REFUGEE

Patrick Moraz is at his best here on the fast and complex parts: he really steals the show! He is amazingly well supported by TONS of complex and elaborated drums and very good bass parts. Moraz's keyboards are comparable here to Keith Emerson's performance of the early 70's: he uses an overdose of Hammond organ, and his piano parts are absolutely OUTSTANDING. The album contains no guitars! The weak point is that the music often takes time to take off: there are too many experimental, monotonous & strange not loaded bits. The good lead vocals sound between Peter Gabriel, Mick Rogers (Manfred Mann's) and the Kayak's singer.

"Papillon" has some lengthy repetitive and experimental bits, but the catchy piano parts are EXCELLENT! The epic "Grand Canyon" track, after its lengthy experimental bit, has a rhythmic and catchy part amazingly similarly to the Kayak band; then, after the repetitive, powerful & dirty organ note, there is an OUTSTANDING fast and complex part, very structured and synchronized. "Ritt Mickley" is very structured, complex and fast: Moraz's organ, moog and clavinet combination form a delightful melodic texture, with a floating mellotron in the background. The epic "Credo" has EXCELLENT elaborated & expressive piano parts; there is an apocalyptic church organ part; there is an OUTSTANDING extremely fast and synchronized piano + keyboards + drums bit: QUINTESSENTIAL! Moraz uses a delightful combination of Fender Rhodes - clavinet - moog, slightly reminding the fastest parts on PFM'S Chocolate kings; the only weak point of this track is that the fast parts are not sustained: the listener would like that those fast and complex parts make 100% of the contents of this record.

Patrick Moraz is better with other musicians than alone; he still proves it with this very good album. Do not expect it to be exactly like Relayer (Yes), but it's often very fast, quintessential and complex too, maybe even better than on the Yes' Relayer album!! All the fast parts deserve 5 stars; unfortunately, the slower parts are often less convincing, because they are too experimental.

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