KALEIDOSCOPE

The opening epic in 5 movements can't get much symphonic than this and is for me the highlight of the album - the band delivers as a superbly tight unit and Morse using a large diversity of keyboards adds up to the immense flood of music compacted in over 25 minutes of continuous amusement - 5 stars.

The following lovely mid-tempo ballad with plenty of vocal harmonies and a Roine's guitar solo gets 4 stars.

Black As The Sky is sung by Roine but doesn't live up to the rest of the album and could well have been left out - 2 stars.

Beyond The Sun is pleasantly performed by Morse with only acoustic piano and the help of cello and pedal steel, but finally is just an average song - 3 stars.

Closing second epic of the album, Kaleidoscope is reparted by 7 sections, and it's again a lesson of competence and musicianship by the four performers but for my taste the composition is not so inspired as on the other epic. Nevertheless surely deserves my 4 stars.

Overall: Good album, but not excellent, by a great, great band composed by four musicians of the highest level that are always a pleasure to listen to. Four shining stars !

Respecting the Bonus Disc with eight covers: It surely amazes me the competent performance of these so faithful versions, but for me it doesn't go beyond the simple curiosity of comparing them with the originals (my usual stance about covers in general, btw, with few exceptions)