HOLDFÉNYKERT

Holdfénykert is a strong first album for this Romanian band, which plays a modern interpretation of classic Symphonic Prog. Inspired strongly by 70's Genesis, Camel, Gentle Giant, and Yes... this band still manage to forge a unique sound of their own.

Mellotron sounds lie in the background of nearly every song and add heaps of halcyon atmosphere. There is often a strong flute presence as well, which is usually synthetically harmonized by the excellent keyboardist (Enyedi Zsolt) on his Strawberry Fields-ish flute-mellotron. Occasionally a Mini-Moog lead will surface, but not nearly often enough... as good as this keyboardist is he should be featured more prominently.

The vocals are the strong suit of this band. The female vocalist provides very pure and enchanting leads, while (the band's mastermind and lead songwriter) Bogáti-Bokor Ákos provides excellent harmony and counterpoint.

There are a few very good songs, but also a couple of clunkers. 'Végtelen', 'Ne félj', and 'It's So Divine' are all excellent songs in the first half, but the second half of the album drags a little. The albums's epic centerpiece 'Seven' has some very good synthesizer moments, but is too long and drawn out.

There are three instrumentals: opener 'Napfénykert' is a magical piece of music, somewhat similar to Camel with it's beautiful flute melodies. 'Ha majd egyszer' is an acoustic guitar instrumental with a bit of a folk feel to it: it reminds me of Led Zeppelin's acoustic solo songs, like Bron-Yr-Aur, but isn't as good and basically feels like filler on this album. 'Holdfénykert' is a classically inspired acoustic guitar piece, which also seems like filler and only serves to lengthen this already too-long album.

'Valahol a térben' introduces an electronic beat which gives the song an almost Trip Hop feeling, which i like. I'd like to see the band expound on this style on future material as i really like the effect it generates here.

The band have a strong Pop sensibility and many tracks are very catchy and stay with you a long time... especially the amazing Végtelen. Sometimes they remind me of a Proggy version of the Aussie Indie-Pop band 'Frente'. There are sometimes Jazz progressions as well... this band likes to mix a little of everything into their sound; sometimes i even feel an Astrud Gilberto-esque samba undercurrent, which i love.

I hope this band stays together and releases more albums. This is a good debut, but you can tell there is plenty of room for growth. They are still probably an album or two away from their masterpiece.

3.5 stars