IN SPE II [AKA: TYPEWRITER CONCERTO IN D]

Another boring release by Musea... Not a good start for a review but nontheless the second In Spe album is full of qualities. It's just so badly produced. It's not about the way it is recorded, but more about the choice of sound. Mattiisen has the talent of a contemporary composer, the skill and the ideas. We will say never enough how much wrong electronic facilities can spoil down any kind of music. One advise : Alo should find the time to write down the score for a large classic ensemble or a cello quartet and then go and record with them. His music would - at last - have the recognition it deserves. The really moody "Departure" escapes from this critic, as it stands well on its two legs. A very melancholic ans hypnotic feel on this one, very haunting. As presented here, In Spe has enough hooks to please any Finnegan's Wake fans. Thus, less than a hundred people.

This album starts and ends with digital keyboard noodling, and there really isn’t much else in between. The addition of a manual typewriter as an orchestral instrument might have seemed clever at the time, but in retrospect it just comes off as silly.

In Spe are one of the only (if not the only) symphonic rock band to come out of the tiny country of Estonia, and for that they deserve some attention I suppose. But try as I might I can’t get interested in this album. The poor production doesn’t help, nor does the naggingly persistent typewriter throughout the entire first-half concerto piece. On top of that the featured French horn on the second half of the album did seem like a worthwhile novelty for the first few minutes, but its presence on the interminably long closing track “Departure” borders on being ponderous.

The only reason this record should be considered in the progressive rock category is due to the use of electric guitar, and possibly because of the occasional use of drums. Otherwise I’d say this is nothing more than a curiosity from the mid-eighties, which was a notoriously poor time for music anyway. This album is no exception.

I’d recommend this to fans of really obscure symphonic rock possibly, but beyond that I suspect only Estonians will really find anything to appreciate here. For those reasons I’m going to give the album two stars, but nothing more. ‘Nuff said.

peace

In Spe was a cult musical project during 80-s in Estonia. They released just two albums, both with different leaders and quite different music included. Common base between two works was their experimentation trying to melt neo-classic and rock.

This, second album, is recorded by band, led by music student, keyboardist Aloe Mattiisen. Differently from their debut, this work contains similar components, but in much more easier form, often with "musical joke' elements. Real mechanical typewriter is used as drumming instrument, and all other music is melodic symphonic prog ( with some jazzy bass) and neo-classic pieces in 50/50 proportion.

Quite interesting idea and some very competent musicianship is destroyed in part by two reasons: pure producing and recording quality and very bad mixing. In fact, you can imagine whole recording as roughly fixed between each other quite independent pieces of electric guitar/bass based jazz-rock pieces, keyboards-led symphonic rock pieces and some modern classic chamber pieces. Almost without any connection between each other. And with very plain, uninspired total sounding.

So, this album could be evaluated as rehearsal of very interesting, but raw material, demo tape,etc. And possibly ,its better place is avant prog, not symphonic. I own quite rare LP version, so am not sure, if later CD release has any sound improvement.

In whole, album for collectors and researchers, but hardly for symphonic prog regular fans.