Table of contents for Issue 106 in Prog

Anubis will release their sixth album, Homeless, on March 10. It marks their first record written specifically for the double-sided LP medium. “It was important for us to approach this album differently,” explains bassist/vocalist Robert James Moulding. “We wanted to take on the vinyl format, so have 20 minutes, flip, 20 minutes, and really let that idea shape the record. “The concept meant trying to find how an idea could work within a smaller timeframe,” he continues. “We wanted to distil our sound and get it to its essence.” Lyrically, Homeless represents Moulding’s reflection on a complicated modern world, touching upon mankind’s fascination with environmental issues, populism politics and beyond, making for an emotional nine-track whirlwind. “We all feel there’s a social homelessness for a lot of people these days,”…

“Tool played their whole set to just the four of us awestruck kids in Danny Carey’s loft!” AN ENIGMATIC FORCE for heavy and progressive good, Suns Of The Tundra could well be the UK prog scene’s best-kept secret. Originally formed as Peach in 1991, they’re perhaps best known for providing Tool with a new bassist, when Justin Chancellor jumped ship to join the Californian legends back in 1995. Nearly three decades later, co-founder and frontman Simon Oakes (also a member of The Osiris Club) is happy to admit the impact of that early meeting of minds. After all, if you must emulate someone, it might as well be one of the most revered bands on the planet. “The Venn Diagram for Peach began as shoegaze overlapping with Seattle,” he notes.…

The Washington DC hardcore punk scene of the late 80s and early 90s isn’t the first place you’d look for progressive leaps into the musical unknown. However, in the midst of the famed Dischord Records roster – the label co-owned by Fugazi founder Ian MacKaye – the skittish anxiety that underscored many of the bands at that time was starting to produce fascinating, mutant strains. Yet, even by those standards, Shudder To Think were an anomaly. Their 1990 debut album, Ten-Spot was still driven by that element of restlessness, but it shifted into dreamier and more abstract territories, not least thanks to the mercurial vocals of frontman Craig Wedren. His background in improv theatre shone through in the free rein he gave himself, roaming around the banks of bustling guitars…

Over the last decade, bands both old and new have seen the industry change dramatically. In 10 years, Spotify has gone from 500,000 to 113 million paid subscribers and streaming now dominates the way we listen to and consume music. Physical album sales are dropping in turn, with revenue from online sources doing little to fill that void (Spotify streams are currently worth approximately 0.0035p each). Vinyl sales are increasing, but pressing them is often too expensive, so what can prog do to thrive in this decade? And how can the next generation flourish? Ultimately, an artist must have an understanding of who their audience is to better engage with them. Young death metallers Godeater have found success through the vegan-friendly, climate-change-combatting messages of their songs, so could prog be…

Last issue, we explored the inside story behind Pink Floyd’s The Wall. In this issue, we’re giving you the chance to win a signed copy of Gerald Scarfe’s definitive book about the multi-media extravaganza. One lucky recipient will receive a copy of the lavishly illustrated The Making Of Pink Floyd The Wall, which expands on the story behind the iconic album art, breathtaking stage show and cult film. In the book, Scarfe shares his experiences of working with Pink Floyd, the good times and the bad, and includes many drawings, photographs and designs never previously published. There are also contributions from members of Pink Floyd, film director Alan Parker and a foreword by Roger Waters. This fully authorised publication is a must-have for fans. For your chance to win this…

“The album asked to be made. I had so much material I felt I was wasting.” I spent 10 years of my life dressing up as a Slavic warrior every summer, running around forests, fighting with swords and learning archery,” says Mariana Semkina, reminiscing about her youth, when her parents would pack her off to historical camp every year. “They did a lot of really interesting educational things. I was very bad at most of them, except for fighting and shooting and archery.” Semkina is nothing if not a history nut. Prog meets her in the opulent lobby of London’s Landmark Hotel, a bread roll’s toss from groups of well-heeled guests enjoying sumptuous dinners beneath a towering atrium, and Semkina immediately tells us the history of the building. How it…

