Issue 2025-057

A/lpaca — Laughter

Jerry Kranitz

A/lpaca are the Italian quartet of Christian Bindelli on guitar/vocals, Andrea Verrastro on bass/vocals, Andrea Fantuzzi on keyboards/vocals and Andrea Sordi on drums/drum machine. Similar to their Make It Better debut from 2021, Laughter consists of concise songs, with only two breaking the 4-minute mark, which makes for a non-stop roller coaster ride of a relatively short 31-minute set.

The music is difficult to describe, but I'll cut loose with a oneliner... We've got punked out psych rock with a Can meets Chrome quality, angularly hyper-kinetic buzzsaw rock, space-industrial dance rock à la Pressurehed, and even some space-ambience and dream-pop.

Evil Prawn is a brief but formidable opener, being an oddball combination of surf-punk, psychedelic noise chaos and garbled voices, which takes a hairpin turn into the potently psychedelic dance-thrash of The Confident Laughter. An Encounter eases the pace, though not the intensity level, being a power rocking slab of industrial space-punk. Other highlights include Brano Fantuzzi, an electro dance and sound collage blend of Pressurehed and Chrome.

Empty Chairs is an awesomely brain-pummeling space-punk rocker, peppered with a variety of experimental sound bits, making it feel like a thrashier version of Chrome. And from here on a/lpaca go easier on the listener. Kyrie is an atmospheric instrumental. Who Is In Love Daddy? is a (somewhat) sedate goth rocker with a catchy angular guitar melody. And compared to the rest of the album, Don't Talk is pure gothic dream-pop and the most serene song of the set.

Avant prog-punk? Psychedelic industrial noise-rock? Crazy variety but it flows. You have to hear it for yourself.

Deep Energy Orchestra — The Science of Sound

Owen Davies

I was inspired to check out the Deep Energy Orchestra's Live album The Return after reading its DPRP review in 2020. Since then, I have acquired their debut album Playing with Fire as well as the Return. I hold them both in high regard and so I jumped at the chance to write some words for DPRP about their latest release The Science Of Sound.

An hour spent in its company is time well spent. It does not disappoint and in many ways consistently exceeds expectations. It is arguably their most impressive release to date. The sound quality of the recording is superb, and this aspect certainly enhances everything. The clear production values give space for each instrument and consequently the interplay between each instrument is gloriously captured.

In fact, probably the most notable feature of the album is the way that the players are given the freedom to express themselves and trade notes with each other. The interplay between Warr guitar and keys in the outstanding Secrets Of Subtraction is magnificent.

The collective of musicians that feature on various tracks on the album creates a gold medal roll call of players associated with prog music, progressive Jazz fusion, and Indian music. They include such notable performers as Gary Husband, Adam Holzman, Joe Deninzon and Trey Gunn.

The leader of the band and principal composer and arranger is Jason Everett. His bass playing is by turns melodic and powerful and is notable for the way that it supports and invigorates the music. The tones that colourfully garland The Dancers in a kaleidoscope of fretless low-end highs and lows are breathtakingly beautiful.

The instrumentation used by the players signposts the type of music that the Deep Energy Orchestra create. When an album contains tracks that feature Bansuri, mirdangam, kanjira, ghatam and a Zen drum as well as a piccolo sitar bass, then it is probably going to involve an exploration of the fusion of Indian music with many other influences.

At points during the album, I was fleetingly reminded of the music of Shakti, and The Mahavishnu Orchestra, but for the most part The Deep Energy Orchestra offer what is a unique sound that has a recognisable style.

I enjoyed most of the pieces and particularly liked it when the musicians exchanged melodic lines with each other. There is some wonderful interplay in Dance of The Woodnymphs. The whole piece has a freshness and infective energy that is hard to ignore. The percussive elements of the tune offer an ever-shifting current for the other components of flute, mandolin, violin, and sitar to soar and flourish.

Captain Quirk is an expansive fusion tune that occasionally has a sort of Return To Forever feel. Mark Letteri's growling, snarling guitar tone eloquently elaborates things and is the perfect foil to several quirky bass and drum interludes and exuberant violin flourishes. Adam Holzman's synth sound gurgles, bubbles, and simmers in all the right places, and the concluding call and response section is simply outstanding.

Fireflies is one of my favourite tracks. You can almost taste its atmosphere. The hypnotic blend including Zen drum, Warr guitar and Kanjari is sure to transport listeners to mellow ochre hazed sunsets and the wispy rippling of wind-whipped currents on the Ganges.

I thoroughly enjoyed The Science Of Sound. I think it is likely that it will feature in my best of 2025 list for DPRP.

It is fascinating, it is immersive, it is in fact very good!

