Artist: Zembus
Title: Squaring the Circle
Type: Album
Label: self-released

This album is described as the “sum of the band’s experiences”. For sure I sensed that Zembus, who come from Italy, were giving it their all throughout this album, which for the most part amounts to a collection of earnest and 70s style Progressive Rock/Metal. Amongst their influences, the band quote Rush, Dream Theater, Iron Maiden, Metallica and Queensryche but it’s Rush I would compare them to most in terms of vocal and keyboard style and song structure.

I think the right word to describe a Zembus track is kaleidoscopic. Tracks never finish where they started and each journey takes us through several phases. It’s not always impressive though. On the first track “s.o.t.c”, the 70s style synthesiser, in this case reminiscent of Rick Wakeman, mix with some pretty awful hippie vocals amid a strange concoction of noises. The beauty of the way this track progresses is that it’s never going to stay like this and in the end the emotional pitch gets stronger and the vocal line is endearing – the squaring of the circle, indeed. “The Storm” sounds shambolic to begin with but once again develops into a good strong track. The singer is in full control, and the guitar sections are heavy and funky. The EuroProg clap-a-long section, maybe to get us into the feel of a live performance, doesn’t make any impact and is bizarre. We move on to “One Thousand and One Nights”, which as the title suggests, is full of Eastern promise, but here mixed with strong doses of Prog and heaviness – the two don’t really meet. Then there’s an electric guitar solo straight off a Manfred Mann’s Earth Band album of your choice and a mellow part, but in spite of the disparate qualities and relative lack of any mix, it’s still as rich as a fruit cake. “Proclaiming” is pure Metallica, powerful as a track and with plenty of motion. Its energy and power are mirrored on “Cry”, a piece of EuroProg but nailed to the ground by the singer whose wobbly beginning has now been replaced by a voice of authority. The funky drum and guitar sections made this track the highlight of this album for me. Each track has its own identity and I appreciated that but other than “Cry”, none of them seemed to get everything right, especially on the vocal front. “Perfect Time” was far from perfect in the vocal department but picked up thanks to some urgent guitar work. By complete contrast, “Snow” had a classical feel to it with the rolling piano which created the ideal setting for a sensitive track, however it was once again spoilt by off-key singing. Sadly, after a classic rock-orientated beginning and the dreamy if clichéd 70s style keys at the end I can’t think of anything good to say about the final track “Transposing a Moment (While Sleeping)”, which was a dreary wailing piece of emotion with no apparent direction.

I’ve listened to this album several times and it has grown on me, however even now I find that when I listen to it as a whole, it’s a disorientating and at times painful experience. There are parts that I really liked and parts that are awful, and that’s on the same track. This is a band who would really benefit from creating a concept album and then concentrating on musical and vocal quality rather than the myriad of ideas which make “Squaring the Circle” so fragmented. I could listen to Zembus if they got it right, but I don’t think they have succeeded here.

http://www.myspace.com/zembus
http://www.zembus.it

Andrew Doherty

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