STRATOSFEAR

"Stratosfear" begins extremely beautifully with soft guitars and synth chord progression, but almost immediately after this opening the sequencers creep in for dominating the whole album, and the mood of the music is changed dramatically. I can't escape memories of the bad music from 1990's Commodore Amiga here, and this music certainly isn't my cup of tea. The beautiful meditative theme returns in the end, but I would have preferred to have it been exploited more, or accompanied with some other kind of orientation to music creation. "Big Sleep in Search of Hades" is a pretty tune with flutes, bass and harpsichord-sounding keyboard melodies, being much better than the opener title track. Later there's a more oppressing theme presented, reminding slightly "The Heaven and Hell" album of Vangelis. "3am at The Border of The Marsh from Okefenokee" starts really primitively, sounding little like old "Ping Pong" computer game having some lush harmonica lines and dreamlike synth voices over it. After few minutes the space is filled with stronger and nicer soundscapes. "Invisible Limits" is a slow track building up moods quietly with nice flutes, flowing in quite symphonic style. Sadly the texture of the sound palette is the same as elsewhere on the record, somehow sounding sterile to my half-deaf ears, and not allowing anymore very pleasing aural trips. Even though there are few nice moments in the music, I personally lack the abilities to enjoy the aesthetics of this record, and felt that the future of the group ventured to directions not anymore within my own personal area of interests. Though disappointed by the music, have to adore the wonderful front cover picture though.