CALATEA

Late-70's produced still some quality Progressive Rock and Flame Dream were among the bands that did so.They were found in Luzern, Switzerland in 1977 and the original crew were guitarist/singer Urs Waldispühl, keyboardist Roland Ruckstuhl, drummer Peter Fuhrer, bassist Urs Hochuli and woodwind player/singer Peter Wolf.Their debut album ''Calatea'' was originally released on Phillips in 1978.

In ''Calatea'' Flame Dream delivered quite complex Progressive Rock with numerous breaks and time signatures akin to masters YES, GENTLE GIANT, GENESIS and VAN DER GRAAF GENERATOR.From these influences YES should be the more evident, as the style of the band was full of the Englishmen's ethereal breaks with multi-vocal harmonies, Classical-inspired piano and harsichord intros, WAKEMAN-ish bizarre synth parts and STEVE HOWE-like guitar hooks.The melodic moog synth parts though are closer to the style of GENESIS.Among this mainly symphonic material Peter Wolf found plenty of space to offer endless sax and flute attacks, some of them are quite melodoius, others are very sharp and edgy.The arrangements of the album are pretty tight, filled with very complicated instrumental themes and demanding interplays, definitely a prog fan's heaven.The instrumentation is nicely balanced as well.What is not really consistent is the above average songwriting and of course the very strong YES resemblance is not exciting either.

Pretty solid material in Classic Prog vein and it is a crime there is no legit CD reissue still around.The only CD version I am aware of is a bootleg release by Tachika.Very good and complex Prog for fans of YES, VAN DER GRAAF GENERATOR, CATHEDRAL or YEZDA URFA...3.5 stars.