The Far Cry — Once There Was

Ignacio Bernaola

When I first reviewed The Far Cry's debut If Only back in 2021, I wrote that it was an ambitious work that rewarded careful listening. It wasn't the easiest of albums, but once you settled into its detail, it became deeply satisfying. Four years on, with Once There Was, the band have returned with an album that takes that ambition further. This time the music feels more confident, more daring, and, above all, more engaging.

The opening three tracks set the stage. Unholy Waters is bold and dramatic, a fourteen-minute piece that immediately announces the band's intentions. Crossing Pangea stretches out with a sense of adventure, shifting moods but always keeping a natural flow. The Following is shorter, sharper, almost a pause before the storm, but it works well as a bridge.

These songs show variety, but it's clear they are preparing the ground for what follows. Because the heart of this record is the twelve-part suite Once There Was.

At over half an hour, it's the kind of work that could make or break an album, and here it absolutely defines it. Right from the opening guitar line, the suite pulls you in. It's one of those beginnings that makes you stop whatever else you're doing, because you sense something important is about to unfold.

The second movement carries a clear echo of classic Yes, with bright tones and uplifting momentum that recall the optimism of the seventies prog giants. From there, the piece dives into darker passages, moments of calm reflection, and sudden bursts of energy, all of which keep the listener engaged. What I admire most is how the suite manages to be ambitious without being overblown.

Each section feels essential, and the transitions give the sense of a journey through changing landscapes: light to dark, tension to release, despair to hope. The emotional thread—nostalgia, loss, and the fragility of memory—runs through it all, and that's what makes it resonate long after it ends. Honestly, I almost wish the album had been built entirely around this suite because it's strong enough to stand on its own.

With Once There Was, The Far Cry show how much they've grown since their debut. They haven't lost their complexity, but they've gained focus and a willingness to take risks. The result is a creative and thoroughly enjoyable album that makes you want to come back, to dig deeper, and to discover something new each time.

Marco Galletti — Musical Objects

Sergey Nikulichev

I am pretty sure that a solid number of progheads is struggling to accept the disturbing sensation that many new releases leave a bland feeling of “been there, seen it”. While there's nothing particularly criminal with them, they just don't seem to hit the right heart strings, like the classics did and still and always do, right?

Well, Marco Galletti's new release does not stand up on the same level with the classics. But paradoxically, it mixes good and bad things without leaving a bland afterimage. The good is quite good, the bad is equally bad, but the sharpness of taste is there all the same. For better and for worse, ex-keyboard player (and occasional vocalist) for Italian obscure legends Arcansiel, Marco Galletti releases his third solo effort, bluntly titled Musical Objects in 2025, and does 99% of the job on his own, including guitars, bass and percussion, not to mention a collection of piano and synth tools. He also mentions that the only non-digital instruments on the record are the two Fenders: a Strat and a Jazz Bass.

It doesn't take more than a couple of listens to figure out that the artist is a classy composer plus a confident keyboard player, but leaving a lot to be desired in the vocal and guitar aspects, as aptly demonstrated in the opening L'Aria Chiara Come Non Esiste Piu'. The guitar tone is abominably ugly, the vocals fall far from being convincing, but the soothing string section in the opening part and the keyboard intricate post-ambient themes are equally satisfying.

Does it get any better? It does, to my ears from time to time. The succeeding As The Silence and La Lune est nee still suffer from unconfident (I am tempted to say “shy”) vocal performance and questionable percussion, but the main musical ideas shine brightly. This mixture of beauty and clumsiness and finding strange balance in being unbalanced has a lingering impression throughout the record.

The odd thing is that Musical Objects are equally distanced from both RPI traditional garish sound of PFM, Le Ormeor Barock Project, and from Italian ambient prog of NoSound, Stefano Panunzi and Fjieri. Some comparisons with Antony Kalugin's early, pre-Karfagen works would not be unjustified, albeit not in the same quality league yet, I am afraid.

La Primavera is another elegant piece of music, but plagued with very poor electronic drums arrangement, that takes attention away from the good aspects of the track. On the contrary, though the following Nouvelles histoires and Raining feature no less irritating percussion, both tracks manage to create exquisitely dreamy atmosphere, while La Floraisson delicately echoes ideas from the first tracks, and again is a composition to cherish.

I am not sure if it is my luck, or natural selection, but when thinking about Musical Objects I am reminded of earlier reviewed releases by Patrick Broguiere (see this one for instance). Both artists fall into a peculiar category “an obscure musician with an array of good musical ideas and negligence in regard to delivery”. Listening to the album is hence a radical departure from many well-arranged but hollow prog releases of the XXI century. It's up to you whether to pick it as a sample of healthy nutrition, served on disposable tableware, so to say.

