CONSPIRITORIUM

"Conspiritorium" is the debut album of The Rupert Selection, a new US band which is looking to gain a place in the difficult musical realm, and of course, within the even more selected progressive rock realm. This album was released in 2011 and consists of six compositions that make a total time of 48 minutes.

The first track is "Spirals". The first seconds have a kind of spacey mood, with some distant noises, but some seconds later they disappear and the other instruments appear. The music has some neo prog elements, and some other rock ones, but in general I fully agree in the crossover label, here we can understand why. Since this first track I must admit I was not attracted by the vocals, though their importance in the development of the song may be high, I cannot say I am fan of them. There are several changes in this track, sometimes the music is just soft, with some spacey effects, in other moments it is rockier and more explosive. What I don't like, is that in moments I feel it loses track, I mean, it makes some fractured moments where my interest decreased.

"Rocco's Ride" has some kind of funky guitars, complemented by spacey synth effects and with again a distant voice; in moments the keyboards produce a kind of symphonic tune, but in general the music is very accessible, easy to listen and to dig. It makes some changes later, giving the music dynamism. The last part is the best, with a cool guitar solo that makes a blend of rock and psych/spacey music. "Mr. Chips" is a short track in the vein of heavy prog. Cool guitars and a nice work on drums, bass and keyboards. After a minute the vocals enter and put their grain of sand.

"A Nickel for Every?" is one of the longest song, reaching almost the ten minutes. It has an explosive start with heavy guitars, later it makes a change but the fast sound continues but now with that blend of rock/psych/crossover. In this track we can appreciate several inner changes, passages with different nuances but that are connected to each other, however, I have to say that as much as I tried with several listens, I did not feel that great enthusiasm with the music here, I was never involved, unfortunately. Though I am sure some people may have a contrary opinion, the memorable moments of this song (and the album as a whole) are only a few. I am sorry if I am being harsh, but you know, this is subjectivity after all. Worth clarifying that the band's members are talented and their music is not bad at all, but I believe they have to work harder.

"Pennies in the Desert" is an electronic oriented track with a tense atmosphere and spacey effects. Though in one hand a track like this shows that the band is capable of implementing different styles in a single album, in the other, one may think they actually are lost in the limbo and don't have a clear particular sound, I mean, they are still looking for an identity. Who knows, but I honestly think the latter. The album finishes with "Jabberwock Jazz", which is the longest track with almost twelve minutes. It starts softly with piano, then a radio tuning appears and gives the impression a person is driving a car. Later a sweet guitar is implemented and a delicate sound continues for two minutes, until it makes a drastic change and turns into a heavy, almost metal-like track. As one can imagine, that heavy passage is just brief, because later the band delight us with some changes, letting us know they challenge themselves to create a complex composition. In the end, I believe this is the finest track of the album.

Well, honestly, as I mentioned above, I am not that happy with this album, and I swear I tried and tried, but the result was always the same. For me, the music here does not add anything new to the prog rock realm, but I trust they will do better in the future. For now, my grade will be two stars. However?

Enjoy it!