Review Summary: Saviors who have crossed the ages... to revive classic-prog
In the 70's there was a "collapse" of prog bands, that's why it was inevitable that some of them, with good material didn't reached success, one of these bands was
Yezda Urfa.
Very little is known about the band, formed in 1973 in the United States, they only released three albums (one of them is a live one), the first one, Boris, was released as a demo in 1975 but got rejected in every the music label. Decades later, in 2004, the band made a recording deal with Syn-phonic records and the album was finally released to the public.
Boris if often compared to some
Yes albums, however, it manages to create its own identity. The first song,
Boris and his 3 Verses, Including Flow Guides aren't my Bag is a ten-minutes epic that has some acoustic guitars and catchy vocals... but it is the impressive synth work what makes of this song arguably the best on the album, what Phil Kimbrough does with the keyboards is nothing but exceptional.
The album varies its styles at many moments, some of them being dominated by synthetizers or electric guitar riffs and some other by acoustic guitars or flutes, like in
3, Almost 4, 6 yea , the best example of this constant (yet awesome and well worked) style changing is
Texas Armadillo a two minutes instrumental ruled by the sound of a banjo that can even make you forget that this is a prog album.
Certainly, it sounds like
Yes at some points, but not like some kind of copycat band, it sounds just as good as the best material
Yes did, with a synth work that is on par with the one of Wakeman and also adding some instruments that this band wasn't used to play, like flutes or banjos.
Definitely an essential album, is one of the biggest examples of a band that didn't get the recognition it deserved: catchy vocals, INCREDIBLE synth work, awesome guitar riffs, etc... makes of this album one of the strongest in the genre.
Yezda Urfa would release in 1976
Sacred Baboon (that would also get rejected and was released to the public only in 1989) but it consists mainly of reworked material from
Boris so it won't impress as much as this album does.
Yezda Urfa is:
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Brad Christoff- Drums, percussion
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Phil Kimbrough- Synthtizers, mandolin, vocals
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Mark Tippins- Guitar, vocals
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Marc Miller- Bass, cello, vocals
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Rick Rodenbaugh- Vocals
Special thanks to: Syn-phonic Records, the only label that recognized the talent this band has.
