IL-LūDĕRE

Genovese band Il Tempio Delle Clessidre released their third studio album four years on from AlieNatura. Il Ludere is another excellent piece of music that fits nicely in the progressivo Italiano canon. I've followed them since 2014 but their journey began in 2006, when keyboard player Elisa Montaldo met former Museo Rosenbach vocalist Stefano 'Lupo' Galifi in the Black Widow record store in the heart of Genoa. They assembled the group Il Tempio delle Clessidre, named after a subsection of the 1973 Museo Rosenbach classic Zarathustra with the notion to perform that album live ? with the inclusion of Giulio Canepa on guitar, Fabio Gremo on bass, and the 19-year old Paolo Tixi on drums. There's a DVD of a 2011 performance in Seoul with extras including footage of their 2009 debut performance from Genoa's Teatro della Gioventu, which acts as a documentary of the Galifi era (Black Widow Records BWR168). Part of the Seoul gig was the modern recreation of Zarathustra in its entirety which, though technically challenging was hailed as a resounding success.

My introduction to the band was at the Fiera Internazionale della Musica in Genoa in May 2014. I'd specifically gone to see La Maschera di Cera but was struck by the stellar range of the line-up, a testament to the healthy state of Italian progressive rock in general and the importance of the host city in particular. Il Tempio delle Clessidre played on the first day and, because I had seen drummer Paolo Tixi play with Fabio Zuffanti's Z-Band a few weeks before, I was intrigued by their inclusion on the bill. I'd looked up references to them before seeing them and was delighted to hear their style of melodic symphonic prog. Afterwards, I could fully appreciate their tag as a successor to Museo Rosenbach. Vocalist Francesco Ciapica replaced Galifi for the second album, AlieNatura (2013) and his voice has a similar quality to Galifi, full and rich with a good range. The entire performance was very assured and impressed me sufficiently to visit the Black Widow stand and buy a copy of their first CD. I bought my copy of AlieNatura in Black Widow in 2015 and it has proved difficult to decide which of these first two albums I like better; both are of an amazing quality, best exemplified by Il Centro Sottile from the first album and the multi-part suite Il Cacciatore from AlieNatura.

Il Ludere includes another change of personnel, with former Änglagård drummer Mattias Olsson replacing Tixi. As with the preceding album, the title Il Ludere is a pun combining the Latin verb ludere (to play) with the article il to generate a double meaning: the act of playing and, from the verb illudere, deception or illusion. The cover illustration continues this theme and the first track Le Regole del Gioco (The rules of the game) spells it out. What is immediately striking is that this is more conventional rock-sounding than the full-on symphonic prog of its two predecessors, although it remains firmly in the prog camp thanks to great playing, intelligent writing and, to a greater extent, a rejection of straightforward form.

Le Regole del Gioco owes something to musique concrète: an instruction to the listener how best to enjoy the stereo effect before segueing into the upbeat, jazzy La Parola Magica (The Magic Word) where the first hints at a different sound can be detected. The organ tends to follow the vocal melody, the guitar is distorted and the concluding electric piano seems to be influenced by the Canterbury scene. If that isn't hint enough, Come Nella Favole (As in the Fables) begins like a heavy rock track and Ciapica even pulls off a high register vocal. What separates this track from a multitude of early 80s metal bands is a fiendishly tricky break, though I can imagine this being a new live favourite. There may be a hint of guitar hero about the soloing on next track Dentro la Mia Mente (Inside My Mind) but this is a fairly lengthy, more complex piece which reminds me of some of Finisterre's experimentation featuring tape effects. After that the rest of the album is undeniably proggy.

Spettro del Palco (Stage of the Spectrum), which was selected as a single, is the tale of an unrequited love with a tragic ending. It's set in a theatre and comes across as suitably dramatic, with themes picked out first by delicate acoustic and ending with a crescendo of passionate electric guitar. The coda provides a prelude to the theme running through the penultimate track La Spirale del Vento (The Wind Spiral.) Prospettive (Perspectives) opens with an acoustic guitar figure and builds slowly with piano and synthesizer before a Mellotron like break and some striking electric guitar. The vocals are full of feeling and most effective, producing some high quality prog. One of the most achingly beautiful moments on the whole release is the Gilmour-like guitar on Manitou where the percussion, similar to the recording of Peter Gabriel IV, is played out on the bottom kit, without cymbals. This provides an earthy, world music feel which is fitting for a song about a fundamental life force. Nuova Alchimia (New Alchemy) flows on almost seamlessly, initially with sparse percussion, though it's very riff-driven. There's an interlude with a sort of carnival atmosphere before Montaldo plays a fast synthesizer solo in classic RPI style; the vocals form an important part of the song, adding immediacy, but unfortunately it doesn't really develop.

Perhaps it was the influence of their new drummer, but there are some distinctly angular lines that call to mind Olsson's former band Änglagård or even Fragile-era Yes on La Spirale del Vento which, at 8'43 is the longest track on the album and closest to the material from the first two albums. This is my favourite track; there is plenty of space between the vocal passages to allow Montaldo to shine with some excellent lead synthesizer and the whole piece is well-constructed. One of the biggest surprises is Gnaffe, included as a bonus track on the CD. Based on the 14th Century Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio, a collection of stories ranging from the tragic to the erotic, it includes tales of wit and practical jokes. The song, at times medieval and at others what I would regard as traditional Italian popular music (during the duet between Ciapica and Montaldo), offers the contrast between almost scholarly classical guitar and outright playfulness during the storytelling.

Despite being a little uncharacteristic of progressivo Italiano, this album has grown on me the more I've listened to it. To be fair to Il Tempio delle Clessidre, they have produced a more homogeneous work because they've widened the pool of creative input. This may seem counterintuitive but it's the distorted, riffing guitar that has pulled them towards rock. On the other hand, there's still a huge variety of textures that would never get represented in the mainstream and the inclusion of Olsson has provided the impetus for utilising a variety of effects. It's unfortunate that my grasp of the Italian language is so poor, because I'm sure that there are more musical and lyrical puns at play throughout the release.

Despite my inability to pick up nuances in the language I think that though it may be a little atypical of the genre, from the atmospheric to the dramatic, this is an excellent addition to any prog collection.