LIVE IN BLOOM (PROGVENTION, NOVEMBER 6, 2010)

My first thought was how odd that Garybaldi are doing a new live album without Fossati, given how important his guitar was to their formative sound. Only the drummer Maurizio Cassinelli and bassist Angelo Traverso are around from the "Nuda" days. And yet the show ended up being very nice in its own right. I was never a fan of Fossati's Hendrix hard-on anyway, so the involvement of different people made little difference to me, frankly I wish there was even more change to report. That said, Fossati's replacement Ricky Pelle can burn it up with the best of them and there is plenty here to sink your teeth into.

The album is more of a hard rock/jam thing than traditional RPI, recalling bands like Flea and Osage Tribe. It is definitely a guitar-first (or would that be guitar-fest?) experience. The band pushes Pelle into heavy yet dreamy territories and then the song floats there giving him time to cut loose and wail. Some of the finest moments in this mode occur in the excerpt from Astrolabio's "Madre di cose perdute", a heavy and atmospheric number with tons of mood. "Il Volto Stanco Delle Gente" cooks like a Santana track with hand percussion and blistering leads trading with organ. There is a sweet melancholy keyboard progression with flanged guitar effect on Nuda's "26 Febbraio 1700". It's all fine rock and roll, though a little too much of the album's mid section is muscular jamming without much extra to interest me. But if you love long jams by the likes of Cream, Santana, Hendrix, Crazy Horse, etc, this album will be right up your alley.

My favorite track was the bonus studio cut "Appena Prima Di Cadere" which certainly makes clear this band could easily transition from live hard rock to making a thoughtful and interesting "Italian prog" studio album if they decide they want to. A good album although far from essential RPI. A special nod goes to the fantastic cover art!

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