“Sexy Boy was a big single but if you listen to it, it doesn’t sound very commercial. It’s not very fast and it’s kind of creepy as well.” Writing about music is like dancing about architecture,” said Frank Zappa, or Elvis Costello, or possibly Martin Mull. At the risk of deconstructing that quip and taking all of the joy out of it, it’s survived for 40 years or more despite its disputed provenance because of the absurdity of the image. Dancing and architecture are set up as a juxtaposition with one regarded as frivolous, freeform and fun: the other rigid, angular and very serious. Nicolas Godin, the unshaven one from French downtempo giants Air, may turn this idea on its head with his new album, Concrete And Glass. It’s a…

Nightwish were in the middle of their 2018 Decades tour when their bassist, Marco Hietala, decided to take his solo material out for its first road test. “I played them a few demo versions, and when Erno [Emppu Vuorinen, Nightwish guitarist] came to have his morning coffee on the tour bus in his underwear, he was humming…” Hietala says with a chuckle, intoning the melody of his latest single, Stones. “Then Tuomas [Holopainen, Nightwish leader, songwriter and keyboard player] came out from the bunk section and said: ‘That song’s been playing in my head all night!’ So I was like, okay, Stones is going to be a single.” His bandmates are firmly on side, but as a music industry veteran in his own right this is hardly the first time…

We had to ensure we got paid off,” says Paule everything right, and being picky about the sounds and stuff really Bringloe, The Far Meadow’s affable drummer, reflecting on Foreign Land, the band’s much-admired third album. While it was being made, the London-based group were indecisive about its eventual release format, and were focused on achieving the optimum sound. Then keyboard player Eliot Minn suffered a devastating family bereavement, which put a temporary halt to its progress. However, since its release the plaudits have come thick and fast for its elegant swathes of symphonic prog artistry and contemporary flourishes, bookended by the epic opener Travelogue, which checks in at over 18 minutes, and the classic 70s vibe of the title track. Bringloe and Minn formed The Far Meadow after the…

Welsh prog-metallers wrestle with rage, self-loathing and vulnerability. There are certain individuals in music who give the abiding impression that they’re a little too driven for their own good. Godsticks’ Darran Charles is one such, and he’s admitted that a key theme of their new album is the battle he has, as primary songwriter and frontman, with his own perfectionism and self-critical tendencies. Thrillingly agitated and uptight, but resonant and defiant. While Inescapable isn’t a concept album as such, there’s a mood thread that can be followed through it, introduced with the tense self-laceration of opening track Denigrate. A hateful wrestle with self-loathing, it tenses and tightens like a bulging blood vessel in the neck of a man having a nervous breakdown, full of juddering, nervy staccato riffs. Whatever inner…

Aussie tech-metal pioneers embrace vinyl for their three albums. Timing is everything in the world of prog. If there was any justice in this ludicrous, berk-filled world, Karnivool would be universally regarded as the creative and commercial equals of tech-metal giants TesseracT and Periphery. In fact, the Australians arguably deserve to be regarded as among the scene’s earliest protagonists, having formed in 1997 and released their debut album, Themata, a full five years before either of the aforementioned bands squeezed out a full-length. Unfortunately, due to a tendency to take four years to make a record, Karnivool’s rise has not been as meteoric as their music plainly deserves. Consequently, these lavish vinyl reissues of all three of the quintet’s albums to date are long overdue and ripe for wide-eyed reassessment.…

VENUE THE SCALA, LONDON DATE 08/12/2019 SUPPORT IAMTHEMORNING, RIKARD SJÖBLOM Guitarist Rikard Sjöblom has come on tour without a guitar. For the Gungfly and former Beardfish leader – last seen wrangling his axe with Big Big Train – this presents a problem. So he’s had to borrow an undersized acoustic from Iamthemorning’s Marjana Semkina, and the evening kicks off with a short but jaunty stripped-back set with BBT’s violinist Rachel Hall, climaxing with a folksy version of the band’s Haymaking. Iamthemorning are a man down from their recent run of headline shows – there’s no guitarist on stage – but it doesn’t seem to matter much. Only Freak Show and the closing K.O.S. feel slightly shorn of heft, and Semkina is charismatic enough to plug any gaps, whether it’s by…

