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Epidaurus - Endangered CD (album) cover

ENDANGERED

Epidaurus

Symphonic Prog


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ZowieZiggy
PROG REVIEWER
1 stars Epidaurus released a good album in 1977 and then took a little rest...Seventeen years actually ! Times have changed in the meantime. So, did the band. And not for the best.

The album nicely opens on an a spacey instrumental. It sounds as a good start for a concept album, but unfortunately it won't be the case. I quite liked the special and high pitched vocals from Chrisitane Wand so what the heck do we need these weird male vocals during "Tonight" ? and even if "Tonight" is also pleasant, these vocals partially ruin it. Pop influence is already present. Symph pop ?

"October 1919" is my fave "Endangered" song. Another good instrumental even if it is a bit repetitive.

Now, most of the following numbers are not really great. Mellow and uninspired music. Vocals will have a more important role but I have to say that the fantasy of their first work is gone. Most compositions sound the same and when you listen to this album in a row, some sort of dull feeling prevails.

The "climax" is reached with "Between the Lines". Believe me, there is nothing to read between them. The worse here even if Christiane tries to save it a bit. Actually, in this song her tone of voice reminds me Jerney Kaagman (from "Earth & Fire").

Well, maybe that the worse was not reached, yet : "Seed In Your Heart" is particularly hard to diggest. Poor "commercial" song (although I doubt that the band could reach the charts with such a song). Pop / disco with trumpets and tutti quanti. Bad, bad, bad.

Even if the mood is still on the mellow side, the closing number is probably one of "best" song of the album. Nice acoustic intro (at last we got rid of those awful rhythms) !

Absolutely not essential of course. One little star and time for "Epidaurus" to call it quit (actually they should have done it after their first album, at least they would have been recalled for having released a good album).

Report this review (#136484)
Posted Thursday, September 6, 2007 | Review Permalink
Tarcisio Moura
PROG REVIEWER
2 stars Well, after 17 years the german group Epidaurus came back with this CD. Make no mistake, their sound changed, a lot! And not for the better, unfortunately. Actually it is not bad music, but it is a completely different band, even if they managed to reunite practically everyone from the original outfit after all those years. Most of the stuff here is simply too popish. Which is a pity really, since it is obvious they are terrific musicians and Christiane Wand has a beautiful voice.

The quality of their material is quite uneven too, jumping from prog to electronic to pop without warning. It lacks direction and personality, as many tracks seem to be done by a different bands at times. Some songs are nice (October 1919 and Between The Lines, for instance are fine pop tunes, the former kind of a Genesis instrumental circa 1978 and the latter reminds me of Renaissance around the time of Song For All Seasons). But sometimes they just blow it (Seed Your Heart is just terrible).

Conclusion: you better listen to this record before you even consider buying it. Although - for my taste - not a complete disaster, it is nothing like their promising, symphonic and very good debut in 1977. Two stars.

Report this review (#179375)
Posted Monday, August 11, 2008 | Review Permalink
Marty McFly
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR
Honorary Collaborator
2 stars Much worse than their debut. The biggest changes that has happened in between are 1)dominant woman vocals (which became much more extensive) 2)simplified sound, even I've heard worse. This is certainly step in a bad direction and after this, this is yet another example of one album wonder + one disaster in form of follow-up.

Well, I was trying to find something good on this, but it's so hard. Cheap melodies (strong melodic element actually, but not a good one), almost to the point where it becomes very annoying.

2(-), not good, it really isn't worth of adventurous listener's attention, only for historical purposes and/or if you want to hear something unchallenging, easy-listening music.

Report this review (#319609)
Posted Sunday, November 14, 2010 | Review Permalink
kenethlevine
SPECIAL COLLABORATOR
Prog-Folk Team
1 stars As I continue to review comeback albums after "raising a family" absences, I couldn't help noticing that one of EPIDAURUS' children has posted their 1996 "Endangered" album in its entirety on youtube. Well, at least it must be a relative because of the following statement: "The first album of Epidaurus and this One are gems of Symphonic Prog and essential for every collector of Prog rock." Perhaps the only truth in all of this lies in the term "collector", as in only a German symphonic prog completist could procure this drivel and not feel cheated, provided they never listened to it of course.

Let me hasten to add that even the band's debut fell somewhat short of high end jewelry status, but it offered enough moments between elegant instrumentals and Christiane Wand's vocals to be accorded due reverence for their contributions to that creative epoch. Here we have a lazy pop cum disco album with occasional symphonic and electronic arrangements that at best ("Tonight", "October 1919") remind me of countrymen P'COCK but not even to that level, and at worst (pretty much everything else but especially "Seed in Your Heart"), would not pass for filler on RENAISSANCE's awful archive album "Songs from Renaissance Days", which was basically an album of also rans. If one might occasionally be inclined to hum "By the Wayside" or "without You", that's just more in the realm of self immolation than anything resembling a compliment.

So here we have it, a species which should be endangered, an album with essentially no audience and no redeemability, and cruel punishment of a band's modest legacy.

Report this review (#2973930)
Posted Wednesday, December 13, 2023 | Review Permalink

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