HAROLD BUDD & BRIAN ENO: THE PEARL

OK, let's face it. "The Pearl" is the same thing as Harold Budd and Brian Eno's previous album as a team, "Ambient 2:The Plateaux Of Mirror", and you can barely hear the difference between songs from different albums. A disappointment? Not if you like "Ambient 2", but in a way, it is anyway.

If there is a difference, we can find it in the style of the music; while "The Plateaux Of Mirror" had a little bit of electric piano and tons of arrangements, in "The Pearl" the electric piano is the main character, and the arrangements by Eno are put in the background.

Another thing we can find of original is "the trip"; "The Plateaux Of Mirror" was like walking through a cold, rural landscape, here the scenery seems to be more opened: it could feel like your gazing at a beach at nighttime, or looking at a pale grey sky, or even in a dense fog. But the album is, in my opinion, obviously covered in a cloudy and at the same time dark light, that makes the songs here at times truly great.

In fact, some songs here are really amazing; "A Stream Of Bright Fish", "Against The Sky", Lost In The Humming Air", the title track, and the final "Still Return" have moments that are truly unforgettable. Too bad that the rest doesn't get at all to the same levels.

In conclusion, despite this album has a few good songs, the fact that it's practically identical to "Ambient 2" makes me give this 3.5 stars, also due to those couple of songs that never really appealed to me.