VENUE SHEPHERD’S BUSH EMPIRE, LONDON DATE 14/12/2019 It’s during a final encore, Mask Machine, at the end of what has been an exhilaratingly enjoyable show, when Flying Colors’ vocalist Casey McPherson steps down into the audience and begins walking up an aisle. Out of nowhere strides a security guard, heading straight for the singer, with the clear intent of evicting this evident miscreant. Obviously neither the spotlight nor microphone, or indeed the fact that for the past two-and-a-half hours McPherson has been more than visible singing his heart out onstage, are enough to assuage the vengeant jobsworth. Spotting the onrushing threat, the singer calmly strolls back round the front of the stage and up the other aisle, before a fellow guard steps in to inform his colleague of the error…

VENUE THE GARAGE, LONDON DATE 10/01/2020 A modest but enthused crowd has gathered for this, the latest chapter in the life of one of modern prog’s leading ladies. Prog says ‘chapter’ because there have already been a few. And while the hook for tonight’s show is Findlay’s latest solo record, Wild White Horses – made with Thunder guitarist Luke Morley – most of the people here have come via her previous projects. Most of these were somewhat different. There was Mostly Autumn, the 21st century’s folky, modernised answer to Genesis via Jethro Tull. After she left in 2010, there came the Heather Findlay Band and Trio, followed by prog-folk collective Mantra Vega. The prevailing ingredient has been folk, and she still has a foot comfortably in that world – Wild…

VENUE THE CLUNY, NEWCASTLE DATE 17/12/2019 “Shall we do another one?” asks Kavus Torabi after The Utopia Strong’s gig has formally come to an end. It’s a genuine question rather than a coy come-on. A rowdy crowd at The Cluny leaves him in no doubt of the answer. Just 50 minutes earlier, the concert began slowly with the spooky whirligig chimes of a children’s musical box, a scattering of pulses and random industrial bleeps darting across the PA, gradually attaining depth and form. For a moment or two, it looks and sounds as though the complex knots of patch chords on Steve Davis and Michael J York’s modular synths are actually part of some kind of cosmic telephone switchboard connecting the present day with the future via a flaky modem…

READERS’ QUESTION TIME? The thud of Prog hitting the doormat is always a happy sound! Issue 105, with articles on Floyd, Flower Kings etc, and a review of Trail Of The Dead’s new album (wish the review had been longer), has already been greedily devoured. I really enjoyed the feature on Jethro Tull’s superb 40th anniversary edition of Stormwatch. The article was very interesting and informative. But I was hoping Ian Anderson would be asked if the excellent 40th anniversary series was going to continue and whether Tull’s A would get the same treatment this year? (Hopefully with Steven Wilson’s input again.) Alas, the question wasn’t raised. This got me thinking about an interesting feature that other magazines have had, and may still do for all I know. They invited…

Dark prog denizens Katatonia will release their 11th album, City Burials, this April via Peaceville Records. Recorded during 2019, the LP follows the first official cessation of activities in the band’s three-decade history: a one-year break that vocalist and co-founder Jonas Renkse believes has rejuvenated them. “We’d been doing the band for such a long time we thought we might all focus on something else for a while, and see if we still have the drive and the hunger to do Katatonia,” he tells Prog. “As it turned out, we all missed it very much. This isn’t a comeback, because we only had a break for a year! But it’s good to recharge. Me and Anders [Nyström, guitarist] did the [death metal side-project] Bloodbath thing; I also became a dad…

