IN OGNI LUOGO IN OGNI TEMPO

In true progressive rock fashion, this album cover is a colorful depiction of someone's vivid imagination, in a Salvador Dali science fiction like style. The Italian band that calls itself PERIFERIA DEL MONDO, which means "Periphery of the World," is one of the world's best-kept secrets. Their advanced and complex sounds come compiled into one impressive amalgam of rock and jazz music.

This stunning LP comes housed in gatefold sleeves with lyrics (a combination of Italian and English) and colored photos of the group on an enclosed sheet; in addition to that, you get a bonus 45. The liner notes found on the inner sleeves of the album are in Italian. If you really are interested in a translation, you could go to the Alta Vista translation site, although it would be very time consuming to type everything in manually. I do not think it is worth spending the time to do that and I prefer to just listen and enjoy the music. Their music sounds brilliantly recorded and arranged throughout this LP, thus it is so enjoyable that you can understand it in your own way even if you do not know Italian. There is not that much singing to distract you from the most important part of this experience, the music. This band is an outstanding group of musicians that puts a refreshing spin on things with their tight and crisp prog-rock compositions.

I went online to see what kind of attention they were getting and it looks as though they are recognized for their accomplishments and have a quite a following. This does not come as a surprise to me at all as they certainly sound as if they are accomplished musicians. Everyone that listens to music of any kind will tell you that it speaks the universal language of entertainment. PERIFERIA DEL MONDO is one of the better Italian progressive rock bands that I have heard, and there are many, so it remains a difficult task to separate your work from everyone else that is doing the same thing. I think that they successfully accomplish their mission in making you aware of how special they are on this album.

[Banco vocalist Francesco Di Giacoma and guitarist Rodolfo Maltese guest on the first track, "L'Infedele," as well as helping out during the mixing of the album. -ed.]

Rating: 3.5/5