Summary? This record has: a collection of beautiful musical ideas, poor vocals and even poorer percussion arrangements. This record doesn't have: big budgets, AI-generated cover art, breakdown riffs.

Inner Cabala — We Are Solitude

Calum Gibson

Out of the Netherlands come Inner Cabala, an international collection of musicians who found themselves together in Groningen and formed this group, crafting post-metal inspired by the likes of Mogwai and Leprous. Earlier this year they released their first single Perdition to build the anticipation for this, their first album, titled We Are Solitude.

The album is an ambitious one. Trying to breach a very competitive style, with some incredible talent as contemporaries is never going to be easy, especially for a debut album. And unfortunately, I don't feel this album is going to stand out by itself. But bear with me, not all is doom and gloom.

Nothing is bad here. The vocal harmonies work well, the occasional harsh scream is well-placed and adds a nice weight to the passage, the riffs are catchy, technical and feel like math-rock but played like prog, and the drums are certainly tight and intense throughout. As a whole, the group are talented musicians. Tracks like Feathers and The Remnant show their energetic side, with some dark and hard-hitting chord progressions, tremolos and aggression.

However, it does feel at times that the band knows how they want to sound, but maybe not how to naturally get there. Instead, forcing some ideas and passages together. This occasionally comes out sounding a bit disjointed, or a tribute to the genre. Unfortunately, this results in the album sounding a bit like the musical equivalent of a partially built jigsaw in the box with the other mixed pieces. It knows what to be and is part the way there – But not sure where to go next.

As I said, though, it isn't all doom and gloom. The record is catchy and has good moments, the band are tight and certainly proficient with their instruments. And it is a debut — a young band with their first release that is a solid effort, if a bit “safe” in the sound. It takes to find your own feet, and when your genre mates are groups like The Ocean, Haken, Ihsahn and Psychonaut among others. It will be a hard start.

But it also has a benefit. If fans of those bands mentioned need a new one to support and to see how they will grow, then Inner Cabala will be one to keep an eye on. I know I'll be interested to see what comes next.

Lightspeed — Delta

Jerry van Kooten

For a band that was founded in the 1970s, four albums is not a lot. But as with many bands, things happen along the way. Lightspeed was founded by Rod Chappell, after his departure from Zon. (You can see his name as co-writer on the title track of Zon's first album Astral Projector.) They took their first break in the late 1970s, reformed in the late 1980s to record a demo tape, then a CD, then another CD which was mostly a re-recording of the first cassette.

In 2004, the third wave of activity produced the album Waves. And suddenly we're another 20 years ahead to welcome Delta. The songs had been worked on for a while until co-founder Gene Murray passed away in 2018. Although Chappell stopped the project because of this, it was his daughter reminding him how much Murray loved the songs and they were worth finishing.

I agree with her.

To my pleasant surprise I read that Rod's former Zon colleague Howard Helm has joined the band on keyboards! I've always loved Helm's keyboard style, also on the 2017 album with the band Aldenfield.

From the information I got, it seems the band were a little worried on how to market the album. It's too progressive for AOR and too AOR for progressive rock. As a reviewing party we do not really care about marketing and we've seen the blending of genres for a few decades now, which might be the reason for the existance of progressive rock in the first place. What we do is tell the reader what they can expect so they can make up their mind if this could be something for them. So what is on offer here, what can you expect?

The description is not far off, though. A large portion of the album is in the overlap between prog and AOR, but moves into pure prog very often. I think that applies to the first two Zon albums as well, although Lightspeed and Zon are not the same.

Above And Beyond kicks in the door with high-energy, heavy melodic rock. Lush Hammond support, a flashy keyboard solo in the middle (courtesy of Oliver Wakeman, who plays on no less than five tracks) and flashy guitar solo at the end, Yes-like melodies in the vocals. The verses are more AOR in structure but a lot fuller and busier in arrangements than usual. The song sets the scene and tells you what to expect in terms of energy and musicality.

Constant Change has a great bluesy groove, and a sax solo that was is both unexpected and fitting. The AOR elements present themselves in the verses again, but the other elements are much more present. Sands Of Time is very proggy. Modern prog, that is. Different sections alternating, while a catchy chorus keeps it from going too far. I love the great long guitar solo!

In the more AOR section is Cast My Cares, but the twist is another long guitar solo followed by another sax solo. Different Light has a darker sound, which is lifted for a long and excellent keyboard solo and then guitar solo. The melodies are awesome!

Those are just a few examples showing what the overall feel of the album is. But there is another thing. Besides the technical prog bits, the underlying feeling is not forgotten, making it a warmer album than let's say your typical Styx. (Styx fans will find much to enjoy here!) It's proggier than any Perry-era Journey album, but again, Journey fans should definitely take a listen.

