LOTUS UNFOLDING

Ozric Tentacles return with Lotus Unfolding, in which the Wynne clan and guests offer up something with a little bit more bite than Space For the Earth and Technicians of the Sacred. There's still the clean, pristine production one has come to expect from recent Ozrics releases, but at the same time there's a forcefulness to the music which has been missing for a while, with opener Storm In a Teacup setting the pace and the rest of the material ably measuring up to the standard set. It's nothing to completely shift the direction of the group's gradual musical evolution, but it is a finely-crafted product of it.