DAWN DANCER

A large Dutch/Flemish septet that had an intriguing line-up (vocals, guitars, drums, percussion, bass and dual keys) but didn't really exploit it to the degree that they could have. Musically, this is fairly straight-on sympho, and while some of the tunes have surprising twists and turns, there's little here that hasn't been done before elsewhere, and better at that. Even the percussive bits, which are somewhat compelling, are basically the same basic concept as what the band Corte Dei Miracoli were doing on their much superior album. And again, this is a case of two average keyboardists not doing anything that one good one couldn't.

The vocals are hopeless, a ridiculously histrionic lunatic attempting to cover up his lack of vocal range. It doesn't help that the English lyrics are beyond silly. "Be my day's destroyer, I'm your breath enjoyer", and that's not even the worst of what's here.

Quite unsurprisingly, the high point of the whole album is "Grace", an instrumental.