APRYL

Apryl began life in 1995 in Conegliano, a town in the province of Treviso. After a first immature demo that was recorded in 1996 and entitled "Tela", in 2002 the young band finally managed to release their debut album on the Mellow Records label entitled "Alorconfusa", recorded between 2000 and 2001 with a line up featuring Ermanno Barsè (keyboards, piano), Giorgio Riondato (bass), Alberto Celotto (guitar), Andrea Lorenzet (drums, percussion) and Leandro Di Giovanna (vocals). The result of their creativity is an interesting mix of vintage sounds and more recent influences although, in my opinion, the vocal parts are not always up to the task. The art cover by Flavio Gregori tries to capture the musical content...

The long, complex opener "Hesperia" sets the atmosphere. It begins by experimental sounds and a sudden surge of pulsing energy alternated with more relaxed passages. The music and lyrics evoke the image of boy who has just captured a beautiful, colourful butterfly with a net. As he admires his prey in a transparent box his fantasy begins to run and the butterfly becomes a nymph, daughter of the night. Atlantis is her home, a lost island where golden apples grow... Eventually, the magic beauty of the butterfly and its desperate efforts to escape from the box move the boy who decides to set the little creature free...

The evocative, cinematic "Ghe-pardo" (Chee-tah) is an instrumental track that goes through many changes in rhythm and atmosphere drawing a kind o game full of jerks and slowdowns where you have to get lost to find yourself again... The following "Tarta-ruga" (Tur-tle) starts softly by a simple guitar arpeggio. The atmosphere is dreamy while the music and lyrics conjure up surreal images of hanging waves, suspicious clouds and tidy seabeds hiding mysteries and memories. Then something strange shines through and gets out of the lagoon, towards the land...

The last track, "Nelle vesti di Adia" (In the guise of Adia) begins by an oblique waltz tempo while hermetic lyrics add touches of autumnal colours upon the musical canvas to stir your imagination. The music drives you through many changes in rhythm and mood alternating soft, dreamy passages to bursts of energy taking you between lights and misty shades where subtle, dying figures dance in the twilight, so close to touch you...

On the whole, an interesting work that deserves a try.

Two years after the good EP ''Corollari di figure'' finally luck hit the door of Apryl.The Italian quintet was signed by Mellow Records and finally released its first full-length release entitled ''Alorconfusa''.

The album include both the nice compositions of the band's previous EP, two nice Symphonic Rock tracks with a soft atmosphere but always professional musicianship, heavily driven by Barsè's keyboards but also having a jazzy approach on the guitar parts.The rest of the work contains another two long compositions, which follow more or less the same vein.Keyboard-based Symphonic Rock with even some Post-Rock and Jazz-Rock touches, filled with Barse diverse keyboard passages, including extended piano interludes, soft synth atmospheres amd more intense organ parts.A solid rhythm section and a smooth guitar performance complete Apryl's music proposal.From the two ''Ghe-pardo'' seems the less interesting due to a very long hypnotic synth-part around the middle, while ''Tarta-ruga'' is absolutely satisfying, modern and romantic Italian Symphonic Rock with some nice synth explorations, close to the style of MONTEFELTRO, and an excellent dreamy atmosphere.Add to the picture a singer with an extremely warm voice and the whole package is definitely rewarding.

Unfortunately this was Apryl's last studio contribution and the band's traces have been lost ever since.However ''Alorconfusa'' remains a delicate work of Italian Symphonic Rock, which will satisfy all the fans of the style.Recommended.

APRYL were an unknown Italian band formed in mid-90's in Veneto.They managed to release a two-track EP and a full-length album during their career.Their self-produced EP contains two long tracks and it's a good example of keyboard-dominated symphonic prog,not unlike LE ORME or NUOVA ERA.Ermano Barse's piano and keyboards are all over the place,from the classical-like interludes and the atmospheric backgrounds to the ethereal piano ,the trully complex instrumental parts and the synth loops.The sound is not bombastic at all,I would say the the music follows the vein of the classic 70's Italian bands,focusing on atmosphere and romanticism.Vocalist Leandro Di Giovanna has a very nice and sensitive voice,while the album contains some really complex and jazzy bass work too.A decent symhonic release that should appeal mostly to fans of keyboard-driven progressive rock.Recommended.

