DICE

"Dust in Paradise" opens with the sound DICE, based on a long, melodic, hovering intro, 2'30 '' of pure bliss; Christian's characteristic voice (reminiscent of Steve Joliffe's on TANGERINE DREAM's 'Cyclone'); accompanies the notes of this airy track with a pleasant synth redundancy around 7 minutes. "Forever Today" follows on a more psychedelic tune, just by the sharp guitar and evanescent choruses of Ramona Nóvé; more dynamic, more rhythmic and a guitar that spins around the vocal space and then stretches like the guitarists of BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST. "The Madhouse in Paradise" starts off with a concise prog rock concept at the beginning, vocals forward, ballad on a moderate tempo then it goes, it starts on breaks where Peter's guitar is queen by offering varied loops; some of the PINK FLOYD Sheep 'and long, decrescendo finish that could have been cut before.

"Secret Moon" arrives on a delightful solo from the intro making the hair shiver; the voice which here recalls precisely 'Bent Cold Sidewalk for intonation and melodic line; we find a very present keyboard which accompanies Peter playing repetitive musical hooks. At this point you either find the titles all identical, or you spot the subtleties and differences between each of them. "Deep, Dark & ​​Holy (Dreamscene 25)" on heartbeats underwater, synthetic atmosphere on the 2nd version of TANGERINE DREAM; scent of mermaid choirs telling you to stay underwater, it's divine, scary, how a short track can bring so much musical beauty !! Lyrical psychedelic, the guitar solo is beautiful, fat, oozing heavy and bluesy sound, strident at times, sublime, airy coming from up there. "Let's Go to Paradise" sets out again on the binary rhythm, intro, verse, chorus and rambling of the guitar alternately languid or nervous as at these 6'50 "where it snatches everything maintained by a melodic marshmallow synth.

DICE continues its progressive melodic space route; cosmic rock soaring air not tormented for a penny but whose guitar is declined like a jewel. The prolongation of a singular state which makes time stop, which sends you back to certain solos of the venerable "live" of BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST, ideal album for meditating and forgetting the music; this can sometimes happen and make you forget the labels, the genres, the tastes: here you are entitled to a bucolic and dreamlike dessert flirting between contemplation and meditation.

"Roger Roger Dreamscene 20" starts the ball rolling with a spacey intro of 5 minutes in the atmosphere of the flamingo, with a psychedelic organ at will, good preamble to warm us and dive with "Alive In The Galaxy" and evocative title : do not forget your spacesuit anyway. ELOY RPWL and also had to go through it. The title gives pride to the guitar and its various convolutions; it's melodic, a bit repetitive at first. "It's Coming Now" share in an atmosphere reminding me immediately with its large TANGERINE DREAM "Cyclone" and the introduction of a vocal part. It includes a long crescendo drawer with guitar on every floor, a bit like extension to the pieces of the "Live" to BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST! more nervous moments one would have liked. It is of course the melodic rock without too many waves. "Living Day To Day" from a very different genre with jazzy crossing (the fashion at the moment) and a groovy style, funkier, a little rhythm like that Pharrell Williams has been out with the title " Happy. " It's soft, the atmosphere takes you on galactic waves again with three or four developments in the limpid guitar, sweet and crystalline. The bass and drums help keep the basic rhythm and could give a little change, but the label melodic rock is there. The more stylized development synth allows an opening different spatiotemporal. "Black Stars", perhaps the most beautiful for me, growing a fight between guitar and synth giving a little more energy, creativity under; Voice is still monotone, but the guitar has its little one notes in the treble. It is not yet a furious solo but a melancholy and melancholy solo, somewhat in the vein of what was LANDS END, great band and too unknown. "CyberSky" closes the album with a more industrial piece. again we feel it here, in addition to guitar, aware of the basic and repetitive electronic music as did so TANGERINE DREAM in its second cycle, with research melodic pop- rock. Still this little regret not having more energy swings. My metal-prog profile redoing surely surface! great band and too unknown. "CyberSky" closes the album with a more industrial piece. again we feel it here, in addition to guitar, aware of the basic and repetitive electronic music as did so TANGERINE DREAM in its second cycle, with research melodic pop-rock. Still this little regret not having more energy swings. My metal-prog profile redoing surely surface! great band and too unknown. "CyberSky" closes the album with a more industrial piece. again we feel it here, in addition to guitar, aware of the basic and repetitive electronic music as did so TANGERINE DREAM in its second cycle, with research melodic pop-rock. Still this little regret not having more energy swings. My metal- prog profile redoing surely surface!

