FOUR ACES

The path Cast were walking start to become less and less lonely with each release.In 1995 the band plays outside Mexico, receiving an invitation for the pre-Progfest Festival at Barnsdall Theater in Los Angeles, USA.At the same time they kept producing music in a prolific way and the year finds them launching their fourth full-length production ''Four aces'', where Dino Brassea and Francisco Hernandez share vocal duties.Still this was another self-released production by the band.

The front cover evokes the mighty Fish-era MARILLION, but the Mexicans' roots are still grounded in a more symphonic tradition, covered by the strong Neo flashes of British Prog.This was more than an hour of lush, refined and at times complex Progressive Rock with certain YES and GENESIS influences, becoming even more ambitious as time goes by, now with two epics longer than 10 minutes each.The music is always very good, melodic and captivating with endless display of smooth guitar lines, piano interludes and sharp synthesizers, which still sound a bit cheesy, buried by a mediocre production, but fortunately the lovely arrangements will save the day.While not a first-league album, ''Four aces'' contains all the right elements of a proper Classic Prog album, with switching keyboards and pianos, lots of themes' variations and mood changes, maybe COLLAGE around the same time could be a fine comparison.The long tracks do have a reason of existence, nothing here is stretched or excessive, from the pompous instrumental parts to the laid-back textures and from the instant melodies to the lyrical passages.The band suffers from a period sound, which wanted your prog experience to be bombastic and accesible at the same time, but they overcome these flaws with a professional performance, where the symphonic and Classical inspirations stand out.

They were yet to be discovered by a proper prog label management, but Cast kept producing elaborate progressive music, rooted in the 70's, and they would get a reward for this.''Four aces'' is another winner in their discography, pretty nice, GENESIS-linked Symphonic Rock with some beautiful instrumental moments.Recommended.