EARTHLY PARADISE

This was probably not the best year to release such a debut album. Fully symphonic with great mellotron and synthesizers. A very strange vocalist carry a special style to their sound (but only for a couple of tracks, unfortunately). It seems that we are in the middle of a fairy tale. Fully romantic music, but so nice. This album is apparently extremely sought after (the vinyl version is trading at approximately 250 ?) !

Strong Genesis links during the instrumental parts as you can hear during "Actions & Reactions" which is the best song of the album (at least it is my preferred one). All the fans of the symph style will be overwhelmed with this number, I guess. Beautiful vocal harmonies from Christiane Ward (who could have been listed in the line-up by the way). "Wings Of The Dove" is a very pleasant instrumental, again fully Banks oriented ("Cinema Show" is of course the reference, by no doubt : almost a copy around 3'40"). But I have never been against this "borrowing". When such talent is shown, it is always a pleasure to listen to these derivative bands.

Mellotron fans (to which I belong) will just be blowned away with some tracks (but not all, unfortunately). "Andas" and "Mitternachtstraum" for instance are not really great.

The album was very promising during its initial phase but dropped in quality afterwards. A good album from the mid-late seventies. But not the jewel is appears to be during "Actions & Reactions", unfortunately.

Three stars.