GAUDI'S LEGACY

This is the third album by prog mettalers Pyramid, and is a concept album based on the work of Antonio Gaudi Cornet (1852-1926), who according to my brief flick through the web was the leader of the Catalonia modern movement. He was an architect of great renown and many of his grand designs still exists in Spain, particularly in Barcelona where Pyramid hail from. Producing a concept album is always challenging, but in this instance they are trying to create one form of art based on another form of art, quite an undertaking.

This is quite unlike any other album that I have been listening to recently, while at the same time bringing together themes and styles that will be recognisable to many. It is progressive, while at the same time quite definitely hard rock, which means that they fit in the prog metal genre, or do they? This is a very technical band, with extremely complex guitar/keyboard interplay, which means that at times it is possible to imagine that one is listening to some new work by Steve Vai. There is the same fluidity, the same refusal to compromise to any ideals about what the music should sound like, yet at the same time making a lot of sense.

The second track is nearly twelve minutes long (but annoyingly fades out instead of finishing properly), and when Javier Cespedes is singing it is good strong melodic rock but the music switches and twists so that the listener wonders what is going to happen yet. Some songs are more commercial than others, but there is always the sense of expecting the unexpected. Easily one of the best Spanish albums I have heard in a long time.

Originally appeared in Feedback #70, Oct 02