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Moongarden - The Gates of Omega CD (album) cover

THE GATES OF OMEGA

Moongarden

 

Symphonic Prog

3.10 | 67 ratings

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apps79
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
2 stars A turn of events followed the release of ''Brainstorm of emptyness'', starting right after the album was launched with Tonco and Sardini leaving the band and Davide Cagnata from Obscura joining for a cover on Osanna's ''There will be time'', included in the 97' Italian Prog tribute ''Zarathustra's revenge''.Due to personal problems Moongarden were put on ice in 1997 with Roversi finding time to focus on his first solo album ''Music from my room's window'', which came out in 1999.When things were back on track, Roversi decided to gather Moongarden again with him, Massimiliano Sorrentini and David Cremoni now joined by another ex-Obscura member, Luca Palleschi on lead vocals and new keyboardist Luca Dell'Anna.With Mellow Records never giving up on the group, Moongarden returned in 2001 with the 2-CD album ''The Gates of omega''.

With Roversi exploring the fields of Electronic and Ambient Music during the abscence of Moongarden from the scene, it appears that his newly involved territories had much inspired his style.He brought these influences to his main band and the result was a super-extended effort, torn between an updated Neo Prog sound with lots of piano, vocal melodies and dreamy atmospheres and a minimalistic Ambient/Experimental approach, which focuses on soft singing lines, Industrial vibes, effects and electronics.The bad thing is that he decided to follow the latter style in most of the long compositions of the album, the result being a collage of hypnotic, atmospheric soundscapes with hardly distinguished variations in a lounge palette of music colors.''Forever chained'' and ''5 Years'' are two nice, lyrical and emotional Neo Prog pieces from the first CD, but the 27-min. long title-track maybe found a waste of time, for those discouraged by the label ''Ambient Music''.The second CD contains four long tracks (from 10 to 17 minutes long), which sound more balanced with mixed stylings, but the result is more or less the same.The big symphonic sounds in specific segments is absolutely efficient, the melodic breaks are mostly nice and the vocals of Luca Palleschi are both clean and sentimental.But then follow the emphatic twists towards Pop and Ambient Music with synth-based soundscapes, electronic beats and lounge acoustics, which hurt the overall effort.Focus on the 16-min. ''Home sweet home'', which practically sounds like old'n'good Moongarden and their strong GENESIS references.

One of the most uneven albums I've heard.The Neo and symphonic tendencies are among the goodies of this release and a great example of the style, but the minimalistic, electronic flavors, while quite atmospheric, spoil the cohesion of the listening experience.Approach with caution, at least the album is too long and there is some interesting stuff among the overstretched ideas...2.5 stars.

apps79 | 2/5 |

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