Secret Oyster - Sea Son


Year of Release: 2006
Label: Lasers Edge
Catalog Number: LE1045
Format: CD
Total Time: 49:25:00

Ah... at last, famous Danish fusion/prog band Secret Oyster are out on CD. This particular album, Sea Son has always been a favourite of mine! All members come from other great Danish groups such as Hurdy Gurdy / Burnin?Red Ivanhoe, making this a sort of supergroup. Guitar player Claus Bohling is at his peak here, with fierce, blistering solos. Just listen to the fantastic tour de force on "Mind Movie" (9:16 min.) starting off with a slow, beautiful keyboard theme, then Claus glides smoothly in and builds up a superb guitar solo; it just grows and grows until a thundering, frantic crescendo of towering proportions [ensues], with the wonderful wah-pedal put to the ultimate test! GREAT STUFF! Backed by the ever excellent Kenneth Knudsen on keys & Moog, Karsten Vogel on saxes & organ, Jess St?hr on bass and Ole Steenberg on drums & percussion. Next up, is the fine and mellow (intro- wise) "Pajamamafia" with a change of character, musically that is, approximately 2 minutes after that start, with some nice (Fender Rhodes?) keyboard, and saxes ditto, finally fading out ... and in, shortly again.

Next up are: "Black Mist," very reminiscent of Burnin' Red Ivanhoe (not surprisingly), as Vogel and St?hr were members of said band! "Painforest" (track #5) is a beautiful, almost movie like theme, with fine playing from all concerned! "Paella" is a fusion track with all the trimmings that genre is recognized for; plenty of saxes electrically devised and Moog excursions twisting in and out of the basic theme. Last but not least, the famous Danish Jazz musician trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg lends a "hand" on this fine track!

So ends the original album; but hey, there are bonus tracks! And oddly enough, the first bonus track is titled "Sea Son," an up tempo tune, with duelling keys and guitar to the fore. The 2 final bonus tracks are one tune, divided into ... ahem? two! "Alfresco Part I And II," the first part being a tight theme with brilliant sax playing from Vogel, [where] Knudsen's keys roars and finally Bohling throws in some guitar soloing! Second part has Bohling showing off on guitar synthesizer. A nice little outro!

So what do they sound like, Secret Oyster? Well, mostly I'd like to think they sound like Secret Oyster. But there are also hints of Soft Machine & Mahavishnu Orchestra.

So this fine Danish outing from 1975 has finally seen the light of day, and well deservedly so. As you've gathered, it is instrumental music and period-wise also somewhat improvisation filled, but in my book that's a fine thing!

Why not try out a Danish prog band, this ones comes from the right season (get it?)


Tracklisting:
Oysterjungle (3:01) / Mind Movie (9:16) / Pajamamafia (6:12) / Black Mist (3:41) / Painforest (5:32) / Paella (8:27) / Bonus tracks: Sea Son (5:25)/ Alfresco, Part I (5:39) / Alfresco, Part II (2:07)

Musicians:
Claus Bohling - guitars
Karsten Vogel - sax & keys
Kenneth Knudsen - keys & Moog
Jess St?hr - bass
Ole Steenberg - drums & percussion

Guests:

Palle Mikkelborg - trumpet
Finn Ziegler - violin
Kasper Winding - congas

Discography:
Secret Oyster (1974)
Sea Son (1975/2006)
Vidunderlige K?lling (1976)
Straight To The Krankenhaus (1977)

Genre: Progressive Rock

Origin DK

Added: December 26th 2006
Reviewer: Tonny Larsen
Score:
Hits: 3338
Language: english

  

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