INNER VOYAGES BETWEEN OUR SHADOWS

I only know this Brasilian four piece band from their tribute to the amazing 3-CD The Odeyssey Project, I wrote about them: "Aether from Brasil is the warm and pleasant final act on this 3-CD. They sound traditional with strong echoes from the neo-progressive movement with music that ranges from swinging with fluent electric guitar to dreamy with soaring keybards and mid-tempo with exciting synthesizer flights. The end is beautiful with sensitive acoustic guitar."

Well, after listening to this second album by Aether I can almost repeat the abovementioned musical analysis! The focus is on the wonderful, very flowing and warm guitar work, strongly evoking Steve Rothery and Mike Holmes (especailly the guitar sound on Dans Le Parc Du Chateau Noir), the album is layered with often compelling soli. The keyboards are tastefully colouring the music (strings, church-organ sound and some fine soli on synthesizer). It's a pity that the vocals are not in their native language because the music would have sound more emotional, now the vocals are a bit flat and you can hear the accent easily. And at some moments the atmosphere in the compositions is a bit similar, it's no coincidence that, in my opinion, the most captivating and alternating track is the cover A Night On Bald Mountain (Mussorgsky) delivering great bombastic eruptions and many strong breaks and accellarations. Nonetheless, this is a beautiful neo-prog inspired album that will please the fans of early Marillion and IQ and bands like Clepsydra.