I tried. I really, really did. I'm a huge fan of Italian Symphonic prog, old and new. I like to try out newer bands that are not necessarily popular, or heard of and I give new discs around four listens before I form an opionion. I couldn't get through three with this disc. It starts off rather well with a very nice melody but once the singer starts to open his mouth it's all downhill and pretty fast at that. Giovanna's voice is off-key for most of the album, flat and most of all boring. Yet, I can look past awful singers if the music is exemplory. But this is not the case. The songs for the most part are filled to the brim with time changes and cliched Genesis ideas, yet they sound unrehearsed and sloppy. The drummer in particular seems off, missing the beat when there's any sign of a signature change. A keyboard passage will pop up out of nowhere and completely destroy whatever melody the song might have. A guitar riff or even pluck will have you scratching your head wondering why. All the songs suffer from this other than the track, "Ghe-pardo" which a quarter of the way through slows down to a crawl and the bass plays some absolute boring notes with Giovanna caterwauling flatly. The song does pick up at the end, but it's to late. I can't stress enough how unprofessional this whole disc sounds. The fact that they produced it themselves is to their own detrement. They do seem to have some sliver of talent, but this disc is plain awful. Unless you need to own EVERY Italian symph prog album, then be warned. I'll end this by saying something I don't normally say: sorry guys, but this gives the genre a bad name....sorry....better luck next time.

This is a band that could go far. The problem is their creativity ! Can you believe that ? They all over the place with a houndred ideas a minute. Not that I don't like intricate compositions, but I just can't get into the music. Okay, I may be exaggerating, but the tracks do sound "messy" to me, not in the production but in the composition itself. The album gets unpleasant and boring the more I listen to it. They kind of remind me of Nueva Era. So if you like Nueva Era, I guess you'll like Apryl. I just hope they will show more maturity in the next album.

"Hello there, we're an Italian band and we like ELP". Oh yeah?

I've been delused with APRYL's bio where their GENESIS' likeness was marked and give their albums few spins. I began with this EP which includes only 2 songs and lasts for 28 minutes.First of all I was shocked when guitar and drums were out of each others tempo in first monemts of the record - I mean that's not the polyrhythmia, they've just failed to keep one and the same tempo together!!! :0 Then I heard A LOT of keyboards. Then A LOT MORE. Each time I listened to it again everything was on it place - there were A LOT of different keyboards and not much sanity. Sone jazz-rock- related bits (think of UK),some guitarwork (not remarkable), but mostly keyboards - bombastic and overwhelming.

I'm not an ELP fan. Though this one is not FULLY keyboard-driven record, the amount of bombastism reached the boiling pot for me. Recommended for ELP, NUOVA ERA, LITTLE TRAGEDIES, ARS NOVA, GERARD, you-continue fans and Prog Collectors - the whole level of band's musicianship is not that much satisfying. But a nice effort after all, and I'll definetely listen to their LP.

Very talented young band from Italy

APRYL is a young Italian band which is pretty much unknown but considering their high skill as musicians and their creativity they would deserve to have more attention. When I first listened to them I was thinking: "WOW what a great symphonic prog they are playing"! Of course they are inspired a lot by 70's Prog reminding sometimes to KING CRIMSON by their guitar style and at times to GENESIS by their keyboards style, but without sounding at any moment like a rip-off of these bands.

Most of the record is dominated by a rather mellow and melancholic mood, although the opener Hesperia starts a bit more up-tempo. A very long piece with almost 15 minutes, but never getting boring at any moment. Fantastic guitar and keyboards and above all the awesome vocals of Leandro Di Giovanna which are in Italian BTW. The composition is intricate with many breaks and shifts but all the times keeping a very pleasant and enjoyable frame. Second all instrumental track Ghe-pardo is in some way the strangest one and at my very first listening I had quite big problems to really enjoy this one and stil it's my least favorite one. It sounds a bit aimless, I've to say, as an example in the beginning they're starting to play some Genesis tunes (I think) but then are losing themselves in complete disharmony. Towards the end of the track it seams they finally found somehow a coherent theme. But anyway this is a strange one and the reason for I can't rate it with the full score. Next one Tarta-ruga let me forget the previous one immediately since it's as fascinating as the first one but it's more dominated by a melancholic mood. Especially the vocals emphasize a strong pastoral tone. The balance between instrumental and vocal sections has been just perfectly managed by the band. Last track Nelle Vesti di Adia again a very long one is as brilliant as tracks 1 and 3 and a bit more up-tempo like the opener. In this one they're managing to include some odd tunes and rhythm into the composition more successfully than in track 3.

As a SUMMARY this album is an excellent work by this very little known young band and I think there are still even better things to come from them. It's a blend of harmonic and odd symphonic Prog which has worked out almost perfectly. All fans of 70's Prog should definitively check it out, they won't be disappointed!

An excellent addition to any Prog collection