LAYERS

Analogue keyboard sounds are a feature that almost never goes wrong for me: when used properly their richness and warmth outweighs easily the disadvantages in variety when compared to the cold modern digital approach. Tangram's 2012 album "Layers" features a plenty of them, mostly used in a mid-period-Tangerine Dream-fashion (as the project's name suggests). It is just too bad that the cd seems to be quite unbalanced, the first six songs being pretty similar in style and structural format (repetitive dreamy sequencers and drums and well, many layers) to the extent that they become a bit boring. Highlights of these include the wonderful "Violent Sunrise" and "Regrets Are Just the Start". A more melodic attempt is found only on track 7 "Modern Losses", a nice but quite average track. "Nocturn" is a quiet, not very memorable minimalistic piece and "Compliment of the Trees" finishes the album nicely with its opening style. "Layers" is not the most fascinating album out there to my ears but has enough content to be worth checking out. 2,5 stars rounded up to 3.