Music reviews. CD reviews. Critically hip!

The back of this cd jacket lists these items as instruments: Earth Harp, Aquatar, and Violin Jacket. I’m not joking. Yes, I said a violin jacket. MASS (Music, Architecture, Sight, and Sound) put together their odd instruments to produce their world renowned third album Planet String.

For those of you who do not know what these instruments are, I shall attempt to educate you. The Earth Harp is the world’s largest stringed instrument with strings that can be up to 1000 feet in length. An Aquatar is a three necked instrument consisting of a regular guitar, a bass, and a sitar. Use your imagination for the Violin Jacket. It basically has the components of an electric violin wrapped around a coat that is worn by the player who uses a bow as normal, or as normal as playing a jacket can be normal.

This is where the fun starts. Take these abnormal instruments, combine with a few traditional beats of the drums, make them sexy and sultry with a few new age vocals, and then put them on an outlandish stage with the players dancing around and you get something that is close to combining the Cirque de Soleil with the Blue Man Group.

I am sure this band is a spectacle to behold in person. If so, they should have included a DVD instead making this CD. Any visual aspects are lost in listening to nearly an hour of wailing and oooing and ahhhing. Invention and style points=10/10. Music value=2/10. Me laughing while rereading the second sentence of this paragraph=12/10.