Quantum Fantay - Kaleidothrope

(CD 2009, CD 56:59, DVD 130:00 Shiver Records SHR 513)

The tracks:
  1- The Spirit(07:12)
  2- Cube(05:48)
  3- Zwar Tysch Apy(09:10)
  4- Into The Deep(05:33)
  5- Temleh(03:49)
  6- Frou Frou(07:16)
  7- Moving Circles(04:22)
  8- Kaleidothrope(08:03)
  9- Telepathy(05:42)

Quantum Fantay Website        samples       


Being a progressive rock band, you certainly must have qualities to perform on well-known festivals as NEARfest, Burg Herzberg or Symforce. The Belgium band Quantum Fantay (QF) performed on all those festivals and indeed, they do have quality. The band already proved that on two previously released studio albums and a live double CD. You can describe the music of QF as a mixture of prog and space rock. The music resembles bands as Hawkwind, Ozric Tentacles, Tangerine Dream and Steve Hillage.

On their third studio album Kaleidothrope, you can hear that the band members grew music wise, but has not yet reached their musical boundaries. The line-up hasn’t changed the last couple of years and intensive touring made them a very professional group. Listen to their live album From Herzberg To Living Room. It is the best way to emphasize my statement. On this album, you will find two brand-new pieces at that time. They recorded both tracks as a studio version for Kaleidothrope at Pete’s Mushroomland studio.

Both the title track and the album opener The Spirit has all the elements a good prog track needs. The latter starts with an up-tempo beat while the instruments do all the talking. You never miss any vocals in the instrumental music of Pete Mush (synthesizers), Charles Sla (flute), Dario Frodo (electric guitar) and Jaro (bass). The musicians don’t have any problem to change a fast beat into a very mellow piece and vice versa. However, what struck me most on this track and actually throughout the album is the excellent drumming. Without doubt, Gino Bartolini belongs to one of the best Belgian drummers. However, all musicians deserve a big compliment for their achievement on this third studio effort. I think, QF made with Kaleidothrope their best album so far. The extra bonus DVD is another good reason for buying this excellent disc. On Tales Of The Old Fishing Mine, you can watch a one and a half hour concert filmed during a festival held at Pete’s hometown Lokeren. You can see that QF is a real live band. Besides the performance in Belgium, this DVD also features ten minutes of material filmed at Pete’s own recording studio. We see the individual musicians while recording a part for the new album. They probably took the same camera to shoot some scenes on and off stage during their short European tour. A documentary takes you Germany, Poland and The Netherlands. They even filmed your humble reviewer for a couple of seconds just before they went on stage at the Blues Café in Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. The same documentary makes clear that all the QF-members are friends who make a lot of fun together. In the near future we surely can enjoy more wonderful releases of our Belgian friends.

**** Henri Strik (edited by Peter Willemsen)

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