FEARS

I'd felt that Clepsydra's previous album had been let down a little by rather thin production, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that Fears has the shining sound quality - plus somewhat more interesting compositions and top-notch performances - needed to really take the band's music to the next level. Once again, neo-prog inspired by Fish-era Marillion is the order of the day, but whilst this is a field where there's no shortage of hopefuls trying to recapture that sound, Clepsydra are more interesting than most, producing an album which takes that period of Marillion's sound forward and creating their own interesting spin on it rather than trying to preserve it in amber; my only concern here is that vocalist Aluisio Maggini's performance doesn't quite seem to be integrated with that of the rest of the band; rather than his singing being a seamless part of the composition, all too often it seems to overpower the music. Other than that, highly recommend for fans of the classic early 1980s neo-prog sound.