THE GARDEN

Actually the label of a "Crossover-Band" is right, as these Australian guys are able to make a combination of such "Retro-70's prog- rock" with some elements of jazz, as well as a mix of pop progressive in the vein of "The Ladder" by Yes...ok the musicianship and the songwriting are very interesting (without forgetting their good composition), but unfortunately the music is also quite "derivative"within a lot of music passages- and such feature can disturb us just a little bit, at the end!!

In fact, after listening to it for a couple of times, I've found the same defects inside the present album that I recognized in the works by Nightwatch/The Watch, a band from Milan I know well (especially when in the early nineties Lethe, my former group, let them participate a Prog Festival in Italy for the first time, organized by our bass-guitar player and I began to understand that the old style by Gabriel could be an akward reference to be emulated for the Italian guys...). So, also in this case and by regarding it as a typical feature of so many modern prog bands all over the world, which can fall "victims" of some common places in the progressive music nowadays, UNITOPIA doesn't make any exception!!

Nevertheless, the sweet melodies are not bad and their playing is often a top notch, even though in the second part (especially inside disc 2) their resemblance between them and for instance Porcupine Tree (in the vein of Pink Floyd) or some other British pop bands like Coldplay, doesn't make me feel so thrilled, but nevermind...the present work- dated 2008- is probably their best album, being quite worth to be checked out at least, above all when They abandon a pop style and play a sort of hard rock; but it's not a problem after all!!

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