TOM MOTO

This album won the ProgAwards 2008 prize for Best Debut Album (well deserved indeed) and I can't believe that this album hasn't had any review so far.

Is commonly believed that you can't rock enough if you have no guitars in your sound, and these guys from Pisa, Italy, certainly know how to rock and blow the listener's mind without them.

If the classic term 'power trio' does not apply to bands with guitar-bass-drums formation (hence Rush, Cream or even Motörhead) it surely apploes to another kind, such as keyboards-drum-bass (Le Orme or ELP).

However, the Tom Moto guys (whose band name comes from Charles Bukowski's 'Post Office' character, references to the text will take place on tracks Post Office I, II and III) took a step ahead in originality and decided to attempt a risky format of power trio: bass-drums- trumpet (altough they use electric guitars in the song Dikkop).

Certainly, this rock band format which has already been succesfully tested by bands as Jean Louis and the also italian group Zu, but I did not get addicted to their sound as I did with Tom Moto, as it is not as noisy and abrasive.

Basically, as their bio says, their sound is a high-octane mix of punk, jazz, funk, metal and progressive. The percussive section sounds as if Geddy Lee (Rush) or maybe Les Claypool (Primus) and Damon Che (Don Caballero) got possesed by the devil itself and a jazzy oriented trumpeteer joined the trip.

They have funkier, heavier or jazzier moments, depending on the song (specially in the song Egghead, IMO the best of the record)

That eclectic and perhaps weird mix is incredibly effective and provide a record that is complex, fresh, full of energy and dynamism. The bass is in my opinion the instrument that most power gives to the music, and if you like avant-garde jazz or you are a fan of the sound that slapping the bass strings do, this is definitely your album.

5 stars, absolutely great album, looking forward for more of this band.