KALEIDOSCOPE

With their publicity still stuck within the Canadian borders, the four young instrumentalists from Quebec had the chance to meet Unicorn Digital's boss Michel St-Pere and sign a deal with the label.St-Pere not only agreed to release the band's second album, but committed to reissue Karcius debut as well.''Kaleidoscope'' was exclusively recorded at the RCA Studio in Montreal, where Simon L'Esperance had also the chance to learn a lot on sound engineering.The album was released in 2006.

Another bunch of long Heavy/Fusion instrumentals with a more precise performance, more compact arrangements and a well-balanced sound was the proposal of Karcius in ''Kaleidoscope''.While their style remained very technical and complex, the fair amount of atmospheric tunes and melodic themes indicate a new direction for the band, the one that combines virtuosity and technique with accesible and easily digested tunes.Again the focus is on the jazzy side of Progressive Rock with good individual solos, tight instrumental lines and bombastic passages with full-blown guitar and keyboard moves.They sound like if RETURN TO FOREVER and KING CRIMSON shared the same stage, offering intelligent guitar tricks, ethereal piano preludes and powerful keyboard runs.As with many bands of the style, they often enter a more improvised world, dedicated to loose soloing and abstract deliveries, but these come during their otherwise very dense and well-executed arrangements.Overall the result is pretty satisfying with lots of complex moves but also some decent atmospheric/melodic textures.

A step forward for the band.''Kaleidoscope'' finds Karcius in a mature phase.Nice instrumental Heavy/Fusion with a balanced sound.Strongly recommended...3.5 stars.