VESTAL

Vestal is the band taken the name from the main man of the band, the only member of the band Thomas Vestal, who release Symbiosis in 2009. A well rounded and full of intristing progrssive rock chops and symphonic arrangementsthis self title album has. The album is all instrumental, with good passages, mainly keyboard orientated but aswell some guitar parts interluded very well when needed. Is impressive to see such unknown musician handleing all instruments from this album, the result is a quite a pleasent journey in prog rock realm. All i all a good debute album by this american, nothing really groundbreaking, but well done, well played, pleasent on all pieces, what else a a good release, without weak points. The best pieces are the longest one Methamorphosis, nearly 15 min of great musicianship and good ideas and the opening track Stae of flux, with solid bas lines and solid guitars. I will give 3-3.5 for this album, a worthy one if you listen to prog rock.

Symbiosis is the début effort by US outfit Vestal, the creative vehicle of multi-instrumentalist Thomas Vestal.

The keyboards seems to be his main instruments, and he utilize various forms of these to construct a peculiar blend of symphonic progressive rock and new age tinged music, residing somewhere in between ELP and Gandalf.

A solid but sometimes slightly awkward rhythm section underscore the proceedings, where folk and new age tinged percussions are the element adding most to the proceedings. Pleasant and at times intriguing atmospheric solo guitars is another asset to the compositions, while the utilization of guitar riffs again comes across as slightly awkward sounding in places.

Many good ideas and themes are found on this effort, with opening number State of Flux the best and most developed composition here in my opinion. A talented but slightly unfulfilled act, and it'll be interesting to see what Vestal comes up with next. German artist Soniq Theater explores rather similar musical territories to Vestal, and I'd recommend fans of either artist to check out the other one.