Band : Siena Root
Album Title : Different Realities
Label : Transubstans
Distributor : Clearspot
Release Date : September 2009
Review : CD

You need a scorecard to keep track of this band's ever-changing lineup. Different Realities features yet another change in vocalist. It's mostly instrumental, but we do get vocals from a girl that sounds like she's channeling some high tones of Anneke Van Giersbergen. This time we have Janet Jones Simmonds and she deliver the goods for sure, though I prefer the warm bluesy voice of Sanya. After being lucky enough to see the band perform most of this album live at Yellowstock 2009, I have to admit that I was highly excited in the studio album. The album is split into two very distinctive sides “We” (25.33) and “The road to Agartha” (25.27) subdivided in 10 shorter tracks. After listening to the disc a few times, I kept finding myself wanting to hear it again.

The melodies on “We” are memorable, and the band has a good sense of the groove during their first  jam session, pointing to a strong Captain Beyond/Uriah Heep/Rush background. The music of the second suite is a slightly improved continuation of the style of “Reverberations “ from the album Kaleidoscope. The composition as a whole is not completely convincing, too folky and maybe too long for me, but the track has a pretty good energetic section with some wild drumming and nice guitar-organ clashes at the end. Most of the tracks of the second suite manage to work themselves into a whirling dervish-like frenzy. and evoke the same sense of awe as if belly dancing into In-a-gadda-da-vida in the mythical paradise Agartha. Very catchy and tons of diverse instrumentation to keep things very, very interesting: darbuka, sitar, tsouras, duf, qaraqab, flute, gong, tambourine, electric & acoustic hurdy gurdy, bells gong, sitar, organ, rhodes, synthesizers, tzouras,… There is some great, tight and loose playing, with enough exotic instruments, abound in the whole of the second jam session “The road to Agartha” and “In the desert”, a short segment of “We”, as well as heavy and moody atmospherics.

The way in which the songs are put together, the flow of the album from passage to passage, from song to song, is rather breathtaking and quite rewarding to the listener, well worth recommending.

95/100

Cosmicmasseur.