions. The first time I heard the vocals, I had not yet leafed through the booklet and believed Chaneton to be a German or Luxembourg band (No-Name sprung to mind), judging by the strange accent on the English words. When I listened more closely, I started to notice that much of what was being sung did not make very much sense; it sounded like heavily accented English but appeared to be much worse than that: some words were absolutely incomprehensible. Both the pronunciation of the words and the stress on the different syllables were wrong most of the time and the booklet appeared to contain many grammatical and spelling errors. I was really starting to wonder whether the guys had written the lyrics first in Spanish and then literally translated them, while occasionally checking the dictionary; after which they had told the singer just to try to make it sound English. Really, was there no one in Argentina who could have helped these guys out? Definitely a missed opportunity!
But that is enough about the vocals for now. The music of this song is very nice at any rate. Some nice arpeggiated guitar is played over a solid foundation of bass and drums and backed up by waves of hammond organ. A guitar solo in the vein of Marillion's Steve Rothery is taken over by the keyboard which in turn is taken over by the guitar again. The end reminds me strongly of Pink Floyd's later work.

A Long Time Past starts with some acoustic piano, which after a few bars is joined by acoustic guitar, keyboard (strings) and bass. Again, Marillion and Floyd come to mind several times during this song, the latter, especially when the drums come in. Villanueva's voice, on the other hand, reminds me very much of Herbert Grönemeyer in this track, oddly enough. As appears to be the case with other songs as well, some parts of the lyrics are not in the booklet; a bit sloppy.

Dolphin's Song is an up-tempo track with a great bass rhythm and a very pleasant guitar riff. The slower middle part has a strong early Genesis/early Marillion-feel (twelve-string guitars?) and is followed by a ripping guitar solo over a piano riff which strikingly resembles the one in Genesis' Carpet Crawlers. But that is not all; the keyboard player succeeds to draw attention by delivering a lovely Mark Kelly-like solo, which is very nicely backed up by the other instruments (most notably the drums). Great track!

The fifth track, The Last Dream, starts very quietly, but increases in both volume and intensity mostly thanks to the steaming guitar solo, which is played over another Carpet Crawlers-like piano riff. What I do find slightly annoying however, is the fact that Villanueva sometimes lashes into a whimpering kind of voice, whereas the lyrics do not really give reason to do so. This happens more than once in other songs as well and does give reason to believe that he is not always aware of exactly what he is singing.

Track 6 is a fast version of A Long Time Past and even though the atmosphere in the two versions is very different and therefore hard to compare, I do prefer this quicker one. Nice acoustic piano and undistorted chorused guitar underneath it all, some good work by the rhythm section, another pair of Rothery-like guitar solos and a keyboard bit in the style of Tony Banks's late-Genesis improvisations pretty much sums it all up.

The acoustic piano melody on Soul's Shapes reminds me of Elton John's Your Song for some reason. Again the Herbert Grönemeyer comparison surfaces for the singing (I actually thought Villanueva was singing "so schön" in stead of "soul's shapes" at first...), although it seems all band members are really trying hard to sound as much as Marillion as possible.

If you do not listen too carefully to the lyrics of The Frontier, you hear a very nice track. The music is really good and the vocals once more seem to be a cross between Fish in his early Marillion years (the ends of some sentences sound very much like Fish sung them in Grendel) and Peter Gabriel (the "aaah"s). Whenever there is some "space" in the music, Alex Chaneton makes his guitar howl in the way we know so well from Steve Rothery, while warm washes of strings flow from the keyboard.

The Secret Box starts with a section in which the tension is built up musically and then relaxes in a part which has a guitar riff in the vein of the one in Marillion's Warm Wet Circles from Clutching At Straws. The end section also causes some bells to ring in my head, but I cannot quite put my finger on where I have heard it before.

Just like the first three tracks, the last three songs form a continuous piece of music. Heaven's Sound is a piece played on an unaccompanied classical guitar and therefore brings Steve Hackett's solo track on Foxtrot, Horizons, to mind. Very subtle.
The end notes of Heaven's Sound flow into Aquatic Dreams, again a more up-tempo track. Here Villanueva's accent and his tendency to stress words wrongly are very prominent. This is sad since the music is quite enjoyable. The guitar riff in the intro is pretty much like the one in the beginning of Here Comes The Supernatural Anaesthetist from Genesis's The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway album. Also, there is some fitting "watery" keyboard playing on this track and some interesting bass work.
The title track of the album, Questions Inside The Picture, starts quite heavily (and very Arena-like), but - regrettably, in my opinion - that changes rather soon, although the part concerned does return. Surprisingly, this track contains a flute solo - probably played on the keyboard though, since there is no flute player listed in the booklet - which is taken over by another ripping guitar solo. After the music has decreased in volume for a few bars, the track - and with it the CD - ends a bit bombastic with horns (probably also played on the keyboard), making the overall sound more massive, before it fades out.

