Detailed Reviews [Daymoon - 2013 - "Fabric of Space Divine"]

Prolusion. The Portuguese project DAYMOON is the creative vehicle of composer and musician Fred Lessing. He started recording material under this moniker in the late 90's, and between 1998 and 2002 three albums were recorded, but never officially released. The first official production courtesy of Daymoon was the CD "All Tomorrows", while "Fabric of Space Divine" is the second album to be officially released under this name. Both of them are released through the Russian label MALS Records.

Analysis. "Fabric of Space Divine" is a production that has been a long time in the making. The working process of this concept album started all the way back in 2000 and was finalized in 2012. The majority of the material on this CD was actually made prior to the compositions that made up Daymoon's official debut album "All Tomorrows", if I've understood matters correctly. The hour or so of Daymoon's self-described transgressive rock is something of an uneven ride, at least to my ears. There are many thoughts and ideas packed into each and every minute here, and often I got the impression that the songs do suffer a bit from it, as does the continuity of the album as a whole. There's a lot of stuff going on, and the numerous alterations that is an ongoing feature does give the album experience something of a chaotic tendency. The music as such will by and large merit a description as symphonic progressive rock I guess. Symphonic and symphonic inspired keyboard textures are a recurring and fairly constant feature, at times with nods just as much in the direction of classical symphonic music as symphonic progressive rock. Occasional nods in the direction of jazz and fusion by way of the saxophone add a nice bit of further variety, and atmospheric guitar soloing in the style of David Gilmour, some darker toned textures and cosmic-tinged synth textures all adds a slight touch of Pink Floyd to the proceedings. More of a trademark feature on this album are aspects of folk music however. Pastoral flute and recorder motifs combined with acoustic guitar can be found aplenty, and especially early on folk and world music inspired rhythms add a distinct touch to the songs too, further enhanced by what appears to be subtle touches of African and Middle East inspired instrument details. There's also an instance of a reggae flavored song at hand, Ice Prospector, and unless I'm much mistaken the following piece Digital has a slight touch of ska incorporated into its oddly sounding nature. A great deal of variety in other words, ranging from the accessible to the fairly demanding in scope: hummable, intriguing and compelling on one hand to odd and off-kilter sounding on the other. To my ears, this is a CD of fleeting magical moments, a nice array of pleasant sounding constructions and the occasional moments of confusion and oddity.

Conclusion. "Fabric of Space Divine" is a production that should cater quite nicely to those who enjoy and prefer music with a distinct variety throughout. This is a disc that you will have to spend a fair deal of time with to decode and get familiar with; those who desire to buy an album with a desire to like it or not on an initial listen should most likely shy away from this one. A taste for symphonic progressive rock and world music inspired excursions are both probably needed to be able to truly fall in love with this CD, and a taste for late 70's Pink Floyd will probably be an advantage too.

OMB=Olav M Bjornsen: November 17, 2013
The Rating Room