Hominido

Estirpe Litica

(2014 - CCM - Chile)

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Former drummer Rodrigo Gonzalez Mera from Chile, who previously played in Le Desoorden (sadly now no longer together) brings us a brand new band and recording. A couple of other former members also make up part of this.  A wonderfully exotic and superb release it is!  Precisely incorporating jazz fusion ingredients with world, metal and folk, all in an exquisite progressive work.  Hominido glows with a winning debut.

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Highlighted by beautiful female lead vocals, supported by nimble musicianship, “Estripe Litica” paints visions with each song.  This is the first time I have heard such a particular mixing of lush world jazz fusion with a more aggressive rock, and it works wonderfully.  No gimmicks!  The compositions are well thought out and executed.  I hardly felt the metal influences once they got through the third tune.  The band kept such a majority of interesting jazz oriented music surrounding any of these heavy parts, it just melted together extremely well.

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Do not be scared away by my mention of metal, as it’s the most tasteful this reviewer has come across so far.  Also the vast bulk of this beautiful disc is superlative world fusion with loads of influences adding violin, bajo, didgeridoo, trumpet and much more.  Much of it floats and swims like the more eastern jazz fusion outfits of the 70’s from France and Italy.  Eliana Valenzuela Hernandez’s voice lifts the instrumentation even higher.  Some of the music even gets huge with orchestration and epic proportions. “Shalagram Shila” (Track 5) is not to be missed! You’d be right to assume it includes some South American flavors, as this does after all, come from Chile. Excellent!

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Reviewed by Lee Henderson – August 21, 2014

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