EXOGENESIS

A few days ago ELOY FRITSCH (Former leader of the excellent Brazilian band Apocalypse) was suggested to Symphonic, immediately heard the samples provided and was obvious for the team and myself that this music had no connection with Symphonic but has an evident influence from Electronic Prog, so sponsored his addition to Prog Related and after a couple days was admitted by the Administrator's Team.

Still with curiosity, went to a virtual store and bought Exogenesis a decent album that didn't completely disappointed me (I didn't expected too much to be honest), absolutely different to what the Brazilian musician made with the Symphonic band Apocalypse but consistent with my first impression of his solo work. The music is some sort of New Age, Space Rock and Electronic Prog influenced combo, with more than evident VANGELIS influence. It's also evident that ELOY has an excellent technique and pristine style, but has a weakness in the originality department.

The album can't be reviewed in song-by-song bases, because the tracks are there almost exclusively for order purpose, because it's a 60 minutes complete musical piece that has to be listened as an integral work rather than divided in a way that would never make sense.

Anyway, I will mention the four parts Exogenesis four parts suite, a work that reminds me of Albedo 0.39 with all those space and electronic sounds, but Part IV seems like an unknown fragment taken from the Oxygène sessions.

Let's be honest, the music is good and played with dexterity by an educated and talented keyboardist, but very unimaginative, sounding like a collage of music from other New Age/Electronic/Space authors all pieced together to create a new concept. Interesting, but not my cup of tea, being that he offers nothing new, except maybe for the pompous and brilliant Mayan Temple that rises the level of the album despite the New "Agey" concept.

Until this track I was tempted to go with 2 stars, but being that Exogenesis has some excellent passages that save the abundant weak ones, will go with 3 stars...For followers of the genre or nostalgic JARRE and VANGELIS fans.