Baraka- VII
(Musea MP3069)
From Aural Innovations #39 (May 2008)
This is the 7th record by this Japanese progressive jazz fusion group led
by guitarist Issei Takama. The band celebrated it’s 10th anniversary last
year. The opening track, M75, is a short spacey piece (guitar synth). Bharmad
is a 6 piece 20 minute monster of a prog rock instrumental musical work out.
King Crimson is an obvious comparison. It then evolves into a cool piece with
great melodic guitar playing and some spacey guitar synth in the background.
Reminds me a bit of RUSH sometimes as well. At about 13 mins it really changes
and goes in another direction and gets quite spacey before the heavy Crimson
stuff returns. Very cool guitar at 17 minutes… Great track. Stella Maris
is a very laid back piece with some nice wah guitar. I could do without the
kind of new agey guitar synth stuff that appears here and there. Phantom starts
with a very dark bass and then really starts rocking and Issei plays some really
cool guitar. 2M78 is a more jazzy piece but I really love the multilayers of
guitars and stuff going on in this track. Sand and Stone are next and a more
hard rock track. Reminds me a bit of Van Wilks. Great guitar solo at the end.
Antares is another more laid back and spacey track. The CD ends with Wormhole
and is another heavy Crimson inspired track. One theme that runs through the
tracks is that they very often start with a theme and then disappear into some
space and come back to it again over and over, leaving the musicians a lot of
space to be inventive. Cool band…
Check out the record label web site at: http://www.musearecords.com
Visit the band web site at: http://www.barakarock.com
Reviewed by Scott Heller