Magenta’s new studio album is set for release in April this year on Tigermoth Records. Provisionally titled The Masters Of Illusion, it follows up from 2017’s We Are Legend, with band leader Robert Reed calling it a return to the group’s prog rock roots. “I really struggled with the last album,” Reed says. “I had no appetite to make another Magenta record, so I made something with more electronics and loops; something harder. For this new one, I’ve gone back to the beginnings of the band and what I love about progressive rock: longer songs, great melodies, 12-string guitars, bass pedals, Mellotrons, Moog solos. Traditional prog is a still a little shunned these days, but I love it. We’re doing this without worrying about pastiche or being twee.” Described by…

French prog rockers Lazuli will release their ninth album, Le Fantastique Envoi De Dieter Bohm (The Fantastic Flight Of Dieter Bohm), on February 14. The LP celebrates their fans, telling a fictional story inspired by one of the band’s real-life followers, who travels all around Europe to see them play. Initially, they were worried that said fan – the titular Dieter Bohm – might suffer a heart attack when they told him about their idea. “We gave Dieter all the information slowly because he seems very emotional,” guitarist Domi Leonetti remembers. “It still seems incredible to him. I think he’ll be emotional when he has the record in his hands and when we play the songs in concert.” The follow-up to 2018’s Saison 8 tells of a song that comes…

“I was born and raised in Israel, and everything in my family was always centred around food. We used to travel the country a lot, and we planned everything around food. I would always hear: ‘We’ll go to that place after breakfast,’ or: ‘We’ll visit the other place right before lunch,’ and so on. “Both my grandmothers and my mother are masters in the kitchen; they always used to cook for all the family. So, I used to just sit and eat. All my girlfriends would complain about it – I never cooked! But, when I started touring with Orphaned Land, we’d find ourselves in situations where there’s no food, not even basic stuff for breakfast. So someone had to go out, buy food and prepare it. I was the…

As the end of 2019 drew ever nearer and an entirely new decade loomed, France’s eclectic quartet Stömb marked the occasion by releasing the single Ephemeral. It was the first sample the world heard of Stömb’s new, and second, album, From Nihil – an entirely instrumental record focusing on the cyclical, inescapable nature of time. Life leads to death, creation leads to destruction and, indeed, one new year inevitably gives way to the next. “That’s what’s so different about this album,” says Stömb’s guitarist, Tom Bonetto. “We try to bring a deep concept and people can just listen to it like it’s a bunch of regular songs, or they can dig deeper for the subtext.” Drummer Tom Gadonna elaborates: “We want people to imagine their own singer for this band.…

Growing up, Lulu Davis heard a lot of prog. “My dad would play Pink Floyd, Rush, Genesis,” she recalls, “but also Slipknot, Linkin Park and Nirvana. I remember finding Ozric Tentacles weird but I gained an appreciation for it as I got older.” Those origins have held her in good stead. Now based in Brighton, Davis founded Incendia Music in 2011 when she was just 19, finishing her degree in Music And Entertainment Industry Management at the University Of Hertfordshire. Today, Incendia offers management and publicity services to independent and established acts across the rock spectrum, working on notable campaigns for Therapy?, Kim Seviour, Earthside and Daniel Tompkins’ extra-TesseracT project, White Moth Black Butterfly. Currently on the roster are Coldbones, Major Parkinson and Voyager. She has managed the latter for…

At the tender age of 22, I encountered for the first time a human being who smoked faster than me. He also played drums faster than me, and by all accounts better than me, and everyone else. In Modern Drummer Magazine’s influential yearly poll, he won ‘Best Rock Drummer’ in 1980, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984 and 1985, and then in 1986 they invented the ‘Honor Roll’ to make him ineligible for the annual award and ensure he didn’t win it every year until 2112. As a young journalist on Rhythm Magazine, to me Neil Peart was God. I met him in person once only, in a cavernous room at the Mayfair hotel on a damp Friday in April 1988, the morning after Rush’s first gig at Wembley Arena since the…

