PROJECT CREATION

Hugo Flores returns with Project Creation. Flores is accompanied, once again, by several Portuguese musicians, among them Linx (ex-Forgotten Suns), Vasco Patrício (from ptRocker), Shawn Gordon (from Progrock) or Fred Lessing, in a total of 10 guests. The style is the same as the previous "Floating World", Progressive Rock / Metal alternating between rock oriented stuff, some ambiental passages, and some ethnic music, always with a very intense futuristic / space environment based particularly on synthesizers, but with a strong guitar presence. All the guest participations and the "atypical" instruments (flute, saxophone, acoustic guitar, etc.), besides the 5 voices (3 male and 2 female), help to create the different ambiances of the album. In lyrical terms, this disc works as a sequel to the previous one. It is a science fiction story that will be finished on an upcoming album (oh, those blessed trilogies!). The icing on the cake, a truly fantastic cover artwork, complemented by a no less sensational booklet. A great Progressive Rock / Metal album made in Portugal that is up there with the most popular and well known bands.

I have to begin with a sigh. I tried very hard to like this album. After years of repeated attempts to do so, I have unfortunately found that this music is not for me. I'll do my best to explain why, but first here's why I wanted to like it so badly.

First, the concept behind this sounds like it should be awesome. Dawn on Pyther is the 2nd of a series (yes, that's right: series, as in more than one album) of albums depicting a science fiction story about life beginning on a dead world. In a word: cool. As a Star Trek, Star Wars, and just about anything else "Star" fan, I could easily have gotten behind a concept like that. The second reason I wanted to like this album was because I chatted with Hugo Flores (Project Creation's creator) several times, which is how I came to order the CD in the first place, and I liked him. I liked his ideas, I liked that he wasn't pulling punches - doing something so ambitions is risky. So, I went into this ready, hoping, and expecting to be amazed.

I remember when I first received it I was fumbling with the packaging in the car so I could listen to it right away. My first experience listening to it was on a drive - I forget exactly how long now, but it wasn't long enough to hear the album all the way through. What I do remember is the feeling of my heart sinking further and further into the floor of the car as each track ended without anything of note occurring in it. There are a few things worth noting here: 1 - I am less picky about music when in the car because my mind is partially on driving and I'm therefore less inclined to be a critic, and 2 - I was not able to finish hearing the album immediately after leaving the car, so it had to wait until later that day. My first listening experience was therefore disjointed. At first, I put my lackluster impression down to reason # 2, and figured that reason # 1 distracted me this time. I hoped that once I gave this due attention with headphones, it would improve.

It is now many years later, however, and it has not improved. I find it difficult to make it through the first three tracks. I think I know why: 1 - The wonder of the concept is not adequately expressed in the music. The music is well executed, but the songwriting does not make me believe that I am on Pyther. I do not feel the alien landscape. 2 - The lyrics often strike me as clunky or too literal. 3 - Sections of the music are disjointed. They tend not to flow into each other. (Not always necessary - maybe this was an artistic choice but it didn't work for me). 4 - Many of the synth sounds used seemed cliche to me. 5 - Expression of the interesting concept seems to have taken a back-seat to showmanship. It feels like the album is saying, "look at me, I'm very prog" rather than, "this is what it would feel like to be on Pyther when this world-changing event is happening."

I doubt I will ever feel the urge to listen to this music again. However, I do have to say the technical proficiency of everyone involved was good. If you are just looking to hear someone play an instrument well within varying moods, you might like this. The production is very good, quite clean.

I should also say I was surprised to find this group listed as progressive metal. They do have some metal elements, but I wouldn't have given them this label myself.

In summation, the music did not live up to the concept. But the album was performed and produced well.

This is Hugo Flores new project called PROJECT CREATION. I just reviewed "Out Of Place" by his former band called SONIC PULSAR. Both bands are fairly heavy and Hugo is really into concept albums, so that's what we get here with "Floating World", all 71 plus minutes of it. He's enlisted Linx on vocals. Linx sang on the "Snooze" album by FORGOTTEN SUNS. All three of these bands i've mentioned are from Portugal by the way.

"The Floating World" opens with lots of atmosphere.The guitar starts to make some noise before 1 1/2 minutes then it kicks in. Nice bass 4 minutes in and cello follows. Later on we get some heaviness with piano. "Living Under A Blue Sky" sounds good especially the fat bass lines and the guitar work. Sax and a calm before 2 1/2 minutes. Synths follow then it kicks back in. "The Desert Planet" opens with piano, cello and atmosphere. Some female vocal melodies and drums too. "The Civilzation" opens with spacey synths. It kicks in before 1 1/2 minutes. Vocals follow. Contrasts continue. "Mechanical Dragonflies" features more atmosphere and some flute and female vocals. Drums start to create a beat. Male vocals late. "Arriving" opens with sax and other sounds including deep bass after a minute. Male then female vocals follow. "Warming Up To The Machines" builds until we get some passionate vocals and bass. A big finish on this one. "Artificial Satellite" features percussion, flute and atmosphere. It kicks in at 1 1/2 minutes. Great sound ! Vocals join in. It settles 4 1/2 minutes in but it's still powerful.

