CSILLAGOK ÚTJÁN - SKYROVER

Omega decided to re-mix and re-master three albums that went gold in Hungary and sensibly made available the English versions previously available on German record label Bellaphon in one package. Without a doubt those familiar with the earlier anolog recordings will see the difference in sound quality. As I only had copies of the vinyl issues of these this was most welcome.

An album along the same lines of the previous Idorablo/Time Robber album, this eighth album in Hungarian and fifth album in English from Omega blasts off with a intro featuring an excerpt from Beethoven`s Fifth which paints itself into a grand piano entreé into the Spacey title track Skyrover/Égi vandor. Despite the spacey theme of the album(s) the album(s) also contain a couple of sentimental ballads which work well. Purple Lady/Bibor holgy is a dreamy piece about a mystical lady in the sky while Russian Winter/Lena is concerned with a lost love evoking a very romantic mood featuring a traditiona Russian stringed instrument called the balalaika as well as some emotive " howling" vocalizations from Janos Kobor. It is a bit of a reminder of the music of the earlier Omega years when they blended traditional Hungarian folk-influenced attitudes with rock and this is the standout in both languages.

There is no shortage of guitar soloing from the "Elephant" Gyorgy Molnar. Some fine jazz influenced guitar lines can be heard on The Lost Prophet/Legy eros as well as more rock oriented riffing on High On the Starway/Csillagok utjan which is based on a cool bass riff which leads the piece off. This is more of a rock`n roll piece and doesn`t really fit into any progressive rock category. Omega albums were like this throughout the seventies with roughly 30% of each albums` content containing songs which were more appealing to the masses rather than the hard core fan of progressive rock, great catchy tunes nonetheless.

As with every Omega album the ubiquitous keyboard array was present here courtesy of the Hungarian equivalent of Rick Wakeman, Laszlo Benko and he supports every track magnificently with some form of keyboard effects as well as the synth led Metamorphosis/Metamorphozis.

An interesting offering here in that you get to hear an album sung in two languages with some differences in meanings between versions, the English being a little difficult to understand at times and if you don`t speak Hungarian, impossible. The Hungarian version is the one I prefer, Janos Kobor sings much better in his mother tongue! ( the instrumenal tracks are identical ).

Of course, with the stellar engineering update makes a big difference and will be obvious immediately to those familiar with the anolog recordings. Great late seventies progressive with language options for the investigative prog fan.