ENBOR

Enbors first album reminds me of the times it was made. There is a certain warmth and lustre about Enbor which really strikes a chord with me. Every now and then I return to this album and I find myself smiling and feeling a warm embrace, because the music is warm and gentle. Unfortunately it is not very varied, I'd say. There's more of a general feeling than an albums worth of really good material. The songs does not stand out. Not really. They blend together into one.

The conclusion has to be that Enbors first album is a pleasant and warm album with nice instrumentation and gentle voices. Not a masterpiece, though very pleasant listening.

Lying somewhere between pleasant Electric Folk and slightly CAMEL-esque mellow prog rock,''Enbor'' is a nice album in terms of balance and composition,totally sung in the Basque dialect.Clocking at 33 minutes,this album offers the listener three musically positive elements.Firstly it's the smooth yet carefully performed guitar work of Inaki Gutierrez, Joxe Portela and Ramon Gardeazabal with a sensitive edge and delicate melodies,both electric and acoustic.Especially the slow-tempo rhythms come close to the style of ANDY LATIMER.Secondly,there are some really pleasant male and female vocal harmonies in here.The warm voices of the singers are all over the album and making the album even deeper in its sensitive section.Last, but not least,the wind instruments and their smooth interplays with the rhythm section are really awesome.The dreamy flutes and the clarinet passages of Inaki Urettxaga will reward every fan of decent folk rock purchases.

Thougt not that well known like other Basque folk bands (ITOIZ, HAIZEA etc.) or having even a complicated sound, ENBOR certainly deserve a place in the book of progressive rock for their careful blending of rock,wind instrumentation and multi-vocal arrangements .Folk Rock fans around the world,this was made for you!3,5 stars is my accurate rating.

The sublime vocal harmonies that really made the self-titled album are virtually absent throughout the disk. The greater emphasis on the wind instruments and keyboards works best on "Neska Adiskidea", and is more than a little like ITOIZ circa "Ezekiel", while the closer "Agurra II" is probably the folkiest thing done by Enbor. Both point a way to a more unique sound less pressured by the somewhat obtuse jazz orientation which permeated the earlier part of the album.

Katebagiak is overall a slightly inferior package to the previous ENBOR album. I am going to round down from 2.5 stars, with the N.B that this is the more progressive of the two albums, but we all know that doesn't necessarily mean better.

I hear a lot of ITOIZ in here, not surprisingly since they had already produced 2 acclaimed albums by this time. In the first minute of the opening number, I hear a bit of ELOY's "Ocean", but this seems a passing snippet, mentioned more to reveal the breadth of interests. "Ondoan ez dut inor" and "Zuek ez dazizue" are the strongest tracks, with the latter bearing similarities to early HORSLIPS ("Musical Priest" and to DECAMERON's ("Tomorrow's Pantomime"). The lovely harmonies make me think of Germany's EDEN. The instrumental closer solidifies the eclectic chill-out vibe, with fluid percussion and electric piano to the fore.

Ultimately this is not an exciting album by any stretch, with a sameness that would not engage more demanding progressive ears. However, that same quality lends itself better to relaxation and reflection, and those who enjoy the pastoral, sometimes breezily jazzy, Basque sound of the period will be in raptures.

Beyond that this is a fairly plain album musically, with very little energy and not any particularly noteworthy musicianship either. Nothing here is actually poor, it just doesn’t go very far to draw the listener in and keep their attention either.

The first half of the CD was a side-long title track suite on the original vinyl release, although it is actually made up of several loosely joined smaller parts. The band is mostly acoustic except for some electric guitar (there’s also an acoustic guitar). Add Iñaki Urretxaga on some sort of woodwind (flute or something ethnically similar) and piano and you have most of the band’s sound. Amaia Kareaga’s vocals are competent but not exceptional, but his shortcomings are offset somewhat by decent harmonizing backing from the guitarists Joxe Portela and Iñaki Gutierrez.

After the lengthy opening the band seems to have struggled to come up with enough material to complete the album, and indeed the record is just over thirty-six minutes long so there would have easily been room for another song or two if the band had something more to add.

Of the remaining tracks “Kutsadura” is too long on vocals and too short on musical variety, while “Neska Adiskidea” features some mellow and intricate guitar fingering along with horns but little else. Neither of the other two tracks stand out either, and only the closing “Agurra II” features any measure of percussion or acoustic guitar that would hint that this is actually a Basque album (other than the vocals of course).

I actually kind of like this album the way I like to listen to some of the b-list west-coast American folk singers of the seventies once and a while. But not often, and the same goes for this record. A fair effort, but not much more than a collector piece for fans. Two stars that would be 2.5 if that were possible in the current rating system.

peace

Starting with the 17-min+ title track, the album takes a solid plunge into progressive jazz-tinged folk, with flutes, saxes, acoustic and electric guitars exchanging roles, trading licks, interacting with each other beautifully. Around the 7th minute, an electric guitar riff changes the song's feel and structure, and the track gains in intensity with solid double/triple harmonies contrasting with Portela's dramatic delivery, resembling somewhat Itoiz's singing.

The flipside contains four songs between 6:30 and 3:30, none of which can match the epic on the first side, but still coming quite close for two of them. The opening Kutsadura is an upbeat song where the saxes are taking the front role. The flute-laden Behin Une Batetan is yet another solid track, even if Enbor doesn't take full advantage or their extended line-up to provide more variety top their sound. Although starting dully, Neska Adiskidea is probably the most dramatic track after the lengthy title track; while the closing Agurra is rather embarrassing and musically sticks out like a sore thumb.

The Basque language being completely unknown to me, I have few means to confirm that the lyrics are (as I suspect) all related to each other in a theme or even a concept and my guess is that if so, the theme must be poignant. While Enbor is yet another good (even excellent) Basque folk group, they can't match Itoiz's solemnity or Errobi's adventurous spirit or Haizea's medieval psychedelia. Nevertheless Enbor is much worthy of your investigation, but you'd better start with this one.