ELECTRIC ASTURIAS: ELEMENTALS

3.5 stars. This is the followup to "Fractals" with the same 5 piece lineup. Both of these albums are the electric version of the band as opposed to the acoustic version or the Neo version(haha). Listed under Neo Prog here which is laughable if you've heard either of these two electric albums, but I get that on this site you can only list a band under one sub-genre. More Symphonic and Jazz at this point in their careers. A Japanese band who can play Chamber music or whatever you want because this is a very talented instrumental band. I find the violin to be almost overbearing on this one and while I do like the violin as a flavour I'm not big on it dominating the way it does much of the time on here.

The other issue for me is that this sounds so samey from start to finish. Again this is so impressive with the powerful bass/drum rhythm section with the piano, guitar or violin soloing over top. It's just kind of relentless with this style even though there are so many "wow" moments. So a slight step down from the low 4 star rating I have for "Fractals". We get close to an hour of music and no one track stands out for me but there's no duds either as this is a consistent album in the same style throughout.

I think most Prog fans give both of these electric albums 4 stars minimum but you really need to be a big fan of the violin in doing so. Well I'm keeping "Fractals" around by this band if that means anything. There is a 4 song suite called "Suite Of Elemental" at almost 29 minutes to end the album and the second tune of these opens with the wind blowing maybe not so surprisingly since it's called "Sylphide:Wind Elemental". I just like that part the best. Just sayin'.