CD

Ripples In Time contains progressive metal from the Danish band Chrome Shift. It's the debut album from founders Otto Schütt (guitars) and Jens Christian Nielsen (bass) together with Rasmus Bak (vocals), Jakob Paulsen (keyboards) and Poul Terkildsen (drums). As we all know Dream Theater (DT) is one of the bands that had a huge impact on the prog metal scene. In the accompanying flyer with this promo again DT is mentioned as one of the main influences, but also Pain Of Salvation and King's X are named.

Dolores Castro is a quite handsome keyboardist from Spain making electronic music in the vein of ambient and chill out music. She now delivers her debut album through a branch of the French Musea Records label. Fifth Dimension contains eleven tracks, fully instrumental, and composed and played by Castro. She seems to be inspired by the great masters like Vangelis. She adds nice grooves, a bit of a danceable beats alternated by relaxing, catchy piano and synth melodies.

A Rondo is the second album by the Brazilian band Calix. The line-up consists of Renato Savassi (vocals, flute, violin), Sanzio Brandao (guitars, violin), André Goday (drums, percussion, vocals), Marcelo Cioglia (bass, vocals) and Bufino Silvéro (keyboards, vocals). Some tracks are orchestrated by a chamber orchestra. Their music isn't easy to describe, because of the use of the native language - only one track is sung in English - but also because the musical style differs from song to song.

Jack Bruce is one of the most renowned bass players from the United Kingdom. He's famous for his work with Cream, his solo projects and numerous collaborations with top-notch musicians. He's still making records and doing live performances. His remarkable voice is recognized instantly. Originally he played cello, amongst others, but he developed into a multi-instrumentalist although his bass playing remains his trademark. The album Automatic was originally released as an LP in Germany (1983) and later on in the UK (1987).

Mirek Gil, one of the member founders of the Polish renowned prog outfit Collage, started Believe as a solo project.

The American trio Backyard  Tire Fire, consisting of Ed Anderson (vocals, piano, guitars, harmonica), his brother Matt Anderson (bass, vocals) and Tim Kramp (drums), has released their second album on the independent Originality Is Everything-label (O.I.E). Their music sounds nice but can not be categorized as symphonic prog or progressive rock. The slide guitars, harmonica and the pedal steel guitars provide the sound an overall country rock feel.

5BridgeS originates from the Netherlands. They have been working together with their current line-up for about three years now. The band name refers to the extensive catalogue of Keith Emerson and the five-piece outfit tries to ‘cross a bridge’, reaching out for the sounds of the seventies, wherein truly crafty musicians were still allowed to sound genuinely, passionately warm and a bit rough on the edges. 5BridgeS uses keyboards including MiniMoog, Hammond organ and Taurus pedals.

Na het onverwachte succes van Concerto For Group & Orchestra (1969), geschreven door toetsenist Jon Lord en uitgevoerd door Deep Purple en het Royal Philharmonic Orchestra onder leiding van dirigent Malcolm Arnold, kreeg Lord het verzoek om een opvolger te schrijven. Dat werd Gemini Suite (1971), een album dat stijltechnisch niet wezenlijk verschilt van eerder genoemd album. Deze plaat bestaat uit zes delen, waarbij in elk stuk een instrumentalist de hoofdrol vertolkt.

Under the moniker of AstroVoyager the French electronic musician Philippe Fagnoni uses keyboards and synthesizers to create his music in the vein of celebrities like the Greek Vangelis and his countryman Jean Michel Jarre. Temporal Gravitation contains nice melodies, sometimes cosmic, at other times more symphonic. The fifteen relatively short tracks take the listener on a journey through space.

AstroVoyager is the moniker of the French electronic musician (EM) Philippe Fagnoni. Symphotronic Lunation is a much bigger project than his his first full-length album Temporal Gravitation. Inspired by the journey of the famous American spaceship Apollo 11 with Neil Armstrong, Fagnoni decided to compose his music as a soundtrack and he ended up by finding Eric Parisi, the right man to make a film. It’s not clear to me why a renowned company like Musea send promos like this one to the press.