Between psyche atmosphere soothed and turns instrumentals, DICE has in my opinion the DICE. It's melodic, guitar is omnipresent voice almost swallowed up in the soundtrack of Peter solos. DICE is symphonic, the space-rock, psychedelic, maybe even some neo, crossover, the Berlin school also but surely melodic! DICE is spellbinding discs where you can travel from near and far with them. DICE does not surprise but do not disappoint either. The group could do still better in this universe diversified.

''Silvermoon'' unfortunately seems to go nowhere, Dice have added an even more pronounced touch of Prog into their sound and the New Wave influences have more or less dissappeared, the tracks have become longer, but the direction of the album is a matter of discussion.For example the 12-min. title-track follows a Neo Prog vein, melody and lyricism are the basic characteristics of this composition, then suddenly they decided to offer a more German-linked sound with a bit of spaciness and some heavier riffing in the process to flirt with the late-70's ELOY sound, but the talent between the two bands stops in the accented vocal parts, because the music here is pretty simplistic with stretched keyboard abnormalities and slow guitar moves of a pale color.At least ''Another day'' and its instrumental version ''Another instrumental day '' are decent rockers with discreet organ and a memorable groove, despite the average vocals on the vocal edition.On the top of these changes you can even hear some ethnic and bluesy influences, that only hurt the consistency of the album, ''The bird'' is such an example, extremely long piece for what it has to offer.And then comes ''The croon'', Dice deperately need to proove where they come from and this one offers a cosmic, experimental atmosphere with odd guitar sounds, spacious electronics and annoying beats in a Kraut Rock tradition.At the end of the day this one sounds like a mess with so many stylistical changes and no particular direction.

With ''Silvermoon'' Dice appear to take a step closer to Prog Rock, they just didn't do it in a proper way.A couple of rhythmic pieces with an emphatic sound and striking riffs is the best this album has to offer, because otherwise this one sounds like a mediocre collage of different progressive influences.

Again the very tight links of Dice with Classic Prog are not apparent with the group sounding basically like a cross between ROXY MUSIC, JAPAN and DAVID BOWIE, offering something that sounds like a mix of Art Rock and Post-New Wave.Another good comparison would be GROBSCHNITT during their fading days.However ''Nightmare'' is not a bad album.It sounds often as a genuine work full of inspired atmospheric explorations, great British-styled vocals, artistic elements and interesting guitar parts, passing from Neo Prog to Art Pop to New Wave with comfort.A couple of pieces with dominant organ parts and extended synths sound like German symph-oriented acts of the 80's, but the bulk of ''Nightmare'' is atmospheric New Wave-styled Rock with emphasis on the spacey yet melodic guitar work, the marching drumming and the poppy vocals.Use of distortions and light effects strengthen the fact that Dice reputedly old stylings are gone for good and the band pushed their sound a step further.Compatriots GREEN WAVE are a good reference at this point.A mix of 80's, contemporary and vintage echoes in a charming and well-composed collection of memorable songs.

Not for the dedicated Classic Prog fan.An excellent album though for fans of Art Rock with New Wave aesthetics and anyone with open ears.Recommended.

According to Nove, Dice were initially formed as a pure Progressive Rock group, but this not really obvious listening to this compilation.The first half of the album has nothing to do with the genre, being an incosistent mix of straight Melodic Rock, uninteresting Funk, cliche Blues Rock and pale Synth/Pop Rock with a few good melodies, if you like these styles, but a very flat and often amateur sound, characterized by poor inspiration and a mediocre recording quality.The only interesting cut seems to be the Garage/Psych-influenced ''Away'', which is at least decent.The second part of the album represents more or less moments from the band's first and very rare LP, things become here a bit better but very far from an even average level.Tracks like ''Sunday performance'', '' Every evening has an end'' or ''You caught me hard'' have slight but evident Psych/Kraut Rock influences with accented vocals but also some nice grooves and guitar solos along with the presence of Hammond organ, but the rest of the pieces range from boring to even dreadful, you can find everything in here, from Reggae and Funk to Pop and 80's Rock.Awful and absolutely commercial material of the worst inspiration.

