Elsie

The little available information I have on Elsie – taken from their rather sparse website – tells me that this Polish band originally formed way back in 1988, but following little success went on hiatus in 1995 before deciding to give it another go as an instrumental unit in 2005. Apart from an appearance on a compilation many years ago, this EP is their first release. A long time to wait for 26-odd minutes of material!
Obviously however its not the quantity but the quality that’s important, and on that score this EP is somewhat hit and miss. If me describing the content of the EP as (predominantly) guitar-led progressive rock instrumentals brings to mind Camel, then you’re certainly in the right ball park, although guitarist Zbigniew Slatata obviously numbers amongst his influences, in addition to Andy Latimer, the likes of Yngwie J Malmsteen, as there’s plenty of neo-classical style shredding going on – thankfully its relatively reined in for the most part. Slatata also moves the music into a heavier vein on occasions by introducing some crunchy riffs to proceedings – these are OK in and of themselves, but often seem to jar, especially when they come in to the song from nowhere.
Jacek Fajfer’s keyboard work often takes a back seat to the guitar, but in periods where it dominates, the quality ranges from cheesy, stuck-in-the-eighties efforts such as on the opening Horn and Laguna to the tasteful Hammond organ found on Surfing.
Composition-wise, it’s also hit and miss – many of the pieces have some good melodic parts, and the instrumental work is often decent, but the songs often seem to have a cut and paste feel to them, with different sections not gelling well together, and the longer tracks seem to drag after a while. A fairly rough and ready production and an uneven sound in places (the snare on Surfing sounds like someone hitting a saucepan lid very loudly, and drowns out the other instrumentation) also serves to lessen the impact of the music.
I don’t want to be too hard on Elsie, as there are some good ideas and strong melodies here and there, but taken overall this isn’t an album I’ll be revisiting often, and I can’t see this effort really getting the band much of a wider audience in an overcrowded marketplace.
We have just published new album!
We invite each interested in our music to buy this record.
Please, place the order in our e-mail:elsierock@tlen.pl
We are preparing brand new material for next album. You will find there solid dose of illustrative progressive rock.
Adress URL by
My Space:www.myspace.com/elsiepl
You can listen us in:
www.moonrock.nl
www.progrockradio.com
www.elsie.com.pl/