...E IL SUO RESPIRO ANCORA AGITA LE ONDE?

After having listened to the short opener "Il 'Gia Sentito' e Il 'Non Ancora" all the hopes for a great album are allowed. Examples of such a good and short intro are not frequent. To be able to captivate within hundred seconds is not an easy task.

The same nice feeling prevails during most of "Maggio", but bizarrely it will change from style a few times and it will be mixed with harder parts. These sounds are rather strange to me since they were not featured on their debut album. During these moments, vocals are almost distorted, too raw. Some production problem ? Maybe. It ends up in a jazzy party.

The band already showed some tendency towards the jazzy flavours in their first album and they will build on this for "E Il Suo Respiro". This is put evenmore into evidence during "D'Ombra, Vapori E Sabbia". This song is rather difficult to bear for me. Improvisation is the closest word to define it. A useless drum solo opens a more classic finale. The poorest song of the album.

The sound of their debut can be found again during the instrumental "Eleonora". Acoustic and fully early "Genesis" influenced. A pleasant break.before the powerful, scary and complex "Le Onde, Respiro Del Mare". Very much "Crimson" or even "VDGG" oriented. It is a combination of heavy riffs with a melodic and symphonic interlude as middle part. A very elaborated song and one of the best of this album.

The band will switch again to a very peaceful and fully symphonic track this time with "Dioniso Inquieto". A peaceful track and a pleasant way to break the hard and complex songs format available. The band will propose some diversified music on this album. The listener has again a rendez-vous with the jazzy side of their work ("Malcreanza"). Not bad but frankly it is not as such that I mostly like "Germinale".

The last two numbers are quite good as well. The personal "Avant-Grado" features some strong keys and heavy beats on the one hand but combined with melodic and pastoral passages on the other. All of "Germinale" in one song. It is also one of the highlight. Their cover of "Meurglys III" ("VDGG") is excellent as well. Shorter than the original and avoiding the reggae-ish, repetitive and long finale.

If you are a "Banco" fan, no doubt that you will like this album very much. To my ears it sounds as a good album. Three stars.