Post by cozyal on Aug 26, 2009 14:37:45 GMT -5
Into The Presence CD Review
The brainchild project of one Luis Carlos Maldonado & Tim Alexander both great talents in their own rights. Maldonado stepping into the lead guitar player role in many name band’s on the road.
Tim Alexandra has made his own mark with A Perfect Circle & Primus to name just two.
The music is a very mixed bag of all kinds of influences showing through, rawness of Zeppelin, hints of Queen, yet all done with a new, raw, dare I say funky & edgy sound.
Opening with End Game … Interesting stuff, very atmospheric stuff & sure, Luis voice is very similar to perhaps a few other singers that come to mind. Freddie Mercury, Billy Squier & perhaps even Lennie Wolf (Kingdom Come.).
Second track Lovers is way more Queen like in general, very strong powerful track, still edgy with some hook, which keeps it more interesting. It’s funny, already just into the second track & it’s like you’d maybe expect it to take some other direction in the song, but no. Both song structures so far keep their own identities.
The Garden is next, a little sub-reggae in the verses & perhaps more alternative than the other 2 tracks.
Into Broken Words & it does seem to be a little edgy in type of genre, not grunge, not really AOR, not classic rock, not metal, it’s almost like they have a blend of alternative prog, is there such a thing? Perhaps hints of a little Green Day here, but more inventive than that to be honest. A strong chorus & sweet guitar solo.
Each song seems to have so much variety in their structure on offer.
Phone Call is next & I guess the thing that surprises me is that Luis is a phenomenal guitar player as I saw when he played with John Waite’s live band, but he’s certainly not overly flash so far on this release. Nice solo here though & in the chorus the pace picks up some from the mid-paced verses.
You & I perhaps the most pop rock – if anything here can be considered that way! – type track so far here. Very interesting again & I guess as they’re trying to stick to a prog type sound, they weren’t looking for out & out commerciality. That said these days there seems to be so much variety available out there, maybe this will work.
The solo in next track Radio kind of reminds me of something Brian Robertson would conjure up, back in his Lizzy days. Kind of melancholy compared to the heaviness of the track. Another progressively interesting track & Maldonado seems to have so much variety with the guitar tones throughout the album.
When My Only Crime started I was thinking, this sounds like it could be something Sting might do. It’s acoustically structured, with some prominent cello & acoustic guitar picking in a jazz club type setting, before an electric lead solo is presented. Nice.
Dear Father starts acoustically too, before building into a different beast altogether. Then it builds & power chords kick in & strong chorus takes a hold of things, before getting back into the more subtle acoustic driven verse.
An awesome killer, widdly, widdly solo kicks in before getting back to the chorus again. Great!
It’s probably my favorite song on the album, with Lovers a close second.
After a laid back intro Coming Home then becomes an offbeat affair that altogether throws you, before then growing into an immensely heavily involved track. Loads going on, before then taking things down again & then wallop!
Right in your face again! Very good closing track
Is this an instant album or a grower? Well, it has a lot of prog type vibe to it, but then an edgy alternative yet rocky sound too. It’s a grower for me & it took a number of plays to really feel the vibe of each song.
The sound & songs that these 2 talented guys have achieved is quite something, no doubting that but personally it’s not really grabbing me as I’d maybe hoped. A promising debut nonetheless though.
Check them out on MySpace.com: www.myspace.com/IntoThePresence
3.5 / 5 for me on this one.
Alun “Cozy Al” Williams
