Grey Origin is incredibly the 12th album released by extremely talented Italian multi-instrumentalist Alessandro di Benedetti, the keyboardist and vocalist with Mad Crayon, since 2014. A phenomenal work rate, to be sure.

I am fairly late to this particular party. A friend recommended to me the classy Canvas Two last year, and from there I went on to Canvas One and its instrumentals companion piece. Alessandro’s Bandcamp page is at https://innerprospekt.bandcamp.com/ and I thoroughly recommend that you go along and sample his works.

As with so much of the music we are listening to now, the lurgy pandemic was a huge prompt for this album and Italy was, of course, very much at the frontline of the initial European outbreak. This is an instrumental concept album, and on the aforementioned Bandcamp page, Alessandro explains that the concept is taken from an unfinished Sci-Fi novel in which a scientist tries to graft a human brain onto androids he has designed, leading to some disastrous consequences. Taking together Covid and the repeated stories we read in modern times about how AI will take over much of our lives, this is a topical work. The Plague is the most directly recognisable Covid-inspired track. It features some clever sound effects amongst mournful strings and keys before a voice aching with sadness and death brings us to a close.

What this album manages with aplomb is that most difficult of feats for an instrumental album, that is not only capturing the listener’s attention, but crucially retaining it. Without any words, the album tells a story, and tells it extremely well. It creates moods. For example, on the marvellously quirky L’assistant, I see in my head the strange little bloke who used to run errands for the mad Doctor Frankenstein in those classic 1930’s movies.

You also hear throughout just how talented this artist is. He plays all the instruments, with the exception of the rather lovely Cavie which features a superb guitar solo by the talented Rafael Pacha.

The instrument that above all grabs your attention is the bass. Throughout, we have the bass played as lead or setting jazz, groovy, or rock foundations. Not many people can do this as well as di Benedetti.

The moods, soundscapes, and themes are also very eclectic. The opener, En Trance, is about as good a jazz/prog fusion you will hear. This is also the first incidence of a common theme throughout the album, that of voices rising above the core music to create moods. In The Machinery, the longest track here at 10:45 minutes which captures the sci-fi theme very well, that bass underscores all, with an evocative acoustic guitar before the background voices at the close rise above a fine drum roll to create an early Floydian atmosphere. On Gymnoectomie, the female voice at the close soars above a rather menacing passage thus creating a real diversity of moods.

Brain Sausage is an early contender for title of the year, and the keys and bass grooves here are a joy in what is more of a traditional prog electronica track.

On Le Docteur, if you close your eyes, you can see the surgeon whose face adorns the album sleeve groping about inside the bonce of the unfortunate machine. Synths, sound effects, all evoke a pretty eerie scene.

The other 10-minute plus track is Special Waste. Amongst an embarrassment of riches on this album, this track is rather special. The beginning is beautifully ambient with a delicate piano solo before we move into a menacing phase, then a jazz bassline pushing along synth effects. At three minutes in, the piece features a meandering section before we hear a very clever percussive melody, and this then develops into an overt orchestral passage with wind and string before proceeding with another jazz-laden groove beneath the gorgeous woodwind melody closing with a symphonic chorus of sound. This really is about as eclectic as it comes and is all the richer for it.

This album is highly recommended and deserves to succeed. It is rich, diverse, moody, and a very clever work by a very talented artist.