CONTRAPPUNTI

With Uomo di Pezza Le Orme conquered a peculiar peak of progressive rock for themselves and the Italian scene, and with Felona e Sorona they remained at the zenith of their musical creativity, giving a slightly cosmic twist to their clear melodicism and controlled, elegant power-trio pompsity, their musical offering's two main features. The hard task of following these two vital Italian prog recordings was on the shoulders of Contrappunti, an album that performs very well as a partial continuation of the symphonic maturity already achieved by the trio. It fails to match the unique greatness of their epic concept- album Felona e Sorona, indeed, bit it still contains enough musical richness and stylish touch as to be regarded as an excellent item that means really much to the progressive genre. The band's sound tends to mellow a bit in places, and that's mostly due to the softened treatment of keyboard layers (mellotron, string synthesizer and those moments in which the organ keeps a discreet profile) and an also softened amalgam of keyboards and drum kit. But, on the other hand, you can also find tracks in which the themes are treated with a magnificent sense of mystery: the opening instrumental bears attractive melodies and harmonie,s but it is also a bit threatening, as if it were anticipating the sound that Goblin was soon to develop and own as a signature of theirs. This is an almost 6 minutes of pure grandiose symphonic chiaroscuro. The ballad 'Frutto Acerbo' is an acoustic guitar-based ballad that bears its bucolic romanticism on its sleeve - the piano chords properly augment the allusions made on the acoustic guitar arpeggios and mellotron layers. 'Aliante', another instrumental, is an elegant exercise on well-ordained chord progressions, a bit reminiscent of the sung parts of Yes' 'Long Distance Runaround', but with a subtle dark flair to it: effective, while not great. The same could be said about 'India', a pretty song that could have been greater with a more expanded arrangement and a more robust delivery in the instrumentation. 'La Fabbricante d'Angeli' relatively follows in the same path, but it is more successful at keeping a consistent pace in the mood shifts and the development of the main themes. There is something definitely appalling in Tagliapietra's singing and acoustic guitar, matched with Dei Rossi's playful schemes and Pagliuca's multivaried keyboard inputs, while the lyrics portray abortion practices with naughty teenage girls. The third and last instrumental 'Notturno' is played exclusively on keyboards: piano, synths and celeste join together on yet another journey to mysterious forests of sound, pertinently combined with empty spaces left by the almst mimimal piano chords. It's weird how in this album, that overall makes a soft departure from the general ambience of Felona e Sorona, contains a track like this, which is perhaps the darkest Le Orme composition ever. The album is closed down by 'Maggio', a track that retakes the spirit of 'La fabbricante...' and brings it to a symphonic zenith. An excellent closure for an excellent album, the last great album by Le Orme for a long time. Only in their current refurbished era could they recapture this kind of magic, but that's a matter for other reviews. Contrappunti is excellent, and that's all by now.