"Intervening" is a short piece consisting of atmosphere and synths throughout. "Creating Atmosphere" is something this band has done lots of on this album. Of course this song also has lots of it. "First Species" is really more of the same. It picks up after a minute then settles 4 minutes in. "The Shining Planet" again opens with atmosphere this time guitar makes some brief noise and keys come in. Female vocals arrive.It kicks in before 1 1/2 minutes. I like the guitar before 3 minutes. Male vocals follow.More great guitar before 4 minutes. "Cheops" opens with flute and atmosphere. Spoken words then reserved vocals. It does get fuller then settles again. "Returning Home" opens with piano then the drums join in. Vocals as the sound gets fuller. Tasteful guitar 3 minutes in. It settles as contrasts continue.

Good album. I really like all the atmosphere but overall this album has failed to captured my imagination.

Project Creation is a progressive metal band from Portugal formed around the well known (mostly in Portugal and Spain) musician Hugo Flores. Besides his olo career he formed in 2002 Project Creation , reaching now at number 2 album named dawn on phyter from 2007. I was little shocked by this album, not in a very good way, because this is to my ears some organised chaos with lots of key noodleings. The music is not the traditional prog metal I hear every day, I mean is more towards symphonic metal with duo female/male vocals, but not a one very well done. First, the sound is horrible, is like they don't know each other as a band and now try to focus on what they want to play, and the result is a mixt of everything, high pitch vocals when doesn't suport the piece, to much key solos when is not necessarly in a moody pieces, and some truly awful male vocal parts. The music is not necessarly very bad, is mostly because they don't have a precise scop of what they want to play, they just play, each musician of his language and as a whole is something almost impossible to listen at once. I said earlier that I was shocked because I know Hugo Flores solo career and specialy Atlantis album, and is miles away better than this project, like earth to sun. I'm a fan of progressive metal but this is to much for me, I listend more then 5 times to fully apreciated this issue but was almost impossible to give more then 2 stars, ok 2.5. Zara Quiroga and Alda Reis remind me in places of Anneke of The Gathering, but at least the dutch girl realy knew how to make her voice in something wonderful, and I don't know who is Zara and who is Alda realy, same tone. Now the male vocals are absolutly a desaster Paulo Pacheco , Links eevn Flores done some parts are truly unintristing to the limits, those guys have no voice, they are under the tone and not realy fits the music. Some sax , flute are thrown between prog elements to be more diverse the music but doesn't help to be a total forgetful album to me. 2 stars, for fans or collectors only doesn't matter, is still unpleasent to me. The pieces are long and I had hard times to understand what is going on on some of them, chaos. Not recommended, I have nothing against the band, I apreciated Hugo Flores in his solo career but this is poor.

P.S - I think they were more concentrated in makeing a good cover art then on music, the booklet is well done and the cover art aswel, but the music no.

Great release! This is modern prog rock with excellent guitar work and furious solos, laid over remarkable electronic textures. Zara and Alda are also unique in their vocal styles and featured throughout the whole record. Linx is also a tremendous singer, providing a unique tone and feel to the tracks.

Stand-out songs are the Epic The Dawn on Pyther and the amazing Flying Thoughts. Dragonfly Garden is a standout piece as well, featuring excellent piano lines. Voyage of the Dragonfly closes with a truly wonderful piano vs flute dialog.

Dawn On Pyther is a magnificent album to anyone that loves music. Also, as a plus, with the beautiful artwork you have an album more than worth having. Highly recommended!

For three weeks and maybe 15 plus listenings I have tried to like this. I still prefer fingernails on a chalk board. I am extremely liberal when it comes to my progessive rock. I know that if I don't like it the first, second or so on, I will probably like it by the 10 listens. That was impossible here.

The one plus is the production...after that I can't say much. There seems to be little cohesion in the compostions as they are all over the place. Screeching female vocals out of tune with the rhythm section. Guitars aimlessly wailing over walls of synthesizers. It reminded me a of playing a Hawkwind album backwards. This band has been repeatedly compared to Ayreon and even been called the Portuguese version of the aformentioned band. I love Ayreon and I heard very little resemblence to that band.

If you prefer tight and melodic compositions avoid this one. If you prefer techinical prog metal..again avoid. If you like cool album art then maybe.

Project Creation is the brainchild of Portugese multi-instrumentalist Hugo Flores. "Dawn on Pyther" is the second chapter in an ongoing series of concept albums, the first being "The Floating World" released in 2005.

Musically this is a wild mix of ambient moods, atmospheric metal and prog metal; at times spiced with folk influences. The music scores high on melodramatic and epic moods; with layers of synths, dark-tinged synth sounds and epic guitars lay the foundation for the dramatics; and the vocals from male and female vocalists alike strengthening the melodramatic feel even further.

Concept album, sci-fi story and bombastic melodrama does make this sound a bit like Ayreon; and the similarities are certainly there. This music is more complex; but should appeal to the same crowd.

This is an interesting release, with lots of rich musical moods and to a certain extent original sounds. But it is not a good album per se, but hopefully a promising start where seeds of forthcoming greatness can be heard.

Musically we're speaking progressive metal, mixed with lots of ambient sounding moods; where the synth seems to be the central focus of the musical output. Despite of that; Ayreon was the closest musical reference I could make for this release - perhaps due to the science fiction story on display as well as the grandiosity of the soundscape served here.

What doesn't work in my point of view is the structure and coherence of some of the individual songs, as well as soundscapes that sometimes contain too many sounds fighting to be heard.