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The Veil...
featuring
Sophia Speaks

"A symphony grows from a single note…

Ancient mysticisms lift us up beyond life into the channeled past of the future, offering religious incantations that challenge our mind with the universal and ageless questions of Shangri-La. The keys to heaven are held aloft as the music cascades over our body, drenching every pore and proclaiming the Goddess of Music (in this case named “Sophia”) is the music of God.

Sophia is the music, The Veil is the vessel that delivers Sophia / the music / God to us and opens our spirits to a Zen-like state where we are blessed at a musical alter which connects us to the euphorial plane we all strive to reach in life, yet are only promised
in death. The opening title track “Sophia Speaks” subtitled “(A Translation)” presents lyrics that explain the sanctity of pure love, the eroticism of its sexual connotations, the heaven God allows us to sample/enjoy here on earth, and the lengths it propels us to in order to achieve and preserve it. All presented in a Mass-like atmosphere as the music envelopes us with a Celtic - Mid Eastern style that stirs the soul with an ancient worship of love – obtained musically through “A Translation” that embraces all time, from
past to present; calling forth Arabic, Native Indian, Egyptian, and Celestial implications into a fusion that will carry us dancing forth into the inner spiritual escape we lust after.
Come, Listen, Sophia Speaks…

“My Heart Is A Lion” explodes with a marching band drumming that urgently drags us along on an adventure punctuated by the striking vocals of Deirdre. They snatch our ears with a poetry slam rap, marching us out to grab life and live it to our fullest abilities –
yet it’s the Rounds that proclaim: “We’re made of dreams, and myths and love / Divine inside, stardust gathered from above” that cast hope and doubt, and sends us reeling (listen to this now at:
http://www.independisc.com/sounds/myheart.ram and marvel at this amazing piece of lost musical art. Just listen, just listen to that!) – for, does this song of Sophia (the music) present the power of man to reject God? Or, is it showing that at times man needs to
believe in his own power before he can accept the God that has bestowed upon him the power to do so? In either case it is the power of the music that knocks us down and bowls us over along with Deirdre’s incredible vocals that wail along side Mark’s Guitar which wails, and wails, WAILS!

Centering the disc, “Beggar Man” starts out like Take A Pebble by EL&P, Dealer by Santana, Babes In The Woods by Steve Miller, and Can’t Find My Way Home by Blind Faith dropped into Kashmir by Led Zepplin. (Hell about the only exotic instrument
curiously absent here is the Hurdy Gurdy). A tale of 3 personas in every man, it cranks out a guitar, drums, and sitar jam that’ll just blow your aura to the outer limits. It also acts as a catalyst for:

“Fever Vision”; A tale of torrid passion and bliss as experienced through a fever so intense that the hallucinogenic visions brought on, propel the narrator into a sustained state of arousal that defies
explanation. Yet, when she finally arrives at the other side of the time and reality bending fever she finds that the object of this obsessive eroticism is beside her, having successfully nursed her through, with total representation within the visions. A Tour de Force that is highlighted by the intense spoken word vocal delivery of Margarita, and supported by Deirdre’s backing vocals and powerhouse choruses.

Slipping in one more metaphor before the finale “Star of India” recounts the late 60s psychedelic era capitalizing on an extended sitar solo as we are invited to take this trip while it’s there (the Star of India is not only an exotic cruise ship about to leave port, it is
also symbolic of Sophia, of music), to decide that “There’s no time to lose” and “prepare for Xanadu.”

But Xanadu can be defined in as many different ways as there are different cultures as there are different people. “A Single Note” begins with the end, a death, and the wait for rebirth. Using Deirdre’s wailing chants behind Margarita’s spoken lyric delivery the music pushes us further and further along conjuring Mid
eastern images of tunics, belly dancers, dust and sand. Ancient tales of surreal spiritual power evoked through the hash haze of hookah pipes relate that the cry of a newborn/reborn is the single note that propels the symphony of life.

And so, Sophia speaks; Beginning to end, end to beginning, completing the cycle, handing us the keys to enter our Shangri-La through the artistic God(dess) of music.

Final Note: Just as any escapism can be addicting,
so too can be music.
Sophia Speaks by The Veil is truly an addictive work of art."

- Gary Vollono, Independisc

Sophia Speaks by The Veil
is available now for $11.98 + s/h
Go to: http://www.independisc.com/theveil.htm
for secure on line credit card ordering, cover graphics,
track listing, and song clips.

This site was last updated
Monday, November 8, 2004 12:44 PM