EMISSARIES

I must admit that I was a little disappointed with the last two live RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL albums from 2004 that I reviewed because they had dropped the mellotron and they just didn't sound like their old selves. Well my faith has been renewed big time with this 2005 release which is a double album with one being a studio album and the other a live recording from Philadelphia. Interesting enough it was Ken Golden's (Laser's Edge) description of sitting in that church in Philadelpia in 2004 and watching and listening to these guys play that moved me to buy my first RMI album. Ken was obviously blown away and it was that same event that Steve from Wayside Music approached the band afterwards and ended up signing these guys to his Cuneiform Label where they are now. After the concert at the church the band packed up their equipment and went over to the WXPN radio station to play a live 2 hour set on Chuck Van Zyl's legendary Star's End show.The music from that show is the second disc only edited down to around 76 1/2 minutes. A comic can be accessed from your computer that goes with the music. It was created by avant comic book author Matt Howarth who collaborated with the band on this. In fact he did a lot of the work on this comic while listening to the live radio show. The band gave him the honour of naming the songs for this recording. Also the band created the studio album in direct response to the finished comis strip completing the creative loop. Matt did the cover art for this album as well.

"Seeds Crossiong The Intersteller Void" opens with the feeling i'm standing in a wind storm until around 2 1/2 minutes when horn-like sounds come and go. Mellotron before 4 minutes.Yes ! Synths come in then we get guitar 7 minutes in. An electronic beat then takes over after 8 1/2 minutes and it will stop late. "A Preist Crossing Frozen Water" has this beat with spacey sounds. Sequencers take over then guitar and mellotron (the dynamic duo) come in before 4 minutes. Hell yeah ! It turns spacey to end it and blends into "Mad Bob's Self Inflicted Torment". I like how this sounds with that picked guitar, mellotron and synth sounds. It becomes louder and more spacey before 6 1/2 minutes. Processed vocal sounds after 8 minutes as it blends into "The Emissaries Revealed Themselves". Sequencers arrive and build. Mellotron before 5 minutes. It settles and blends into "The Ice Garden" which isn't as rhythmic as the other tracks and a little more experimental. Mellotron rolls in halfway through. "A Promise Of Salvation" ends the studio album and it has a beat that builds with some deep sounds too. A fantastic studio album right there which the band calls the "Emissaries Suite" because this is one long suite divided into sections.

The live album isn't quite as good in my opinion but almost. "An Intersteller Vacuum Is Far From Empty" is a beautiful piece that is spacey and haunting. "Mobile Star Systems" features a lot of sequencer sounds and I really like it. Guitar after 7 minutes. "A Piano Wanders The Incandescent Vapours" does have piano in it surprisingly enough. It's spacey with guitar expressions early though then we get keys followed by mellotron. Just a great sounding track. "Sympathy For The Bedeviled" has a spacey backdrop with sparse guitar.This is excellent ! Some organ too in this impressive track. "The Arrival Of The Seeds" has lots of sequencer sounds with synths over top. "Deliverance From Nucleur Winter" ends it with more sequencers and eventually spacey synths over top.

A fine recording indeed that will appeal to fans of ASHRA,TANGERINE DREAM and many other high quality Electronic bands.