LITTLE TRAGEDIES

The cross from 2008 is another worthy album from their catalogue. This time a simple album but clocking over an hour of music. Musicaly speaking Little Tragedies is inspired by bands like ELP and from symphonic prog bands from the '70 thats for sure but also they incorporated in their sound some prog metal elements, the combination resulted is excellent and without sounding like a prog metal band at all. The head of the band Gennady Ilyin and together with the guitarsist they done some fantstic work here again. I think this band is quite underrated and to less known to larger public and is a shame because their music is very complicated and yet melodic and full of intresting arrangements. Sometimes is keyboard dominated prog, sometimes is more towards prog metal ala Dream Theater, sometimes the band combines this two always with eficiency and with good intelligent passages. Some brilliant moments are on opening track The cross or The God Abandoned almost 18 min of pure beauty, both show how great Little Tragedies is. Here we have also some fokish moments like on Tanets and in rest the album is an avalanche of keyboards and impressive song writting. Again 4 stars , but I like little more New faust then this one, still excellent and overlooked.

TOP notch album

Little Tragedies is without doubt one of the best progressive rock bands Russia ever had and has of course. THier music is highly impressive in instrumental arrangem,ents with lots of tempo changes and excellent songwritting. New Faust from 2006 released at Mals is a great example of how Gennady Ilyin the main composer and the head of the band manage to understands music in our days and the final product is simply said excellent. New faust is a double album with almost 2 hours of music, but with all that long musical journy , this album for sure doesn't dissipointing at all, not a boring moment, quite contrary each piece is a total winner, with a plus on the epic closing number from first CD - Two Demons, just brilliant. Little Tragedies has a special way of combining symphonic prog elements with in places I can hear Dream Theater similarities, and special in keyboard departement. They incorporate in their symphonic overall sound some prog metal elements, the result is outstanding. Complicated arrangements with many and long instrumental passages, lots of superb guitar works and keyboards aswell, both Alexander Malakhovsky from guitar and Gennady Ilyin from keyboards and aswell voice are very skillful and gifted musicians and musicaly speaking they understanding each other very strong. Some passage sounds like they were extracted from Dream Theatre - Scene from a memory, very similar in aproach, but in the end not bad at all. New Faust is a fantastic album with many memorable parts that will pleases both symphonic prog listners as prog metal lovers aswell. Easy 4 stars, one of the best albums ever from Russia, this is solid as rock and goes recommended.

The second part of the orgasmic trilogy recorded by Gennady Ilyin in late-90's was the album ''The Sun of Spirit'', a work created again at Art-Technology Studio in Moscow, released in 2000 on Russian label Boheme.Ilyin was helped by sound engineer Evgeny Shchukin and guitarist Igor Mikhel, but because there was a band feeling during the creation of the album Ilyin decided to release under the Little Tragedies name.A decade later the album was re-released by Mals Records, this time correctly credited to Gennady Ilyin himself (with a bonus track).

The first few tracks see Ilyin trying to deliver a bit more experimental themes, always of heavy Classical nature, with cinematic soundscapes, sharp Electronic vibes and melodramatic, theatrical vocals.The E.L.P. influences are still apparent in the bombastic synth solos and the grandiose symphonic parts, but there are some very dark moments, close to early ROZ VITALIS, with a haunting sound, closer to Avant-Garde than Progressive Rock.From the fourth track and on things seem to be rolling.The presence of some incredible guitar solos and rhythm parts by Igor Mikhel, the more Prog-compatible structures by Ilyin and the use of the drum programming result to well-crafted Symphonic Rock compositions, which still retain a strong Electronic flavor.Plenty of orchestral themes, bits of acoustic passages and a few nice melodies make the work stronger as it unfolds, eventually presenting Ilyin's talent in full mode.

While this early stuff created by Gennady Ilyin has some too ambitious ideas, it contains enough well-executed material to evaluate this man's unique talent.Recommended, a great work for all lovers of keyboard-driven Symphonic Rock.

The saga continues... Little Tragedies are back with a new studio album. As soon as it was made available I had to have it. Stylistically again closer to "New Faust" they are once again celebrating their full blown, wonderfully over-the-top and classically inspired prog rock including the quirky Russian vocals which makes all this just so unique. Anyone who knows Little Tragedies won't need to have any further description of what this sounds like. To anyone else I would just recommend to listen to the sound samples on their web site. What I really like here is that despite all pyrotechnical wizardry there is also a fine display of composition/songwriting which is a craft that does not always stand at the center with many bands. On the (small enough) downside my gripe would be the synthetic imitation of strings which nowadays in the age of really good sample libraries should not be necessary - or I would recommend to go retro and use Mellotron sounds. Besides that I would really wish this band was able to manifest the budget for a really good recording (no, the sound is not bad, but it could be more transparent and benefit from some high-end production) along with a worthy visual representation regarding the cover design which I think is somewhat underselling the music. That being said I think this is an exciting album for everyone who loves to indulge in a classically infused over-the-top musical fireworks!

The first ever compositions from this Russian band.

The mainman in Little Tragedies, Gennady Ilyin, has a degree in music from a Russian university and is classically trained. That is pretty evident here and on all their albums. Little Tragedies comes into progressive rock from the classical side of scene. Well, approaches progressive rock, that is. Rock, this is not.

What we get here is cascades upon cascades upon cascades of church organs and other tangents. It is like sitting in a cathedral and listening to the organist there playing a symphony. This kind of symphonies. Unfortunate for me, I am sitting in a half decent office and is staring at this monitor. I wish I was in a cathedral though because that would had enhanced this experience/piece of music x amount of times.

