Band: Echoes

CD Title: “Nature/Existence”

Label: ProgRock Records

Label Website: www.progrockrecords.com

Release Date: 2010

Fans of Ayreon, Project Creation and Jupiter Society should pay particular attention to Echoes for one reason in particular and that is I think you’ll really like what you hear. It wouldn’t be an overstatement to suggest that this is a CD with something for a wide variety of musical tastes, everything from prog-metal to symphonic. Hailing out of Venezuela Echoes is made up of Javier Landaeta (guitars), Antonio Silva (guitars), Rafael Sequera (guitars), Alfredo Ovalles (keyboards, percussion, slide guitar), Miguel Angel Moline (drums), Jorge Rojas (bass) and Dave Dufuss (sax). Vocals are handled by Carl Webb, Nick Storr, Tobias Jansson and Pedro Castillo. Now if you happened to notice that the first three musicians were guitarists and your thinking there’s probably a lot of guitar on this record, you’d be correct. Hey, even the keyboard player plays guitar. But that’s not to say this is just a shred fest…far from it.

This is the band’s first CD and the music on Nature/Existence is dramatic, panoramic and yes at times even a bit bombastic with the emphasis on heavy guitar. But like the sonic references mentioned there’s a lot more going on musically here than you might expect. There are a total of 12 tracks and while none of them is overly long some are joined and segue from one to the next, creating the impression of longer material. The music is at times very guitar centric, but the keyboard orchestrated symphonics play a vital role in fleshing out the dramatic sound. It’s big…at times huge with the requisite crunchy guitar and yet it never gets to point of overkill. It’s all about putting the accent on the right point and Echoes seem to have it figured out. They create huge dramatic sonic landscapes and still provide plenty of moments for the composition to breathe and transition from one mood to the next.

The music created by Echoes on Nature/Existence is very captivating; it’s epic-scale, even cinematic. As I said at the outset, if you happen to be a fan of the music created by the bands mentioned or if you enjoy heavy symphonic progressive rock, there is no question you’ll enjoy this record.