GURANFOE This Norwich-based quartet first appeared on my radar when their track, Night’s First Light, appeared on the cover CD for Prog 104. The jaunty Canterbury-esque frivolity immediately piqued my interest, bringing to mind the playfulness and dexterity of Syd Arthur. Already signed to Norwegian prog experts Apollon Records, their debut album, Sum Of Erda, appeared towards the end of last year. The skittish interplay of guitarists James Burns and Ollie Snell is an absolute delight, layered over the bedrock of rhythm section Robin Breeze (bass and Hammond) and Joe Burns (drums). The addition of flute, clarinet, recorder, violin and vibraphone from additional musicians adds to the bucolic charm. Will the lack of vocals on their epic workouts hamper their progress? On current showing, I think not. Listen to: Night’s First…

“IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE JUST JAZZ OR JUST METAL. WE MAKE MUSIC THAT WE WANT TO MAKE. WE’RE A MODERN BAND RATHER THAN AN OLD-SCHOOL PROG BAND.”Andrew Lawrence On a sunny autumn afternoon in London, Prog convenes with Chicago’s District 97 amid their third European tour. Their shows have been well-received and their fourth album, Screens, earned a very enthusiastic review in Prog 104, with Grant Moon hailing closing track Ghost Girl as sounding ‘like a Jim Steinman-Robert Fripp co-write’. But District 97 don’t yet top the prog popularity league tables. That’s perhaps a consequence of them being challenging to pigeonhole. “We are told all the time that we’re not necessarily prog. We’re not all the way metal either, but we’re a little more metal than prog usually is,”…

“It all started in my first week of uni. I saw this girl with a Genesis T-shirt on and knew I had to talk to her.”Matt Harrison In recent years, few bands have captured the prog world’s imagination quite like Exploring Birdsong. Eschewing the typical rock band set-up in favour of dual pianos, bass, drums and Lynsey Ward’s divine iced, chorally backed vocals, the band have nestled within a sound that is distinctly their own. It’s haunting yet beautiful, gothic and uplifting all in the same breath, with elements of Steven Wilson, Kate Bush and Agent Fresco tastefully colouring their plumage without ever undermining their own personality. Now, after years of tireless refinement and finetuning, they’re ready to unveil their first extended release. “We actually played the whole EP at…

“My self-worth is still so wrapped up in music and playing guitar. I see it as a battle, and it is ongoing.” Drran Charles has got a pizza in the oven. When that’s done, he tells Prog, so is our interview. And that’s absolutely fine. In conversation, the God-stick-In-Chief is intense and brusque – some might even say gobby – but he’s also interesting, honest and good, sarky fun. Expletives are hurled easily yet intended to land lightly. He talks a mile a minute and, like many of us men of a certain age, he is fond of a rant. “I don’t go to that many gigs, because I don’t like many venues. I saw Mastodon recently, I’ve watched Rufus Wainwright a few times, and I did want to see…

An encounter with his father’s grand piano at the age of four represents Oliver Wakeman’s earliest musical memory. Having managed to play a chord by guess work, he tried and failed to repeat the trick, realising that he would have to learn the instrument properly. Subsequently he has put the combination of musical genes and hard graft to excellent use. Wakeman came to prominence with 1997’s Heaven’s Isle album. He followed that with a pair of albums with Arena/Pendragon keyboardist Clive Nolan. The 3 Ages Of Magick in 2001 found Wakeman working alongside his father’s sometime Yes bandmate Steve Howe for the first time. That collaboration proved the catalyst for Wakeman replacing his father in Yes in 2008 and touring extensively with the prog giants before making way for the…

Surviving veterans honour their legacy. When founder member and vocalist-guitarist Roye Albrighton died in 2016, it seemed Nektar’s almost half-a-century-long journey to the centre of the eye would be over. And yet, perhaps channelling the title of their 2013 album, Time Machine, they’ve found a way to keep the name alive. Of course one has early reservations: will the surviving personnel do the legacy justice? Would it have been nobler to call it a day? A couple of listens to this new record and you’re reassured. While it’s never able (or trying) to top career highlights like Remember The Future or A Tab In The Ocean, it’s a strong, sincere set of songs and musical workouts that cause a warm glow of nostalgia to massage your shoulders. A huge glacier…

