REVENANT

It's an encouraging thumbs-up for yet another female fronted melodic prog rock band from Poland. Based in Katowice. This quintet was formed around 2006 by singer Agnieszka Kot, guitarist Grzegorz Kot and drummer Krzysiek Cudny and has been gently honing its sound with a series of live gigs and demos.

Revenant does not break any new ground but shows the benefits of this preparation work with a polished collection of songs. Each offers a great vocal melody, with the instrumentation providing plenty of variety, without being over-complex.

Agnieszka Kot has a very seductive tone to her voice, often reminding me of Kingfisher Sky's Judith Rijnveld. She does sound a little strained when she tries to force the power a little bit more, but she certainly has a bright future ahead. So too has Grzegorz Kot, who delivers a series of effective and not-uninventive solos and riffs.

Fans of bands such as Panic Room, Karnataka, and The Reasoning will know exactly what to expect from Corral, with an extra twist provided by that typically Polish neo-prog sound you get from the likes of Moonspell, Collage, and Believe, and early period Delight.

I prefer the shorter and lighter songs from the first half of the album, with Music In My Head having become a real car stereo favourite. The second half of the disc stretches things out a little more and relies a little too much on routine metal riffing. It's more proggy, but not quite so endearing.

Overall though, this is an easy and very enjoyable debut album.