SPARTACUS

Looking backwards it's sometimes hard to believe how much TRIUMVIRAT were popular in Brazil in the mid-70s. They certainly surpassed FOCUS, GENESIS and CAMEL, tied with EL&P and YES and where barely defeated by TULL and FLOYD in the prog popularity contest here in Terra Brasilis.

Since all those bands releasing chronology was misleading we thought then that we were facing an original act - the CD era came years later to set things right and show us that TRIUMVIRAT were basically an emulation of some British groups, even being of a fairly quality. They have still many adepts here and a fair amount of people consider them, until today, wrongly as a top krautrock (sic) band. A credit, nevertheless, must be given to TRIUMVIRAT: they chose to work with real historical events instead of getting inspiration from mythology, literature, science- fiction, etc, as done by many other contemporary peers - they probably pioneered in this query.

Anyway, "Spartacus", a concept album, is an amusing work, easy-listening and enjoyable in several moments. However, the album sounds much more as a movie soundtrack than a progressive work. They certainly were guided by the frantic Kubrick's namesake film losing the chance to approach the sorrowful gladiator's life, ordeal and death with the sobriety and gravity expected for a prog conceptual dealing with this matter.

Songs and sounds run quickly all more or less linked by an ever-present musical theme, slightly noticeable in the album opener, 'The capital of power', but clearly discernible in the second track, 'School of constant pain'. Following tracks are basically a cornucopia of synthesizer playing, with neat passages provided by drumming and bass actions - all done apparently to show band's musicianship than to tell a story.

Best moments are the romantic 'Sweet sound of liberty' that grabs the attention with its catchy mood and the ending track, the powerful 'Spartacus', a mini-epic full of nice variations and surprises which provides an interesting farewell to the this album.

"Spartacus" isn't a decisive or groundbreaking album but may fill the blanket of 70s German symphonic acts with much less pain than that suffered by the portrayed character. Honestly good but really non-essential.