THE STORIES OF H.P. LOVECRAFT - A SYNPHONIC COLLECTION

Marco Bernard made the concept for this project, and invited many exceptional bands to execute it. The booklet is worth summarizing. a) 32 pages that tells a bit of Lovecraft life and work; b) has all the lyrics, the instrumentation/members; c) has one photo of each group. As I predicted before buying this triple CD, many tracks are different one from another. Generally speaking, I don't expect such effort as able to conceive a firm and good concept album. For my surprise, it has a bunch of songs with enough similarities on the mood and proposal, giving the work a considerable cohesion; specially on the first CD. That's essentially why it's the Colossus/Musea project (there are others: Dante's Divine Comedy, the Decameron trilogy, etc) that I most like from the one I've heard.

Most of the groups search for a tenebrous mood. In this regard, I higlight the tracks 1, 2, 3 from CD1, 1 from CD2, and 2 from CD3. Anyway, this is pursued in other parts of this accomplishment. Some executions are more sunny, for instance what Ars Ephemera and Atillio Perrone achieved. The bands that transforms the vocal(s) in a storytelling are more succesful on making the listener dive into the music. Samurai of Prog does it brilliantly, and Sithonia makes it very well.

On CD2, there are three sung languages (two in english, one in spanish and one in italian) that don't match very well. But fortunately this isn't a big problem, because most of the music on this disc is instrumental. Note: I didn't pay attention nor read the lyrics.

Musically, there are only three weak tracks. To my satisfaction, the last ones. On the other side, there are some outstanding tracks. IMO. I prefer not to comment them, only exceptionally; I'll just rank the tracks from 0 to 10.

The Samurai of Prog ? The Case of Charles Dexter Ward ? 10.

Glass Hammer ? Cool Air ? 9.5.

Karda Estra ? The Haunter of the Dark ? 9.3.

Unitopia ? The Outsider ? 9.5 (superb vocal harmonies).

Simon Says ? The Wailing Wall ? 8.7.

Jinetes Negros ?Hypnos ? 8.

Blank Manuskript ? Beast in the Cave ? 8.5.

La Coscienza di Zeno ? Colofonia ? 7.3 (the recording quality isn't good).

Guy Leblanc ? Beyond the Wall of Sleep ? 8.4.

Ars Ephemera ? The Other Gods ? 7.4.

Attilio Perrone ? Topi nel Muro (what a nice surprise!) ? 9.2.

Ciccada ? The Statement ? 7.

D'accorD ? The Doom that came to Sarnath ? 6.8 (a better vocalist would fit well).

Sithonia ? I Gatti di Ulthar ? 7.7.

Daal ? The call of Cthulu ? 7.5 (starts genius, but gets repetitive and too long on the second half.

Kate ? Dream: quest to the unknown Kadath ? 7.5 (could be shorter).

Nexus ? The Colour out of Space ? 7.

Safara ? Calendimaggio ? 5.5.

Aether ? Mountains of Madness ? 4.5.

GOAD ? At the Mountains of Madness ? 5.2.

In a scale of 5, I give the whole effort a 4.1.