First album in years fills a Psychotic Waltz-shaped void. There was a moment in the early 90s when it all might have gone differently for Psychotic Waltz. Progressive metal was going big and the Psychotics were pioneers. Their work was every bit as good as Dream Theater, Queensrÿche and Fates Warning. Some would say better. However, whereas that trinity of bands had audiences that have seen them thrive (in some version) into the present day, Psychotic Waltz disbanded after 1996’s Bleeding. Perhaps they were just too bold, or too radical… too progressive. Whatever the reason for their dissolution, the release of their first album for 24 years, The God-Shaped Void – with the original line-up to boot – is both welcome and timely. As detailed, precise and hook-laden as ever.…

Excellent soundtrack from Spanish proggers. Instrumental progressive music, and post-rock in particular, is often described as ‘cinematic’, with bands finding themselves on movie soundtracks, whether it’s Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s East Hastings in 28 Days Later or This Will Destroy You’s The Mighty Rio Grande in Moneyball. More rare is a band soundtracking a film, though both Mogwai and 65daysofstatic did so last decade. There are enough hooks to grab onto without the moving images. To wit, this new album from Spanish post-rockers Toundra is a soundtrack for Robert Wiene’s German expressionist classic, The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari, a silent horror film where a hypnotist uses a sleepwalker to kill his victims. Not playing it simultaneously with the film admittedly loses some of its impact, but it’s unlikely that many…

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE RECORDING CO Prog polymath celebrates quarter-century of active service. Keyboard and tech wizard Dave Kerzner has become a cornerstone of US prog over the last 25 years as digital pioneer, collaborator and artist in his own right. This two-CD selection of career highlights (often alternative versions) is like a Pacific highway cruise, traversing mid-to-late period Floyd, Yes in astral gossamer mode and mucho Genesis; ornately widescreen, richly dense, politely soul-seeking and unusually melodic, draping David Gilmour-meets-the-Eagles vocals over keening backdrops laced with soaring guitars and Kerzner’s multi-tiered, high-tech keys. His career highlights are like a Pacific highway cruise. Dave Kerzner made his name in the 90s sampling his collection of rare musical instruments using the new 16-bit stereo digital technology, licensing his arsenal to software giants before…

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JOHN PETRUCCI @JPetrucci Spent yesterday mourning the loss of one of the greatest drummers of all time… Truly heartbroken. There has been no greater influence on me as a musician than Rush and no greater inspiration as a lyricist than Neil Peart. What a tremendous loss MS AMY BIRKS @Amy_l_Birks When Amy met Amelie… well at least that’s what I’m calling her anyway. Love her! Can’t wait to find the perfect place for this beauty CRAIG BLUNDELL @craigblundell New Year’s Resolution #6: Block anyone that calls their instrument or a stage an ‘office’. It’s not big, it’s not clever and it’s not an office FLOOR JANSEN @FloorJansen_ Happy New Year everyone! 2020 will be an exciting year for @NightwishBand & me! Hope to see you all soon! #HappyNewYear #2020 #newalbum…

Rush drummer Neil Peart died on January 7, aged 67, after an unannounced three-year battle with brain cancer. He’d brought the Canadian trio’s career to an end in 2015 when he retired, citing damage caused by years of his “athletic” approach to playing, and his desire to spend time with his family. Reports suggest he was diagnosed with gliobastoma in mid-2016. Rush bowed out after a career-spanning 35-date tour. “Honestly, people don’t realise the sacrifice you make as a touring musician,” Peart told sister mag Classic Rock in 2017. “Being away when children are growing up and when your partner needs you around, it’s wrenching. Your family and friends, their lives continue and you’re not part of them.” Their last studio album, Clockwork Angels, was their 19th and released in…

