A BILLION YEARS OF SOLITUDE

Listening to this album every day for the past three weeks has not changed my initial opinion, though part of my motivation for so many repeat listens was due to the fact that I really wanted to rate this album higher. It's just not meant to be. The album is bookended by two epics--both of which rank among my favorite songs of the year--but the other songs in between fail to rate as highly--they lack anything really special to attract me back in. The two epics, however, "The Curious One" (18:06) (10/10) and "Traveller's Last Candle" (12:43) (9/10) are intriguing for their fresh and rather unique flow--including the blending of some quite unusual styles, from THE TEA CLUB to TANGERINE DREAM to AMPLIFIER to ANUBIS to world music and to I'm-not-sure-where, but it's fun. A group I discovered with their debut and knew I wanted to keep an eye out for their next works--which I have--and I'm glad I have. They have grown and improved. It's just that there's still room for more. (Improvement, that is.)

Solid 4 stars. Give a listen; see what you think!