Review on 🚀 Next Release by Karla Richter

As noted in the liner notes, this band took its name from American composer Terry Riley's 1969 minimalist masterpiece Rainbow in Twisted Air, although the music on this 1971 album is anything but minimalist . This is a full Prog album and the eight tracks on the second album show the use of odd time signatures and virtuoso playing from all the musicians (btw, keyboardists Francis Monkman and Darryl Way studied at the Royal Academy of Music for a time). ), somewhat complicated ensemble playing and great vocals, viola Sonya Christina. Keyboarder Francis Monkman made extensive use of the VCS-3 synthesizer on this recording, along with the Hammond organ, mellotron and piano. Interestingly, he was also a decent electric guitarist, using both distorted and "clean" tones. Fiddler Darryl Way is also great and co-wrote the first five tracks with Sonya Christina while Francis Monkman wrote three tracks including the energetic Everydance, the slightly goofy Bright Summers Day '68 and the superb 12'53" suite Piece of Mind It is worth noting that in "Part of the Mind" Sonia Christina recites an excerpt from TS Eliot's epic The Wasteland.In fact, "intellectual" references to literature at the time were not uncommon, for example, Grace Slick wrote by Jefferson Airplane, a work influenced by James Radical Ulysses Joyce Percussionist/drummer Florian Pilkington-Mixa is superb, displaying a stylistic range that ranges from the virtuoso and thunderous raves in Everydance to the hypnotic conga lines in the tranquil Puppets- The bass slot was occupied by the excellent Jan Eyre on the second album, although the position of the bass changed over the course of m changed constantly over the years as bass players came and went. Despite the changes, they managed to create a distinctive sound over the course of three wonderful and highly recommended albums, including Air Conditioning (1970), 2nd Album (1971) and Phantasmagoria (1972).