OUROBOROS

KOTEBEL are a band out of Spain with a leader from Venezuela and I have had a hard time getting into their classical style. "Ouroboros" is the first album by them that deserves 4 stars in my opinion. They had already released four records before this 2009 release, the first three getting overall ratings of 3 stars or below on tis site. The fourth album "Omphalos" is where we get a spike in ratings to an almost 4 star average, quite the improvement but it's an album I gave 3 stars to. So I basically gave up on them until I started hearing a lot of positive things about their 2017 release "Cosmology" which I bought and gave it 4 stars then I went back and picked up a couple of their earlier studio albums I had missed including this one.

Man this is a really consistent album which I like. Yes we get that Classical sort of base here created mostly by the piano but the bass is absolutely huge, just a pleasure. Guitar is awesome as well as he changes it up quite often and the guy can play! Drumming is good but really it's the piano and synths that sort of drive this record. Lots of atmosphere created by the keyboards on here. This is all instrumental unless you count the vocals on the bonus track which I don't because, well it's an extra. This is one of those rare albums where every song is really good. All in the same style pretty much. The opener is all about the bass and atmosphere while the title track opens with this dark bass lines followed by guitar expressions and atmosphere as our 16 minute trip just gets started. The bass is massive on "Satyrs" I mean come on! A powerful tune with a cool piano break after 2 minutes before it gets fat again right Simon? That closer "Legal Identity" is special with that UNIVERS ZERO-like section. The previous two tracks are both top notch as well.

Easily 4 stars and with "Cosmology" my two favourites by them.