The Master and the Monkey (Pt I)
Ambient textures lead this off, and as it climbs it feels a bit like Pink Floyd, but there are also hints of Hawkwind and Kraftwerk. Then, around the thirty second mark, a searing guitar line brings in some fusion sounds. There’s a dramatic building in the under layers as that continues. It rises up gradually and the guitar almost turns to metal as this works onward. Then, a bit before the two minute mark, acoustic elements begin to dominate. The guitar work gets quite intricate as it continues. Then it turns out to a Latin sounding movement. As it works through from there it becomes more classical meets progressive rock in nature. Then it shifts to a keyboard dominated, mellower section. From there a dramatic progressive rock movement takes it in new directions. They turn it towards a rather soaring sound from there. Some vocals appear, but nearly buried in the mix, more as another instrument. Those vocals become more prominent after a time and there’s some crunchy guitar introduced later. In a lot of ways this segment calls to mind the Space Bandits era of Hawkwind. |