Skylark - Wings 3.5/5
Reviewed: 9-23-05
Tracklist:
1. Rainbow in the dark
2. Summer of 2001
3. Another reason to believe
4. Belzebu 2
5. Faded fantasy
6. Last ride
7. A stupid song
8. When love and hate collide
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After 3 excellent CDs that found the band starting to stagnate a little, ‘Wings’ finds Skylark sticking to their keyboard influenced classical metal, but changing the style just enough to sound fresh. This CD has a lighter, more relaxed feel to it with less atmospheric keyboards underneath the basic sound than on previous CDs. There are still lots of nice keyboard solos throughout but, despite changing record companies, the band still cannot get even an average production. As with the last few releases, the production isn’t nearly as bad as it was on the band’s first 2 CDs, but it still isn’t even close to the level of the music quality.
The 3 longest tracks are the ones which are most reminiscent of previous Skylark CDs. “Rainbow in the dark”, “Last ride” and “Belzebu 2” could all be on one of the previous CDs without sounding out of place. “Belzebu 2”, in particular, as it brings back the Belzebu character from the “Divine gates” trilogy. “A stupid song” is actually a very nice track, but Skylark should be above writing a song about a stupid song, it’s simply beneath them. “Summer of 2001” and “Another reason to believe” are the 2 tracks which give the CD a nice, relaxed, easy going feel. They are both very solid tracks, especially “Another reason to believe”.
'Wings' finds the band in somewhat of a transition.
Although this is a very good CD, it wasn’t overly well received by many. There is no doubt that it is a little different than there previous releases, although it does maintain many of the qualities, especially Eddy Antonini’s high quality songwriting and well conceived keyboard parts. It’s not as deep sounding as previous Skylark CDs and it is possible that Antonini spent less time on it as the good tracks aren’t quite as good as his best and there’s a couple more above average tracks than on other Skylark CDs, where there’s more top quality tracks. Those comparisons aside, this stands alone as a very good CD that isn’t the band’s best, but is still very good.
DAVID
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