(Progressive rock) VA - The Spaghetti Epic 3 - The Great Silence - 2009, FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

The art of creating symphonic art rock compositions of epic length is a demanding task for any artists, whether they are highly experienced or not. It takes a great deal of effort and planning in managing to construct a musical piece that will hold the listener's attention for more than 10 minutes, and especially when crossing the 15 minute mark it takes a lot of skill and talent to make it work perfectly. When you have additional parameters to consider as well, in this case a particular topic and a specific stylistic expression as boundaries, most if not all artists faced with this task will face a pretty daunting challenge. First one out on this production is the Russian act Little Tragedies. For the last 15 years they have made a total of 11 albums exploring a sound pretty much in the same vein as requested for this album, and as such one might think that they had a few natural advantages in regards to the task at hand. Even so, their composition is a magnificent creation, probably the best contribution I've encountered so far on any of these joint collaborations initiated by Colossus. Layers of keyboards and organs underscored by skilled guitar textures and inventive rhythms captivate, enthrall and hypnotize in the close to 20 minutes long track; energetic passages and majestic climaxes blended perfectly with elegant atmospheric sequences in a fluctuating yet coherent and consistent venture. Several themes and passages are revisited throughout, but continuity is also created in a somewhat more subtle manner with certain specific sounds and instrumental flourishes repeated. The Hungarian band Yesterdays became something of a letdown after this fantastic opening. Their take on the task at hand is slightly more folk-tinged and on the only album I've heard from this act they are capable of producing some really enthralling moods, at times coming close to sheer sonic beauty – if such an expression can be said to be understandable. Some neat jazz-tinged passages and intriguing layered, Gentle Giant-style vocals are other features on this effort and vintage fluctuating synthesizer layers are a distinctive feature in many parts, but ultimately Yesterdays' contribution ends up as a bit too much of a patchwork as I experienced it – many of the passages excellent individually but not coherent nor consistent enough assembled in one composition. Italian act Not was the only unfamiliar name for me on this album and its contribution made me want to get to know them more from a musical point of view. Epilogo is a hard-hitting excursion dominated by guitars and a distinct, highly distorted bass. Keys and organs add majestic textures to their distinctly heavy approach to the task at hand. In many ways this act reminds me of other Italian symphonic outfits I've gotten to know about in recent years, blending elements from jazz and hard rock in a driving, energetic and hard hitting variety of symphonic-oriented art rock. The guitar sound is vintage, though, and never approaches metal territories – indeed of the three acts contributing to this release NOT is arguably the one with the most vintage-sounding effort.

Exact Audio Copy V0.99 prebeta 3 from 28. July 2007
EAC extraction logfile from 5. March 2009, 13:39
The Spaghetti Epic 3 / The Great Silence
Used drive : _NEC DVD_RW ND-3500AG Adapter: 0 ID: 0
Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No
Read offset correction : 48
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Gap handling : Appended to previous track
Used output format : Internal WAV Routines
Sample format : 44.100 Hz; 16 Bit; Stereo
TOC of the extracted CD
Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
---------------------------------------------------------
1 | 0:00.00 | 19:10.00 | 0 | 86249
2 | 19:10.00 | 20:04.00 | 86250 | 176549
3 | 39:14.00 | 23:25.00 | 176550 | 281924
Track 1
Filename E:\EAC_Extractions\The Spaghetti Epic 3 - The Great Silence\01 - Little Tragedies - The Voice of Silence.wav
Pre-gap length 0:00:02.00
Peak level 96.6 %
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 1F65C86B
Copy CRC 1F65C86B
Track not present in AccurateRip database
Copy OK
Track 2
Filename E:\EAC_Extractions\The Spaghetti Epic 3 - The Great Silence\02 - Yesterdays - Pauline.wav
Pre-gap length 0:00:01.89
Peak level 96.6 %
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 7489C31B
Copy CRC 7489C31B
Track not present in AccurateRip database
Copy OK
Track 3
Filename E:\EAC_Extractions\The Spaghetti Epic 3 - The Great Silence\03 - N.O.T. - Epilogo.wav
Pre-gap length 0:00:04.97
Peak level 96.6 %
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 00238786
Copy CRC 00238786
Track not present in AccurateRip database
Copy OK
None of the tracks are present in the AccurateRip database
No errors occurred
End of status report