TERRA NOCTURNE

A friend told me about this band when I was talking about Pink Floyd-influenced groups in a prog group. It took me some time to find this album and I was quite surprised they were americans. And the PF influences are evident, although they do have come up with an excellent debut work. The main reason I can´t give this record a higher rating is the fact that some times the PF ties are a bit too close for comfort. On tracks like the opener Sacred Moon's Light, plus Let Go and Where Have You Gone are almost PF rip offs. However, this is easily forgivable on the grounds they did write some very good songs and the fact that not all the tunes on this CD are so floydian. The Instrumental ones specially point a very interesting way towards something utterly of their own.

It took me a little while to fully appreciate Lynn Stokes & Sol Surfers many qualities. Ok, there are several parts that remind a lot of the band which produced The Dark Side Of The Moon, The Wall and Wish You Here. So it is no surprise that we have a sax player that sounds uncanny like Dick Parry, Richard Wright-like keys and so on. The difference is that they can write excellent tunes. Some of them quite derivative, but good anyway. And they are really fine musicians who know their trade. The arrangements are very tasteful and there are no fillers, nor weak stuff. The production is top notch. It´s hard to point a highlight, but I can say that tracks like the title track, Open Door and Across The Barrier show their potential to become very big.

Final rating: 3,5 stars. I´m looking forward to hear their next works. If you like the quieter side of Pink Floyd and don´t mind the lack of originality you should not miss Terra Nocturne. For my part, I like it a lot!