GAPPA

This is the first album by this band I've got into my hands and I was rather curious to listen to it. Actually I find the music quite interesting, reminding me a bit to THIEVES' KITCHEN's Shibboleth album, although being not quite as good as that one. They're playing in some way a mixture of symphonic/Neoprog and jazz elements. What's very positive is that the Neoprog influence is very marginal and the jazz input is merged rather well with the symphonic element. During the first few spins the music presented here might still sounds a bit strange especially to our European ears mainly due to the sometimes oddly sounding vocal lines and as well the language.

The opener Souk is not quite suitable for falling in love with this record immediately, but after a few spins and getting used to the vocals the song becomes more attractive revealing some very interesting moments and actually it should appeal to fellows preferring odd stuff. Very intricate and slightly odd song with excellent keyboard, bass and guitar work. Kirmes is basically a more accessible and melodic song although once again vocals by Tamami Yamamoto provide a certain amount of oddity. Another very positive aspect of this album is that keyboard solos are mainly done by the good ol' Hammond. Ranja is a very nice and excellent symphonic prog song with a slight jazzy touch, certainly one of the highlights here having a rather melancholic basic mood with nice flute keyboard tunes combined with excellent guitar/bass play. Vocals are sounding as well very enjoyable on this one. In The Golden Apples Of The Sun melodious and complex sections are alternating in a very felicitous way and here it's becoming quite evident how dominant the bass play is in their music. There's as well a very fine solo provided by excellent guitarist Yasuhiro Tachibana and keyboarder Hideaki Nagaike uses some tunes sounding quite interesting, second highlight of the album. Not to forget to mention that in general musicianship is really excellent here. Without going too much into detail of the rest of the songs I can just say that they are anything than inferior keeping well the quality standard of the album's first half. Closing track Etranger can be called another highlight with once again an excellent guitar solo.

SUMMARY: Third album by this interesting Japanese band is an excellent and solid work presenting some first classed musicianship and should provide enough complexity and pleasure to most prog collectors for quite a few spins. Although possibly not an essential one, it might certainly appeal to all lovers of modern intricate symphonic/jazz fusion. I'd like to rate it with 3.5 stars!