THE FINNISHING TOUCH

Another strong release by "LIFE LINE PROJECT"

A couple days ago the mailman rang the bell of my house and I knew he was probably bringing a couple albums of "LIFE LINE PROJECT" that my friend "Erik de Beer" had sent some days before, so after verifying I was correct, placed "The FINnishig Touch" in my CD player and started to enjoy the music of a relatively new band that I enjoy very much.

This time "De Beer" and company presents us some sort of conceptual album, because the band works on a melancholic anonymous Finnish folk song, now, the interesting aspect of this release is that they don't limit themselves to ethnic music, but explore variations on Jazz, Rock, Prog and even Classical arrangements, creating a very interesting and versatile atmosphere.

But probably the most surprising factor is that "LIFE LINE PROJECT" for the first time since I heard them, rocks and very hard, but manage to make the impact smother blending this new experiment with fluid Moog and sad,melancholic passages.

This time I won't dare to comment one by one the 17 tracks of the album, but only mention the ones that impressed me more, like "Tricky Dicky Finds The Rainbow's End", a fantastic instrumental that has everything, Heavy Prog with a killing guitar that blends with a jazzy piano, frantic synths and some acoustic" sections that satisfy all the tastes.

"Attical Problems" is another surprising track, starts acoustic and almost Flamenco (Lets remember that the Netherlands also have Flemish influence as Spain) but after a few minutes morphs into a fully Prog and frenetic piece of music, with radical tempo changes, simply brilliant and with a certain FOCUS (Mostly Jan Akkerman) influence.

"The Missing Drink" brings back the listener to Prog territory with an outstanding and breathless Moog performance that reminds of "Keith Emerson", but most important leads to an impressive contrast between the soft and Classical oriented "The 2nd Finnish Interlude" and the Flamenco inspired "The Finnishing Touch", two short tracks that in a few seconds prove how versatile this guys are.

Of course I couldn't close this thread without mentioning the pompous "Little Alice" and the amazing "Saudades de Sor" a track based in a 19th Century chord progression by "Fernando Sor" played in Jazz mood with a replica of the Palormo guitar of 1928 that the musician used more than a century ago.

Before moving to the rating I fell it's important to mention that the album has several short interludes, something I see with disrust, being that many bands use this short instrumentals merely as fillers, but in this case all have the important purpose, to work as links between different genres to soften the collision among absolutely different atmospheres that otherwise would sound contradictory. Something "LIFE LINE PROJECT" has achieved with dexterity, being that each and every song sounds as an integral and coherent part of the whole work.

In my opinion "The FINnishing Touch" deserves no less than 4 solid stars, being that it's original, interesting but most important, crafted with intelligence and passion, all the ingredients necessary for an album to be considered an excellent addition to any Prog collection.

As usual with this band, highly recommended.

''The finnishing touch'' was the third official release by Life Line Project, written by Erik de Beer during a time he thought was dying of a terminal disease and featuring the same line-up with ''Modinha'' at the time of the recordings, which took place at de Beer's GitaarStudio between October 2007 and May 2009.The main music concept is based on a sad Finnish traditional song, reworked by de Beer, while parts of the composed material is credited to guitarist Jason Eekhout.Moreover a few tracks on the album date back to the days of Erik de Beer with his premature bands Brancard and Zoundworks.

According to de Beer, ''The finnishing touch'' belongs among the most jazzy efforts of the band.Actually the first few tracks contain strong Fusion touches in the guitar parts and, yes, some jazzy influences on the piano parts.I would say though that this was one of the most Neo Prog-sounding albums the band ever produced.Unlike ''Modinha'', ''The finnishing touch'' is heavily relying on de Beer's work on synthesizers, which are executed on flashy solos and very sharp interventions, but the true problem is that the album sounds very thin and ''plastic'' at moments, especially the drum parts and the orchestral keyboards sound extremely fake.There are still plenty of organ and piano runs in here, but the focus remains on synthesizers, bass and drums with an E.L.P.-kind of style mixed with melodic guitar touches.As the album is structured around Finnish Folk, there are also some folky references at moments with the acoustic guitars in evidence, which de Beer cleverly adapted in a Classical-like enviroment.The second half of the album is much stronger with a turn towards a FOCUS-like style, featuring dramatic guitar playing, smooth flute drives and more balanced use of keyboards.The overall sound recalls of acts such as ELEGANT SIMPLICITY, pretty much synthetic, struggling to offer its true symphonic atmosphere, fortunately the music is well-composed and a few tracks really stand out based on their grandiose sound.

A good Neo/Symphonic Prog album, which could have been even better if some instrumental parts did sound a bit more natural.Recommended to anyone who loves melodic, rich Prog Rock and does not care about a heavier dose of synths.