Beneath the Real is what happens when musicians get together and attempt to record their first album without enough time to develop ideas, or even properly rehearse their sound. If one is to accept the official line on Greece's Morning After, the group was together for barely a year before committing this album to wax, and boy does it show! In their attempts to concoct a commercial-minded mixture of gothic rock and symphonic metal, they shoot for a level of maturity and songwriting sophistication that is quite simply still beyond their means. Rather than shedding light on their future promise -- and there is certainly promise here...somewhere -- the results only reveal their glaring shortcomings instead. Tracks like "Day of the Moon" and "Hell in Heaven" all boast a few, excellent components -- be it the odd guitar solo, keyboard line, or drum break -- but none of these components actually clicks. Maybe if multi-instrumentalist Menelaos Iliopoulus saw it in his heart to play just one instrument at a time and work with other, real, live musicians, he would realize how hopelessly disjointed his songs sound. But, unfortunately, one aspect that not even time nor practice is likely to remedy is vocalist Tasos Iliopoulos' (yes, they're brothers) uncomfortably tuneless and nasal delivery. Out of his many "voices" employed here, the only one that isn't completely embarrassing is his death metal Cookie Monster growl. The situation is so dismal that certain songs (the title track, for instance) often recall comedy numbers by the likes of
Tenacious D -- certainly not what the brothers were hoping for. In the end, it was impatience that killed Morning After's debut, so here's hoping they take their time on the follow-up. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia