Aisles
Hawaii

Americans, like Aisles latest offering Hawaii. It is a Chilean sextet with a fourteen year long history that are now releasing their fourth album, a double disk story that centres around a concept of humans in space colonies at a time when Earth has been destroyed (most likely it collapsed under the immense weight of human stupidity). Cool artwork, and even cooler concept combining progressive rock with sci-fi, I enjoy both those things – but what about those things combined?

The first thing I notice is that you will not be aware of the conceptual side of the album if you don’t listen for it – the story is told in a way that flows really well and those who don’t care about the concept can just enjoy the musical creation for what it is. It is progressive rock, melodic, varied, with hints of jazz, psychedelic stuff and many other things. Excellent production, the soundscape is really strong and interesting and paints a story about the difficulty and challenges of living in a small colony with no support from a main planet, life in space can be a challenge. Not a space adventure, to my ear but I have not really listened to the words just the music so I could be wrong, but that is the beauty of it, it is open for interpretation. Good vocalist is another thought I have when I listen to this album that flows of over two disks with five tracks on the first and seven on the second and with a total playing time of just over eighty minutes. Thanks to depth and variation the playing time seems quite a bit shorter than that.

I think this is a great album, it has much depth and variation with great songs and production – it is what progressive rock music usually is about. Personal, pretty fresh music that has a novel feel to it, I think it is great and when the press sheet says it is probably South Americas most successful progressive rock band I can agree with that as they are right up there when it comes to making successful music. Sure it can require some time to get into this album as it has many dimensions and angles and can feel a bit thick at first glance but it is an album that grows on the listener and after another spin it opens up to you and you start seeing what is so good about it. It is an album you will not be bored with immediately, and it is one that can be played over and over again – and also an album I think has a rather universal appeal, I think it will appeal to most of you if you give it a chance. Definitely my favourite South American album of the year so far.

Twelve tracks are to be found on this album and all of them are good, really good and picking a favourite isn’t very easy. I think though that the opening track The Poet Part I: Dusk is one candidate, it opens the album in a great way and is a wonderful track. I also like the melodic intricacies of the track called Club Hawaii and these two mentioned tracks can be described as something of a highlight of this great album, an album that I can warmly recommend to anyone who likes good music and especially those of you who likes it more progressive.

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