| ......................................THE BAND AND RECORD OF THE MONTH |
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| . | FEBRUARY 2009 |
| Comments:
I must confess I've always liked Progressive Rock bands from Italy. Their music is very sensitve, symphonic, melodic, mixed with a refined progressive rock instrumentation, including good lyrics. Delirium is one of these bands that delivers special form of Prog Rock sound, followed by atmospheric music, embellished with wonderful musical ideas. They play highly imaginative music, but without exaggerations, all instruments are assigned melodic and harmonic, but the main focus are on the amazing guitar solos, grandiose passages with layered symphonic keyboards, followed by beautiful flutes and touchs of a melodic sax, extraordinary and rich vocals, singing in Italian. The latest album "Il Nome Del Vento" delivers exactly how Delirium sounds, songs filled with melodies, songs full of fresh musical ideas, progressive songs, symphonic songs, jazz rock songs, melodic rock songs, an incredible collection of instrumental arrangments that are heady enough for any progressive rock afficionado, all the tracks are a delight. You must listen "Il Nome Del Vento", "Verso Il Naufragio", "L'acquario Delle Stelle", "Luci Lontane", "Profeta Senza Profezie", "Dopo Il Vento", "Cuore Sacro" and "L'aurora Boreale" and you will find a creative and musical texture that each song is so intergraded with each other that you will want to listen them many times. Brilliant, fantastic, and amazing work, highly recommendable... The
line-up on the band today are:
Special
Guests:
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DELIRIUM
Delirium came from Genova, from a previous beat band called "I Sagittari", and formed in 1970, releasing their first single a year later.
"Canto di Osanna", presented at first Viareggio pop festival was a successful single and gave the band an immediate notoriety. They had also won a Radio Montecarlo rock contest in 1971. First album, "Dolce Acqua", also from 1971 contains a good and original mix of prog, jazz and some tuneful melodies, the leading role of singer Ivano Fossati is evident, with his furious flute soloing being one of the band's most distinctive elements. The album, housed in a nice triple gatefold cover, is structured in various movements like a classical suite, but here and there some parts seem a little incoherent with the whole LP. It was not a great success, as demonstrated by the fact that no less than three tracks from it appeared on singles a year later. In February 1972 their memorable TV presence at Sanremo music festival gave them their best success ever with the hit single "Jesahel", soon followed by a similar song, Haum! Always during their career Delirium mixed the commercial side of their singles with the more difficult approach of their albums, and this is particularly evident in this first phase. Around mid-1972 Ivano Fossati suddenly had to leave the group for his military service, later to pursue a solo career that's still successful today, even with a lighter (but always full of jazzy and ethnic influences) kind of music. His replacement was englishman Martin Frederick Grice (from "Boomerang") who, along with the ever present flute, was also a brilliant sax player. Second album "Lo scemo e il villaggio" still has some jazz influences and a stronger use of sax by the new member Grice, with the evident lack of a role singer in the band, all members taking the lead singer role. The track "La mia pazzia" is the closest to first album's style. Third album follows in 1974, called "Delirium III" ("Viaggio negli arcipelaghi del tempo") and judged by many as their most mature work. "La battaglia degli eterni piani" contains a dark-inspired atmosphere never heard in their previous releases, the flute has again a prominent role and the sax is only present in "Viaggio n.2". This is also the first album to feature electric guitar, as Mimmo Di Martino only played the acoustic in previous albums. The band was at the end of their career, also due to the low interest shown by the media, and after some more commercial singles in 1974-75, the last of which with new singer/keyboardist Rino Dimopoli replacing Grice, they came to a split. Apart from Ivano Fossati the only other member to stay in the professional music field was keyboard player Ettore Vigo with rockers Kim & the Cadillacs. In early 90's, following a successful "Jesahel" disco remix, the band reunited with some CD's containing new versions of their best tracks, and still plays live today.  In 2009 the fourth studio album in the story of Delirium was released, "Il nome del vento", released with help from various guest musicians including their original guitarist Mimmo Di Martino, while the live line-up includes once again the multi-instrumentalist Rino Dimopoli. The album, including brand new compositions with the exception of excerpts from "Van Der Graaf Generator's Theme" one and "Dio del silenzio" from "Delirium III", is well played and a pleasant listen, being mainly based on not particularly heavy sounds. |
New
Release
"Il Nome Del Vento" 01)
Intro /Dio del
To get in contact or, If you would like any other information, please visit Delirium's friend via their Myspace site.
I´d
like to thanks Augusto Croce for the pictures and also Delirium´s
History taken from Italian
Progressive Rock Site.
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For
more information and every thing about the band, please visit DELIRIUM
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