Member:
JLucky
Date:
5/8/2006
It is amazing to me how many CD’s are released these days that fall into what I would classify as HEAVY-Symphonic. Not really Prog-metal by any stretch of the imagination these recordings do have the heavy guitars and drums but there is so much more happening musically that qualifies them for a broader description. Take for example The Floating World by Project Creation. This concept is the work of multi-instrumentalist Hugo Flores. As a touchstone reference point think Aryeon. Now to be honest, some of the work in this field fails to live up to expectations, whatever they may be. But then others seem to have the magic. And to my ears Project Creation definitely has the magic.
This concept, about a planet being created and repopulated has so much going for it, heavy at times, yes, but then all at once majestic and panoramic and then spacey and ambient at others. Each musical feel propels the story along. This is one of those epic discs you put on and it engages the theatre of the mind so dramatically that you can’t help but visualize the images. The Floating World features Flores on everything from vocals to guitars to keyboards to sitars and he is ably assisted by Paulo Chagas (sax, flute), Nuno Silva (cello, bass), Vasco Patricio (guitar solos) and Linx and Alda Reis (vocals). Musical styles drift from folky-ethnic to bombastic all the while nicely balanced with male and female vocal contributions. Balancing out the more aggressive guitar moments are plenty of soft flute or saxophone passages. Clocking in at just over 70-minutes there are 14 tracks here, four of which are just over seven-minutes in length. But as you might expect, this being a concept work, so many of the tracks are all linked together making it an almost seamless experience.
Call it heavy-symphonic, a rock-opera or even epic-metal. Whatever you call it, it sounds great over and over again because there is simply so much going on. Kudos to Flores for finding that delicate balance between “overly aggressive” and “mentally stimulating”. The Floating World from Project Creation is a really engaging musical concept incorporating elements of ancient Egypt that I find most enjoyable.
Member:
Windhawk
(Profile)
(All Album Reviews by Windhawk)
Date:
5/25/2007
Format:
CD (Album)
(originally written for www.prog4you.com)
Hugo Flores is a Portuguese multi-instrumentalist, and Project Creation is a new project he has put together; where he has planned releasing a total of 3 albums to tell an epic science fiction tale. Floating World is the first of these 3 albums. There are also plans to use the story for a CGI-animation; where the music from these albums probably will make up the soundtrack
Musically some tracks are guitar driven, while others have the synth as the major instrument. The synth is the central instrument on this release though, even the guitar driven tracks seems to be built up around the synth and keyboard sounds. Flores explores a universe not too far away from another project group - namely Ayreon. Lots of slick metal is being offered, with synths used effectively to fill out the soundscape, and other instruments are used to create moods and effects. Resulting in epic, grandiose soundscapes.
What singles Flores’ project out is that he manages to create striking atmospheric moods, where the instruments feel warm, alive and organic. Flores also seems to enjoy creating floating spacey atmospheres, where the rich organic feel to the instruments creates warm and welcoming ambient soundscapes throughout the album. There are also a few songs here where the guitar is sparingly used or not used at all; where the ambient and spacey soundscapes are the central aspect of the song.
But when that is said; this release is nowhere near the overall quality of Arjen Lucassen's different projects. Listening to this release, I noted down several tendencies that kept reoccurring; that I felt were overall negative.
A lot of the tracks, especially the longer ones, seem to go from one part to the other without too much structure or coherence to the overall song. I got the feeling that the songs in question were patchworks of several parts, more or less glued together by the use of ambient breaks; without much thought to the overall feel and mood of the song.
The soundscapes, especially on the first half of the album, are too noisy. When more than two instruments are given major roles in any given soundscape, it takes a lot of skill to make the different instruments fill out and enhance the moods instead of creating sonic havoc. And Flores seems to have a developing potential there. Several parts of songs could have been much better if he had chosen a "less is more" philosophy.
On the harder metal dominated tracks, the male vocalist really seems to struggle. In my ears, the vocal sounded off key as well as off melody in several places. The male vocals overall is a drawback on this release; on most of the songs they just doesn't sound right.
Lastly, the lyrics should perhaps be taken a look at. As I don't have English as my first language myself; I rarely comment the lyrical output on albums I review. But in this case, I cringed on several occasions.
All in all, this isn't a very good album in my point of view. But it does have a lot of promising elements; all the songs have interesting ideas, most of the songs have parts worth listening to and there are quite a few good tracks here as well.
Best tracks: "The Floating World", "Intervening", "Cheops".
Rating: 59/100
Reviewer: Olav Björnsen
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