The booklet marks the tracklist with a "side 1" and "side 2". Not meant to be LP record sides, as two sides of 35 minutes would be way too much to secure some kind of quality, but it's clearly a way to group the tracks. Side 1, the first seven tracks, from Above And Beyond to Different Light, are played almost without breaks and form a real unit, with some themes repeated further on.

Closing track Wish You Well is dedicated to the memory of co-founder Gene "The Gweed" Murray, who passed away in 2018. An emotional track that builds up to a nice long guitar solo and a fitting slow fade-out. I do hope this is not a fade-out for the band.

Warm vocals overall by two great lead singers, Wilmer Waalbroek and John Persichini, alternating in taking a lead and supporting role. The whole is super-melodic, with great solos, catchy lines in full and diverse arrangements. I am certain a lot of readers are going to like this.

The band took great care of the product. The physical CD is shipped as a booklet, roughly 7 inches, and you can download a PDF of the booklet, containging all info and lyrics, from the band's website. When you buy the digital Bandcamp release, you also get the PDF in the download. This is a proper delivery of the goods!

So, if you're interested in labels, I would say way too prog for AOR and perhaps a little too AOR for pure prog. But I hope my words help you decide whether this is going to something for you and not the labels. I have a lot of prog friends who listen to a great deal of AOR, and it applies to me as well. This is for all those people! Definitely an album to check out for fans of Styx, Journey, Magnum, Zon of course, and yes, Aldenfield.

The Nudge Unit — The Nudge Unit

Edwin Roosjen

The Nudge Unit is a project led by Vito F. Mainolfi from Italy. Now I started the review for Sonnets From The Drowsiness by Pentesilea Road with almost the same sentence. I guess Vito needs more channels to express his music to the world. Again, Vito plays a lot of instruments on this album, beside vocals he plays guitar, bass and on the song North he plays keyboard.

For his project The Nudge Unit Vito is helped by a few musicians from the Netherlands, Hans Duynhoven (keyboard) and Mark Zonder (drums). Just like Vito's other project there is a guest musician with Jason Dykes (keyboard). The album Sonnets From The Drowsiness had a playing time of 104 minutes. Thankfully The Nudge Unit is about 60 minutes shorter which makes the album just over 41 minutes, a normal amount for an album in my opinion.

The Nudge Unit play progressive rock, and compared to Vito's other band Pentesilea Road it is a bit less metal-influenced and drives more towards hard rock. The start of the album can be classified as hard rock but when the keyboard melodies kick in it becomes more progressive. This album is filled with some very fine keyboard playing. What comes to mind as comparable bands when listening to The Nudge Unit are Siege Even, Subsignal and Blind Ego.

The Nudge Unit is a heavy rock album full of keyboard melodies. And that somehow sums it up rather nicely. At times, it touches the boundary of progressive metal, but it never becomes really heavy, really fast or over-complicated. The album contains four instrumental songs and four songs with vocals. From start to finish, this album is a very pleasant spin. The Nudge Unit is just one of those albums that you can put on and just instantly enjoy. If you are looking for new angles, then you will not find them on this album. The Nudge Unit provides proven techniques but without really sounding as yet another rock album. Simply classifying The Nudge Unit as a hard rock album is too easy, there is more than enough going on to keep things interesting from start to finish. Never a dull moment. People who like heavy prog should really give this album a try. The album keeps getting played a lot on my sound system.

Rocking Horse Music Club — The Last Pink Glow

Patrick McAfee

The Last Pink Glow is the fourth studio album from this collective of session musicians/songwriters who work at the Rocking Horse Studios in New Hampshire, USA. Amongst their previous releases is the exceptional 2019 tribute to original Genesis guitarist, Anthony Phillips, Which Way The Wind Blows. The band creates albums that are eclectic and adventurous. This new release, based on writer Jack Kerouac's work, continues that tradition.

A staple of their discography has been the involvement of prominent guest musicians. Joining them here is Genesis keyboardist, Tony Banks, who co-wrote and performs on the standout track, The Haunted Life. His input on the song is substantial, and it is wonderful to hear Banks perform a rock song after so many years of him focusing on classical recordings.

It is one of many highlights of this entertaining release. Musical diversity is key, and the tracks range from soft rock (It's The Small Things), rock (If We're Silent and We Listen), country-esque (The Ballad of Joe Martin), blues (Big City Small Town Blues), and the ELO like pop/prog of Restless Wanderers.

The band's more blatant prog chops are well on display throughout as well on moments such as, Haunted, Splitting Atoms and the excellent twelve-minute album closing title track. Though Rocking House Music Club doesn't necessarily consider themselves a prog band, the sheer musical diversity that they produce is indisputably progressive.

Both lyrically compelling and musically rewarding, The Last Pink Glow is another exceptional album from this talented band.