I think that Chaneton would be better off to write their lyrics in their native language next time. But if they do indeed want to keep working with English lyrics, I would strongly advice them to get some help at writing them from someone who is more fluent at the language than they are. Apart from that, the singer would do well to take some English lessons. Maybe this all sounds a bit harsh, but Chaneton's music is good and does deserve a wider audience. It would be sad if that would fail only because of their poor knowledge of English.
If you are in for some very nice, though not very original, Marillion-esque music, and do not mind a language error or two (or three...), then you should definitely check this CD out. Especially those people who are into Pendragon, No-Name and, of course, (early) Marillion and Genesis might like this CD.

Conclusion: 7 out of 10 (mainly because of the music).

Country of Origin: Switzerland Format: CD (EP) Record Label: Dazed Music Catalogue #: DAMCD 0001-01 Year of Release: 1999 Time: 26.55 Info: Contact

Seek after Venus is the first official release of the Swiss band Moondaze. While Switzerland is not a country usually associated with progressive music, this is undeniably one of the best mixtures of elements of progressive metal with prog and art rock I've heard this year. The band's line up is made known only by their first names: Manu (vocals, keys), Mac (guitar), Reichi (bass) and Dave (drums). Music is credited to the band as a whole, Manu has written the words. Seek after Venus contains three previously unreleased tracks.

Singer Manu's vocal intonation and melody lines in the brooding song Got Used To It are at times very close to Geoff Tate, like in Suite Sister Mary. This track has splendid guitar work by Mac, both subtle chords and harsher strokes, and two lamentful guitar solos as centre pieces. Sound fragments from a railway station are used to create a setting to the lyrics, the thoughts of a man becrying his fate on a train. When the song seems to have reached a powerful climax, subtle guitar chords return, after an anticlimax's momentary silence invoking the sadness of this individual.

The eleven minute song 3rd November packs so much material and diverse themes, that it could easily have been stretched into a short concept album. It starts with a wallop with double bass drums, guitar riffing. Manu comes to grips splendidly with some difficult vocal parts. Guitar does tend to get a bit overbearing at times. In the last third of the track the complex interplay of instruments yields to a spine-tingling melodic arrangement. Much attention has again been given to lyrics, which tell the tale of a man murdering his family in cold blood, after his wife has decided to leave him. This is also an attack on modern journalism, displayed with a dark sense of humour; after a news report on the family tragedy, the reporter continues: "Other than that, the weather today was warm and sunny"!

Like the first track Un-Coming is a melancholic song ("We seek after Venus while the world turns without us"), but it has its share of venom. This most straightforward of the three tracks still manages to surprise with a sudden mood shift halfway through, rivalling the melody of 3rd November's last section, but then edges its way back to the central theme towards the end.

Moondaze's music reminds me somewhat of German band Scenes in instrumentation, vocal melodies and the mixture of heavy prog metal with subtler progressive music, though the Swiss compositions harbour far more complexity. In this respect Queensryche's Suite Sister Mary again comes to mind as a good comparison. The greatest advantage Moondaze has over Scenes is the quality of singer Manu's vocals in comparison with Scenes frontman Hubi Meisel.

Thoughtful lyrics, great musicianship and a fair share of melodic and atmospheric rhythm and style changes. With these three tracks Moondaze show themselves to be a band that's set to reach a greater audience than they've so far attained. Production value is good and all band members come off equally well in arrangement. The artwork by Swiss photographer Pascal Richard doesn't really impress me, but fits the mood of the music.

One of the few minor points is that Seek after Venus is an EP with only 26 minutes of music. Enough to wet my appetite, but it left me wanting more! Let's hope a full-length album is in the making. An earlier release in 1997, the demo CD Life Will Live On, self-produced and self-mixed, did feature other material, so this shouldn't be to far-fetched a thought. Although Moondaze has been around since 1997, this 1999 album is the band's first official release, which makes it my belated pick for last year's best newcomer.