To reinvent Dice was a clever move by Christian Nóvé, because the early years of the group were consumed towards accesible music with very few to zero true offerings to a demanding listener.This compilation holds some interest only for historical reasons and it is very far from even being questionably recommended...1.5 stars.

On "Newborn", their 2011 offering, the commitment remains the same, notwithstanding a few very welcome and hypnotic keyboard passages. The vocal melodies continue to veer towards the type of AOR that we wish we could get out of our heads, particularly in the choruses of "Dancing with All Gods" and "Crying Angels", the weakest numbers here, and it's all a bit too languid too often. However, most of the remaining tracks like "Tomorrow's World" and "the Future is Still Waiting", while far from earth shattering, do more than survive on the goodwill of previous albums, and might serve as entry points to the group's expansive new agey meets PINK FLOYD approach. In fact, "On the Way", in spite of the aforementioned shortcomings, possesses a riveting outtro, all the more impressively so for its minimalistic keyboard melody and woodwind accompaniment.

While I yearn for the enthusiasm and energy of "Waterworld" or the emotion of "Within vs Without", if you seek to become a newborn fan of the group, almost any role of the DICE will do just fine.

Chronologically, "Eternity's Ocean" slots in right after the "Without/Within Trilogy", and picks up where the final installment left us, extending the freedoms of Jens Lübeck's sax and flute, while offering ever more intense lead guitar options for Peter Viertel. As a result, it seems as though the inmates are running the asylum, which, while musically not always a bad idea, results in the busiest and perhaps least focused DICE album in some time. Here it seems like many of the cuts are simply way too long, particularly the aptly named closer "Falling Apart", which clings pit-bull style to a decidedly pedestrian beat, reminiscent of 80s BOWIE for most of its 10 minutes, and throws in dreadful radio "noise" to boot. Luckily little else here plumbs those depths, although "Secret Harmony" is a bizarre misstep that proves that even shorter material is not safe from the quality control police. From its frantically paced opening there is simply nowhere to go but down, and boy does it.

The rest of the tracks are good or better. I have to specifically call out "The Last Hour" which is blessed by divine flute work that sets off the more restrained but still skilled lead guitar before the sensuous sax has its turn. The pace is more deliberate and unhurried. Nove handles the keyboards, and here his supportive organ work is especially praiseworthy. "Venus and Mars" resides closest to other DICE album openers we have come to love and, while "Following the Wind" seems the heir apparent to its predecessor's "Hold the Spirit" combined with a tickling nostalgia. it also suffers most from Viertel's least subtle work as it draws close to a close. Hopefully in subsequent releases he will be more reined in and the balance between guitars, wind, and keys will be struck.

This release shows a group perhaps unsure of their next move, and, while they are by no means salting away their future, I can't help feel this won't be the DICE album to live on in eternity.

Later I found the information in one Polish rock site,that they re-founded band and successfully play and even regularly record albums. It wasn't easy to find more information on them, but I realised that they are still based in Leipzig and are mostly popular around former Eastern Germany and some Western Polish territories. Let say -good local band.

So it was really interesting to hear their new album - after few decades! No big surprises though - I found almost what I expected to find: melodic straight forward rock, but with nice, almost symphonic arrangements,and compositions are really long (almost all -longer than 10 minutes), what shows band orientation to prog listeners.

Music itself is quite simple, but soulful, plenty of sax and flute are added and it makes the music even more nice. Vocals are competent, if a bit old fashioned. Main problem in musicianship field is for sure the drummer - his level is strongly below average there, and too often his drumming reminds cheap drum machine's sound.

For sure, this band isn't one of higher league (even not from the first one), but their melodic symphonic rock (more rock than prog),with some Scorpions-like guitars and a bit naive and old fashioned compositions has it's own beauty. Just if you don't judge them at the high standard requirements.

No way album for real prog fan, but for those with love to melodic not too complex pop-rock with symphonic arrangements, long compositions and dreamy,romantic atmosphere, this album could be nice listening ,I believe.

My rating (with a some advance for their naive beauty) is 3.