NO ILLUSIONS

(Recycled from my magazine article on several Garden of Delights re-releases.)

German PANCAKE released three studio albums, each notably different. Weak debut Roxy Elephant (1975) is mostly guitar rock with WISHBONE ASH influence; Out of the Ashes (1977) was an improvement, as the keyboards were added. The vocals are perhaps the weakest link on every album, and the change to a female voice on this third album didn't much help in that matter. Biggi Zmierczak's screeching voice is very untalented to my ears.

The compositions are mostly decent. Slightly messy, synth oriented sound combines the space rock of ELOY and tight Heavy Prog. The couple of more symphonic and the longest tracks, especially 'Autumn Leaves', are easily the best ones, they bring in mind some other German bands of the time such as ANYONE'S DAUGHTER. Half of the six bonus tracks are studio leftovers, half live material, all clearly of lower quality than the album itself. 2½ stars.