L'ISOLA DI NIENTE

Drunk with the possibilities, or in espionage terms, the plausiblilities, of rock music that is in constant flux, the Milanese legends just let it go here, offering a set that is packed with promise. Most of that promise is fulfilled on this five-cut LP from '74, their fifth in the studio, and drunk is what one should probably be when hearing this puppy for the first time. The operetta that opens the 10-minute title requires some patience but it busts out soon enough with some heavy-ass guitar riffage from Franco Mussida and a complimentary vocal, trudging its way through a thicket of tin-can symph, neat ascending arpeggios, satisfying odd-metered rock, bumblebee synth/guitar lines, more forced operetta, and ambled beach-combing.

'Is My Face on Straight' is good, could've been better, features some appealing rhythms but also some awkward Greg Lake-derived singing and doesn't distinguish this ensemble. But it's still prog, what are you gonna do. A faux cash machine sets the pace for 'La Luna Nuova', taken over by synths, flutes, gonky basses, fluppy drums, an organ, all thrown together for a nice midsection and high-quality crescendo with bracing guitar/keyboard matches. Sleepy and smitten 'Dolcissima Maria' is acceptable (if you're on your honeymoon in Liguria), and Jan Patrick Djivas' bass bumbles out jazz-rock experiment 'Via Lumiere', a not-so-bad take on the fusion of the time.

This is both a very good and yet largely facultative album; it is a noncompulsory addition to a prog listeners collection, and should be among, but not the first of, the purchases a new RPI fan will make.