IMPOSSIBLE HOLIDAYS

Impossible Holidays is basically Musk at Dusk Vol. II. It's an album of songs sung by Irmin himself and his deep non-singers voice more concerned with atmosphere than with hitting the right notes. It has once more a good number of memorable melodies, instrumental brilliance and vivid rhythms driven by Jaki Liebezeit on drums and Steve Shehan's percussion, and Irmin's original dreamy sound world characterised by his faible for traditional dances such as waltz and tango, the lush sound with his occasionally dramatic but often understated piano, with a strong addition of the bandoneon. I don't think the album is quite up with Musk at Dusk, as the standard of the singing is below the earlier album in places, and there are some lengths. The closing track Gormenghast Drift is an instrumental that I like a lot and that works well ending this album, however it is all too similar to some of his soundtrack instrumental work (Irmin is one of those artists who are strikingly original and individual compared with others, however he can be accused of often using the same idea more than once - which of course might be seen as legitimate for soundtracks).

Ultimately though the highlights and the fact that I am a fan of his general approach and most of the musicians here carry this clearly above the three stars and it ends up with 3.8. Also, there won't be another regular album for nine years and he won't follow up on the concept of Musk at Dusk and Impossible Holidays, so we have only these two albums of this kind, and for sure what's on offer there is enough for two good albums.