IN SEARCH OF THE CRYSTAL

After the promising releases of the CD Legends and the EP Legends Remain, I was curious about Magrathea´s next move. While their two earlier works were not very original, they showed a great potential with their classic 70´s Genesis influenced music. Unfortunatly they seem to be following the same path as other worshippers of the british legend, like Citizen Cain. That is: they assumed Genesis music would be more complex and less melodic than any of their previous albums.

According to that, the music on In Search Of The Crystal is far less appealing and charming than on Legends. You can also pick up some other influences here and there, like the ELP-like timbre of the Hammond organ on Passion Play and the strong resemblance of Yes in the chorus and keyboards arrangement of the opener Search For The Crystal. But while they are still trying to find their own sound, the Genesis shadow is still all over it. Not that is bad, but it seems that making their music more complex for its own sake is not really doing any good to the final cut. In fact, it was bad for Citizen Cain and it is bad for Magrathea as well.

The best moments are still when they sound like Genesis on tracks like Heaven Is Not Enough and the beautiful Interactive Dreamers (best song on the entire CD). Again this is not terrific original, but it is good anyway. I still think the music here has enough good moments to warrant a 3 star rating, but barely. 2,5 would be a more fitting, but I´m in a good mood. The potential is still there. I really hope those guys will achieve a good balance between melody and originality

Forth album to date of this discret symphonic prog band from UK named In search of the crystal from 2008. Knowing until few weeks ago only previous one Legends, I've decided to check aswell this album, so I'be bought it from their bandcamp page. The album was complitely re recorded few weeks ago in june 2012 with a diffrent cover art , quite better then first issue. Even the sound is not fantstic, not many bands have big buget for mastering, mixing and producing, but is not a big problem because the compositions are most of the time enjoyble and well performed forgetting about the sound. Again a typical Genesis influenced album with all the ingrediants for a symphonic prog album and quite similar with predecesor. Nice keyboards passages and guitars aswell, quite complex and well played, the best example is the opening track followed by the best piece of the album, at least for me Bug eyed monster. Overall even the originality lacks here big time, the arrangements are decent and fair, fans of US from Holland, North Star from USA, Genesis can appreciate this band, they have ok albums and shows potential with each release.3-3.5 stars