GAUDI

Alan Parsons Project had become less and less interesting with boring pop albums like Ammonia Ave, Stereotomy or Vulture Culture, but on Gaudi one finds fine moments in the purest APP style. It didn't bring anything new, but the familiar formula - a mixture of pomposity, dreaminess and tidy pop balladry wrapped in the perfectionistic production - got one more fairly succesful result here, if not as good as Eye In the Sky, talking of the 80's albums only. Gaudi is unfortunately rather short and has only seven tracks, and not all of them very good. But maybe there are enough enjoyment for three stars.

It is a loosely conceptual album inspired by the Barcelonan architect legend Antoni Gaudi, most openly so on 'La Sagrada Familia' (that's the famous cathedral which never was finished) and the closing part of 'Inside Looking Out' (with a collache of voices talking about Gaudi). Naturally architecture or visual arts in general is more difficult to 'interpret' in music than for example horror stories, but I think they could have tried at least to put more Spanish feel to it, if the 'Gaudian' feel was too distant for them (electronic artist Robert Rich managed to get the mosaic-like atmosphere on his Gaudi album).

There's the usual bunch of vocalists: Woolfson, Zakatek, Chris Rainbow, and my favourite APP vocalist John Miles on the grandiose 'La Sagrada Familia'. That one, 'Inside...' and the instrumental 'Paseo De Gracia' (sadly the only one) are the highlights for me. As a whole Gaudi is not among the very best of the APP albums.