Lost In Translation

"Lost In Translation represents a new phase in our lives. After years of constant touring, it was important to us that we reinvent ourselves, and wanted to write honest songs about the real things happening in our lives. We spent a lot of quality time together in-between albums as friends, watching movies, hanging out, and talking about our future plans. That brotherly love and bonding initiated the first batch of songs that has helped us shape the album. A lot of the songs are about personal experiences and the things every human goes through and it was nice to let go of the rules we had laid out for ourselves. It's a new era for all of us, and we're proud of how it's turned out. Lost In Translation means that we're all searching for something, whether it's a voice, meaning, a place where we belong; we all face our own challenges. This is about shaping your reality and trying to make sense of the journey along the way."

California native Jeff Scott Soto is a journeyman vocalist who started out singing for theatrical metal guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen in the '80s. He then went on to front numerous not-quite-on-the-radar groups throughout the '90s before teaming with Journey guitarist Neal Schon in the group Soul SirkUS in 2004. Since 1995, Soto has also consistently released solo albums, this being his fourth. The opening song, and Schon co-write, "Believe in Me" is bravely out of time and place, sounding like an outtake from Journey's Frontiers (or like psyche-up music from an '80s teen film). "Soul Divine" has an '80s lite-metal bent to it, as does "Drowning" – and so it goes, without much deviation.

For the first time ever, Peter has recorded a collection of cover versions. The songs come from a variety of musical worlds: Classical, American Songbook, Italian Pop and Tango. In all but three cases Peter has also translated the songs, from Italian, French and German. As strange a project as this might seem, there’s an overall sense of cohesiveness to it and it’s absolutely of this time. Two songs have lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein; the music for one is by Jerome Kern, the other by Richard Rodgers. Leiber and Stoller provided lyrics for “I who have nothing’, originally an Italian tune. Three Italian songs are at the core of the album, written (and originally performed) by Fabrizio de Andre, Luigi Tenco and Piero Ciampi. The two tango pieces were composed by Astor Piazzolla. Finally, there are two classical songs, respectively by Faure and Mahler.

The Japanese instrumental duo Gontiti fuse smooth jazz, easy listening and subtle Eastern influences into a lounge music style that has enjoyed lasting popularity at home while also finding an international audience. Their 1988 album In the Garden begins on a high note with "Andersen's Garden," in which melodic acoustic guitar figures play over a light bossa nova beat. The sound is something out of time and space - it could have been recorded anywhere, at any time in the last 40 years. Unfortunately, the rest of the album isn't as distinctive as that and gravitates toward slick, Western-style smooth jazz with synthesizers, drum machines, and burping fretless bass guitars. Gonzalez Mikami and Titi Matsumura's acoustic guitars dominate "Ferris Wheel" and the harmonics-laden "Acoustic Eel," but other songs, such as "Bandit in the Midnight" and "Homemade Grief," mix horns, strings and electric drums into rhythmic smooth jazz confections…

Their ninth studio album shows Poor Genetic Material, considered by many as Germany's best art- and progrock band, at the peak of their creative powers. Absence - the experience and feeling of lacking something. People or ways of life that we have got used to, that gave us comfort and security, that have left their mark on us and shaped our character. Yet, many of them have turned to hardly more than faint memories. That may be so simply because we have changed. Or because whatever or whoever these feelings were attached to is now - for various reasons - beyond our reach. This experience is the central topic of Poor Genetic Material’s ninth studio album.