NAUTILUS - 20,000 MILES UNDER THE SEA – 1978 (SWISS) heavy progressive

The album starts with the title track and it’s a wonderful slap in the face, they hit the listener with all the band has, strong bass riffs close to Gary Thain during the “Uriah Heep” golden era, vocals very close to Deep Purple and an excellent organ by Ralph Stucki sounding as a blend of Farfisa (that send you back to a point in the late 60’s as a melting of The Doors and Grand Funk Railroad) but other times sounds as Hammond in the vein of Ken Hensley meets Jürgen Fritz, great aggressive and strong opener.

“Sleeping in the Wind” has a more acoustic approach, the guitar Christian Bauer stars soft ad mo0ody blending with the spacey keyboards in the vein of early/mid Pink Floyd, but then Bauer takes a harder edge and Ralf Stucki follows the style of Triumvirat during the Illusions on a Double Dimple - Spartacus era, less cohesive than the previous but not for that reason less impressive, again good quality material but less aggression.

“Like a Bird” Starts semi acoustic again with a very pleasant mood a bit dreamy and very atmospheric, the vocals are recorded in a second plane with the backings taking the lead in some moments, the keyboards are clearly like in most British Psychedelia, strangely in this track the bass is less impressive than in the first two but again another very beautiful song and great melody.

“Deep Inside Me” tell us that the Uriah Heep influence is back, the classical Hensley sound and mystery is recreated from the start and the effect is boosted when an elaborate guitar mixing metal oriented flashes with Mick Box’s typical distortion, the lead voice of Dieter Ruf is not very close to David Byron, but the choral work by Stucki and Bauer reminds me of Look at Yourself or Demons and Wizards but then the piano changes the mood to some German Symphonic style combined with a touch of Hard Rock, along the opening track, the strongest up to this point.

“Lady” is another song inspired in Heep the keyboards are less dark but much faster getting closer to Deep Purple, very melodic and coherent, the only problem is the choral work that is the weakest at this point, sounding even out of key by instants and the keyboards seem to loose the road sounding again like Jürgen Fritz in Pompeii but this time with an out of place guitar work a bit flat, the weakest track of the album but still not bad.

“Lost in Time” is a longer track that starts like a marc with a clear psychedelic sound and strong drumming by Peter Fibich, the guitar played in the style of The Doors meet Santana are quite pleasant, the vocal work is very elaborate with radical tempo variations still takes us to Carnaby Street back in 1968 or 1969 even when less druggy and moiré vibrant, now Ralph Stucki plays in some sections as Rick Wakeman in “Criminal Record” proving how versatile the guy is, if you’re a psyche era nut as me, I’m sure you will enjoy this excellent song.

“To the Sky” is a short but full of energy song, the opening keyboards a la Hensley in Look at Yourself are breathtaking, the vocals strangely remind me of Peruvian Proto Prog in the style of LAGHONIA perfectly back upped by a a great guitar that reminds of Santana work and a strong rhythm section, a song that has everything, if it was only longer would be perfect, but as some people say it’s better to leave the audience asking for more.

The album is closed with “Opus For Ghosts, Crocodiles and Four Living Persons”, the name is longer than the exhilarating track (1:48), NAUTILUS again hits us with all their repertoire, Baroque keyboards, flashy guitar, strong bass and Peter Fibich who is a human metronome, great way to close an excellent album.

A few years ago after two decades of listening Prog’, I thought nothing could surprise me, but while getting older my capacity of surprise is not lost, this guys really impressed me, they had the advantage of releasing a pure Prog album in 1978 after listening by all the early icons (They looked at the world on the shoulders of giants) but didn’t felt in the easy path of cloning them, NAUTILUS took this inspiration and worked it in a very intelligent way

Urs Lerch - bass
Dieter Ruf - guitars, vocals
Peter Fibich - drums
Ralph Stucki - keyboards, vocals
Christian Bauer - guitars, vocals
1. 20,000 Miles Under the Sea (5:14)
2. Sleeping in the Wind (5:01)
3. Like a Bird (4:19)
4. Deep Inside Me (5:58)
5. Lady (5:00)
6. Lost in Time (7:21)
7. To The Sky (3:51)
8. Opus For Ghosts, Crocodils and Four Living Persons (1:48)

Organ / guitar based progressive rock. Despite a powerful intro it fails to maintain any real flow or level of energy. There are lots of ideas that manifest themselves as short repetitive motifs that seem to change just for the sake of changing not for any real musical idea. This makes everything seem somewhat disjointed. The vocals are quite limited in range and power. There's a few brilliant moments (from the guitar or organ - the bass and drums are average) but they are too few and far between.

Highly recommended!
Rip from CD 256@ (full artwork included)
Download link
http://link-protector.com/287167/