Estradasphere
Palace Of Mirrors

Estradasphere: the name easily sticks in your head, the music doesn't.

I am convinced that there is nothing wrong with categorizing music into a genre, a movement, a period: it facilitates understanding, approach, and identification. A punk band can make punk music for those who tend to want to be punk. And this is fine for 92% of people.

On the other hand, those who do not want to categorize themselves, who unconditionally love alchemizing over the seven notes as an occupation, passion, and hobby, can make any kind of music. I'm not sure if the opposite is true. I can tell you that Estradasphere are a folkish violinist (Timb Harris), a metal drummer (Lee Smith), two keyboardists with a passion for electronics and video games (Kevin Kmetz, Adam Stacey), plus a tough guitar player (Jason Schimmel) and a bassist (Tim Smolens) who doesn't mind using his voice.

"Palace Of Mirrors" is the album of maturity, where these folks abandon the charming Super Mario remixes to focus on tracks like: "Colossal Risk", an unfathomable collage of jazzistic variations (with significant references to surf rock) on that "spy music" so popular in Bond's days (Bond, James Bond); "Those Who Know...", a progressive passage (with baton swap) from one voice to another, culminating in an epic/orchestral finale.

But we talked about Folk. After all, the (fragmented) soul of this group gathers around Slavic, Hungarian, and Romanian folk music. Evidently inspired by Bartók, these guys offer their very personal vision of Balkan ballads; played at high speed and with a decidedly very personal touch, this music manages to touch jazz fusion ("A Corporate Merger") and metal ("Smuggled Mutations"). Interesting, I would say. "Six Hands" is another standout track: a kind of syncopated ballet for six hands (indeed, six) on the piano. Not bad at all. Clean technique.

If throughout the work the references to classical music are not lacking, in the eponymous track, "Palace of Mirrors", our Estradasphere strive in a more direct way. The piece itself is decent, with great insights, and serves as a tribute to romantic music. However, the subsequent reprise is conceptually far more interesting, where the theme is dissected in a kind of cadenced tango, with changes of time and instrument (and genre, after all). A piece that demonstrates the scope and potential of this multifaceted sextet. 

Yet Estradasphere show they know how to break taboos with taste with the dreamy "The Debutante", where behind the piano-bar style lies mature and serious jazz. 

My assessment of this Transylvanian album and the band is very positive: these guys have created an album that musically offers an excellent use of instruments and electronics; they have managed to merge very diverse genres to personalize a sound that is already unique on its own.

And then... well... explain it to me: since when are Americans interested in Austro-Hungarians and European folk music?