The music itself is good. Most of it is brooding passages and melody lines which captures the subjects brilliantly. There are some lack of good melody lines. But I am coming back to this cathedral thing where this music should be enjoyed and not in a grubby office in the middle of nowhere. This is music to be experienced. Not to be listened to. Fetch me a cathedral and I will give this a four star rating. Without it; three stars will have to do.

3 stars

I couldn't agree more with Prog-jester that the vocals are the biggest issue with this album. He mentions the lyrics too but I don't understand Russian so obviously I have no idea about that. It's not that the vocals sound bad, in fact he's a good singer but the Russian language is really unattractive to hear sung. If this was an all-instrumental album i'd feel much differently about this record. It's over 77 minutes which doesn't help either.

"The Sixth Sense" has an epic intro and it kicks in rather heavily. It lightens with synths and piano then unfortunately the vocals arrive. It kicks back in after 3 minutes with organ. Nice.Themes are repeated. "Bird" has this FLOYD-like spacey intro with sax and piano.The vocals ruin this great mood.Trumpet in this one too. It changes after 3 minutes as the tempo picks up and the piano leads. It turns heavy 6 minutes in. I like when it calms down 7 1/2 minutes in too. "On The Seashore" is spacey to start and synths lead after 2 minutes as it picks up.The vocals join in. It settles back to almost a 90's CAMEL-like flavour. I love when the guitar comes in before 5 minutes and it gets heavier.Vocals return as it settles then it's spacey late.

"Prodigal Son" features piano and reserved vocals.This isn't good especially when the vocals arrive. It settles back before 8 minutes. "Consolation" is ballad-like.Yikes. "Dream" is mid-paced and vocal and piano led. Horns too. "Bonding" is again ballad-like with vocals. No thanks. "Turkey" is synth led and uptempo.Vocals before a minute. Horns and guitar after 1 1/2 minutes. Synths are back leading again. "I Am Polite With Modern Life..." is a mellow, sappy ballad. "Pre-Memory" is laid back and vocal led. It turns instrumental before 3 minutes.This is better but it's just okay. "You And I" is not good at all. "I Haven't Lived,I've suffered Through It..." opens with piano melodies as vocals join in. Another ballad. Just kill me now. It does pick up some. Fans only.

A free album from these Russian masters of orchestral symphonic prog.

The Christmas tree type of pine tree on the front cover gives the rather wrong impression that this is a Christmas album. It is not and Little Tragedies has slightly shot themselves in the foot with this artwork. The music does have a wintery theme though, but winter can also mean January.... or February. Anyway; nevermind the artwork.

As usual from Little Tragedies, the music is orchestral symphonic prog with masses of woodwinds, keyboards and some guitars. This in addition to the drums and bass. There is no vocals here. The music on this album is like ELP meets a troupe of woodwinds players. Some of the songs here also sounds like those two meets a lost Dream Theater. Yes, there are even some progressive metal tunes on this album. That in addition to the classical music here with a heavy slaint of Russian folk music.

The quality is good throughout. There are no remarkable tracks here though and the music passes by as excellent, non-offensive background sound to some ironing and house cleaning. Not to mention trying to crack the latest crosswords from The Times. This type of music is bordering to muzak in my ears. But it is very much a worthy free download from their homepage. Make up your own mind, please. My mind is a three stars award though.

3 stars

Free for downloading full album ? Great !

I came across their music by Prog Archives' random mp3 play with checking some articles, and I heard beautiful guitars. I thought it is a song of The Enid which I didn't know till then, so I checked the name and player of the music, and I found that the beautiful music is of this band. I knew the name of the band but I did not recognize that they are doing this kind of melodic ones. The next surprise I got was that they say we can download this album for free on their official web site !!! Hoiw come ?

I am appreciating their music not because it is offered for free but because it is really great music. Imagine, The Enid joined by Keith Emerson and Steve Hackett. Won't you listen ?

The debut album from Little Tragedies, I presume. Or maybe that was The Cross. I am too lazy this morning to find the answer. Anyway, this album show some promise. But it still falls short of expectations.

The music is synths and even more synths. It is also symphonic prog with a large degree of avant-garde music too. It also have a large degree of Russian folk music in it too. What this have to do with the tragic demise of Titanic in 1912, I do not know. But the Titanic tragedy moved a lot of other nations than those directly involved too so a Russian doing a Titanic tribute is actually perfectly normal...... and honorable.

Most parts of this album most certainly feels like a funeral dirge. There is even a Russian traditional hymn here, sung in Russian. Which gives this album more style. Unfortunate, the avant-garde nodding destroys what could had been a good album. I am normally a fan of avant-garde music. But in this case, the avant-garde musings here is totally missing the boat. It feels like a bad excuse to rack up the minutes. There is some good music here. But not enough to call this a good album. I give it two stars, bordering to three stars.

2.75 stars

I have not written any reviews for a long time but I am writing this one as this album is my favourite prog release of 2009 and I want to share it with you all and promote this album a bit - it doesn't have any reviews yet. The abum is available for free download from the Little Tragedies website. Little Tragedies are a Russian band and usually sing in Russian, which might be a problem for some listeners but in the case of this album, there will be no such problem as it is totally instrumental. The album is also a Christmas album. However, as there are no lyrics and no traditional Christmas tunes, it is an album that you can listen to throughout the year. If the cover art were changed, you could be forgiven for thinking that it is not a Christmas album at all. In terms of music, it is difficult to pick out favourite tracks as they do sound quite similar to each other. The music is mainly quite melodic and cheerful although it does stray towards fusion territories sometimes (tracks 1, 8 and 14) but this is quite rare. For those of you who like harder-edged prog, you might prefer to start with these tracks. The main feeling I have when listening to album is that it really is magic - it makes you feel that you are going to a magic shop - or even a magic funfair. I am reminded of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker sometimes by the tunes. So give this album a try if you want to be transported to a magic place - you do don't you?