LA COMETA

Ok I felt like I needed to do a 3 star review to hopefully bump up the dreadful 2.29 score that this album has. Why? In my humble opinion, I felt that 2.29 is not justified. This album is actually "good". Not great. Not a classic by any means and most certainly not in the same league as their first s/t album. And one could argue that this is not really a progressive album like the first s/t album. This is more in the vein of the 2nd album from 1974.

You can find out the full story on why this album was not released for over 35 years on the italianprog dot com web site. But this is a treat to be able to have a never-heard 1974 album available. Most of the time, those "never before released" albums tend to be "a drag".

However, there's some good songs on this album. I feel there's actually a few great songs on this album. It's an uneven album with a few "skippable" tracks (skip over after you heard them 1 time) but there's a few songs that are beautiful italian prog/folk.

For a few of those beautiful tracks "Nenae" and "Oratorio", I'm reminded of a few of the mellow tracks from Nuovo Idea's "Mr. E Jones"(another album worth seeking if you've never heard it) and Gruppo 2001 along with a few in the vein of the 1974 Adriano Monteduro album w/Reale Accademia.

Those 2 are great songs with vocal harmonies and nice melodies that make lots of those italian songs from the 70's stand out.

The other really good song is the "Makumba Hotel" with it's breezy/airy wordless vocal harmonies and argentine/south american overtones. It's infectious. Sort of reminds me of the 'South American Getaway" that was the background music on Butch cassidy and the Sundance kid when they were in South America towards the end. You know the music where the vocal harmonies are going "Ba ba baaaa ba" :-)

Cool tune.

Just those 3 songs alone make this a justifiable purchase for $5.99 which you can get on amazon.

I've heard this album several times and those 3 songs stand out.

As per the others, "La Cometa" (the opener) has a "cool melody" but it gets old very quickly and runs out it's pleasure after 2 minutes and repeats itself for the next 3-4 minutes. The other songs (which is about the other half) are either skippable or "mediocre" and forgettable. The last song is dreadful and I agree with the reviewer here that it sounds like the music from a cheesy 1970's game-show.

I'd bark and howl at the moon in anger if I paid $20-25 for this. However, for $5.99, I snort like a happy pig and purr like a happy cat at the 3 good/great songs I mentioned and only growl at the not so good songs.

I'd give this about a 2.8 round up to 3 stars.

Worth a listen. You can go to amazon and listen to 30 second sound samples for each song on this album. Should give you a sample.

I sure hope there are other "never-before-released" albums from 1970's in the vaults across Italy by many of these bands.

BTW, I would like to mention the brand brand new albums by Reale Accademia in 2008/2009 titled "IL LINGUAGGIO DELLE COSE" and "TEMPO SENZA TEMPO" (where Adriano Monteduro has resurrected a band under that name) are horrible albums. Almost "techno" with drum machines and literally no melodies.

I found out from the italian prog website on a recent interview with one of the original members of Reale Accademia (who was the lead guy on their 1972 album) that Adriano used the name of "Reale Accademia Di Musica" for these 2008/2009 albums without the permission of the original members from the 1972 band. Be very careful with those 2 albums. Buyer beware.

This "La Cometa" album even ranks below "TEMPO SENZA TEMPO" on this website. I feel that's an unjustified joke because "La Cometa" is so much better in every sense of the word. Don't let that 2.29 rating scare you from at least going to amazon and zipping thru all the 30 second sound samples of "La Cometa". Also, youtube has 2 of the songs from "la cometa" in it's entirely including the ""Makumba Hotel" album. It's worth typing that into youtube and giving it a listen and then deciding if it's worth buying the album (or at least just a few songs from the album).