BESTIARIO

Rather an excellent collective coursework at a hypothetic Prog Faculty (with a cryptozoologic elective course) of a conservatory of music than a genuine prog album. I got an email info about this band from a friend, with the subject 'Spanish prog is still alive!'. Yes, indeed. And I was especially glad to hear that it was a new Spanish prog band singing in Spanish. Since 1990s, when I discovered Spanish prog scene for myself and realized that I prefer it even to Norwegian, Brazilian and Japanese prog scenes (other faves of mine), Spanish lyrics themselves sound like a fairy-tale music in my ears, no matter if I don't understand what I hear (I don't speak Spanish). But when I listened to Bestiario I caught myself at a thought that I constantly felt... even difficult to express correctly what I felt. Lack of Guadalquivir's Camino Del Concierto? Lack of something Fragua- or Cuarto Menguante-like? The music sounded like it was turning around something very essential but steadily missing it. All the best was done by means of arrangement, not melody making, not generating fresh ideas. I.e. Circle Project's music surely contains ideas, but mostly generated not by Circle Project. I tried to imagine hypothetic feelings of a person who will listen to this album 50 or 100 years later but failed to find any moment in it which could thrill him/her. Perhaps it would be a great music if there were no Coto-En-Pel, no Gotic, no Cai, no Ibio, no Iman Califato Independiente etc. And especially if there was no Rivendel and their exceptional second album from 1996, The Meaning. I think this is what Bestiario is closest to, both structurally and functionally, - and what it loses to at all. Oh yes I read the band's biography here on PA, and I am aware that initially it was a Facebook interest group and the album was just a game. But let's be beyond random details and circumstances. This is the music. And if it cannot be appreciated if the listener is unaware of its background and not into cryptozoology, then maybe Facebook is not the best place for forming a prog band?