Fungus: The Face Of Evil

You know a band has an undecipherable logo when they feel the need to also pop their name at the bottom of their latest CD in a nice plain text. Hence I can tell you that The Face Of Evil is by the Italian Progressive band Fungus and not Gulliut as I originally suspected. Anyway, I digress...

Formed in the early 00s, and releasing their debut effort in 2004, The Face Of Evil is now the third album from this outfit who, it would appear, know how to construct intricate songs that dart from idea to idea and mood to emotion, while still somehow not quite managing to fully hold the attention. The band themselves are all talented enough, with the guitar work from Alejandro J Blissett more than capable of making you turn round and take notice. However for too long he is content to strum out less inventive ideas and motifs. He also too often allows acoustic guitars to move into the limelight, adding to a lack of urgency and a propensity to sit in the ho-hum. The solos however are universally excellent, even if a few of his best efforts do come just as a song begins to fade out.......

The overall feel is of an obscure album that somehow slipped through a time-field, leaving the 60s and early 70s, only to land in the here and now, slightly dazzled, a little confused and decidedly less than comfortable with its surrounds. Every now and again a scream of vocals, clatter of drums, or a whoosh of keyboards arrives in your head, spinning you round and having you reconsidering your lack of interest but these moments, as in "Rain", don't last, shuffling out of the way all too quickly to make space for a far less exciting passage.

Nothing here is awful, in fact little really evokes enough of an emotion to really engage hugely positive or negative thoughts, instead leaving you zoning away from the sounds and surprised when the album concludes and you've forgotten to listen. There are some quirky moments and there are attempts to infuse less obvious straight ahead moments into "The Sun", or "The Key Of The Garden", but again a mid-paced safety zone is quickly sought out and taken cover in, leaving you wanting more of what was merely hinted at.

Not a bad album by any stretch of the imagination, but can I hand on heart tell you I'll ever be enticed back to sample its wares ever again? Well truth be told, I very much doubt it.

Track Listing
1. The Face Of Evil
2. Gentle Season
3. The great deceit
4. Rain
5. The Key Of The Garden
6. Share Your Suicide III
7. Angel With No Pain
8. Better Than Jesus
9. Requiem
10. The sun

Added: January 18th 2014
Reviewer: Steven Reid
Score:
Related Link: Fungus Online
Hits: 2257
Language: english

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