URDOXA

Thork's Urdoxa is a one-of-a-kind album, combining droning, synth-clad guitars to the heavy bass-line that is masked by throated vocals that almost completely define the album's smooth, dark figure. The second track, Arche d'ebène however, appears to be one of the only memorable tracks on this album, overpowering the other tracks and compensating for their weaknesses. All in all, this is still a definite ear-grabber and deserves to be recognized.

French dark Prog group, found in 1998 in Annecy by a five-core line up: Multi-instrumentalist Sébastien Fillion, violin player Claire Northey, drummer Michel LeBeau, Nil's bassist Samuel Maurin and guitarist/singer Antoine Auresche.The first couple of years the group performed many concerts and focused on writing material for their upcoming debut ''Urdoxa''.The album was released as a private CD in 2000 (Nil Records).

''Urdoxa'' offered a very unique proposal by Thork, being a mix of modern Psychedelic Rock with Progressive Rock and Folk.The musicianship is very interesting and at moments impressive, but lacks a bit in consistency and the whole atmosphere is often too chaotic.Not because of the arrangements (which are fairly complicated) but mainly because of the endlessly changing moods.The combination of folky instrumentals, led by vocal narrations, driving violins, synths and calm guitars, with the bombastic guitar-driven breaks and grooves seems charming and attractive, but at the same time it is the reason why the album is a hard listening.Four out of the eight compositions are over the 10-min. mark and contain good ideas.From the hard-sounding guitars to the soft psychedelic vibes and from the lovely violin workouts to the organ/synth- based passages, Thork achieved to come up with some really intricate material.Even some parts led by grandiose synths have sort of a very dark, Gothic atmosphere.The vocals of Auresche though are very cold and unexpressive for most of the time and combined with the lack of decent melodies make ''Urdoxa'' an album full of captivating but also a bit unemotional passages.

What really surprises me is that these combined music elements could definitely end up creating a total winner.''Urdoxa'' fails to be labeled as such an album, but the personal approach of the band make this one an interesting release, or even essential for fans of deeply atmospheric Progressive Rock.Recommended overall.