b r a n d o n

La Máquina de Hacer Pájaros was Argentinian rock star Charly García's "obscure" 70s band, sandwiched between his much more popular groups Sui Generis and Serú Girán. It also happens to be his proggiest, compared to the folkier sound of the preceding Sui Generis and the poppier flavor of Serú Girán. There are easy comparisons to be made here with classic-period Genesis and other mainstream British prog groups of the time. However, much like the Italian groups before them, La Máquina de Hacer Pájaros use folky elements to give what is fundamentally symphonic prog a somewhat different sound, borrowing from outside influences while still remaining authentic to their time and place. The songs here range from the straightforward melodic folk of "Como Mata el Viento Norte" to the full-blown prog epic "Ah, te Vi Entre las Luces." Throughout, the band uses soaring guitars and dual keyboards to make their case, with intricate and funky arrangements the norm. The dual keyboards was apparently a big deal, with the claim being that La Máquina were the first Argentinian band to make use of such an instrumentation; and they are generally put to good use, with one keyboard often playing a clean piano timbre while the other squeals off a high-pitched synthesized lead. Everything is all very melodic, of course, with South American folk influences readily apparent in the melodies and in the vocals, which are of the soft-spoken male variety. An uplifting symphonic prog album if there ever was one, La Máquina de Hacer Pájaros peaks with its final composition, "Ah, te Vi Entre las Luces" — a largely instrumental eleven minutes that flies by in a breeze of calming beauty. The song shifts gears smoothly multiple times, between quiet tranquility and brief but intense instrumental rave-ups, before coming to a dramatic, somewhat over-the-top but beautiful crescendo. It's nicely representative of the album as a whole; a bit heavy-handed and bombastic at times, but folky and nuanced at others. A solid entry in the huge list of good-but-not-great symphonic prog that came out of Argentina in the latter half of the 1970s. review by Brandon Wu — 6-2-06 —