London prog project Novena will release debut album Eleventh Hour on March 6 via Frontiers Music. The band is the brainchild of composer, musician and theatrical director Harrison White, and features both Slice The Cake’s Gareth Mason and Haken’s Ross Jennings as singers. “I take care of clean vocals,” Jennings tells Prog, “and Gareth has one of the best screaming voices in the UK underground scene, so he handles that and the spoken-word parts.” The sextet is completed by guitarist Dan Thornton and drummer Cameron Spence (both formerly of No Sin Evades His Gaze), and bassist Moat Lowe. In 2012, Lowe and White were in Bleeding Oaf, who supported Haken at legendary venue The Borderline. “We hit it off and our paths kept crossing,” says Jennings. “Later they reached out…

Nektar have released their new, 66-minute studio album The Other Side through Esoteric Antenna. The legendary progressive rockers, now based in the US, reformed in 2019 on their 50th anniversary; they’re a completely different group from the one that recorded Megalomania as New Nektar in 2018. Bass guitarist and vocalist Derek ‘Mo’ Moore, drummer Ron Howden, and lyricist Mick Brockett from the original line-up have been joined by Ryche Chlanda, a group member in 1978 (guitar, vocals), Kendall Scott (keyboards) and Randy Dembo (bass, 12-string). For The Other Side, they worked for six months in the basement of Moore’s New Jersey home on unreleased song ideas from the late 70s, rearranging, writing new sections and adding new lyrics. “It has a 70s feel but it sounds fresh,” Moore says of…

Valentine’s Day changes a lot as the years pass, and, as a happily married man, the days when I sent cards anonymously are long gone. I remember when I wrote my first Valentine’s card, way back in the 1950s, at the age of 10. That year, a lot of the other boys in my class were boasting that they had received at least one. So, not wanting to feel unloved or outdone, I spent my pocket money to send myself three. All of them had suitable inscriptions inside, which I had secretly composed. These included the usual proclamations, of: “You don’t know who I am, but I know who you are”, and“I see you in my dreams every day.” What an auspicious start to my love life. In 1960 I…

“I first got into prog when I was about 13 or 14. A friend’s older brother had a collection of Rush vinyl and I had a big revelation when I heard that. I then moved on to other prog bands, but I didn’t discover Steven Wilson until he released The Raven That Refused To Sing. Wow, what an album! Around that time, he was on tour in North America and played my hometown of Montreal, so I got the chance to see him live. It was my first experience of quadraphonic sound and it was amazing. Now every time he comes to Montreal, I buy tickets. “To me, prog isn’t about musical prowess or being able to shred a keyboard solo simultaneously with a guitar solo – it’s the way…

“I’ve really got into 70s prog. Trespass is one of my favourite records.” FAR BE IT for Prog to judge an album by its cover, but when we received The Isle Of Ailynn, the second album from Canadian alt-folk artist Mappe Of, aka Tom Meikle, we were pretty optimistic. A beautifully illustrated sleeve featuring an opulently dressed father and daughter gazing out from a veranda to a bay of water and a distant island on the horizon. The sticker on the sleeve, meanwhile, reads: “the sophomore album built on fictional landscapes full of strange flora and fauna, mysterious phenomena and mythological beings”. Sold, and we weren’t disappointed. The Isle Of Ailynn is an album where a vivid visual concept, a narrative thread and some similarly evocative music have evolved together…

Official Progressive Albums Chart The prog top 30 albums December 2019 1 JEFF LYNE’S ELO From Out Of Nowhere (RCA) 2 PINK FLOYD The Later Years – 1987-2019 (RHINO) 3 TOOL Fear Inoculum (MUSIC FOR NATIONS) 4 FRANK ZAPPA Hot Rats (ZAPPA/UMC) 5 OPETH In Cauda Venenum (MODERBLOGAT/NUCLEAR BLAST) 6 MARILLION With Friends From The Orchestra (EARMUSIC) 7 WITHIN TEMPTATION Resist (SPINEFARM) 8 BRIAN ENO Apollo – Atmospheres And Soundtracks (UMC) 9 HAWKWIND All Aboard The Skylark (CHERRY RED) 10 STEVE HACKETT Genesis Revisited Band & Orchestra Live (INSIDEOUT) 11 KING CRIMSON In The Court Of The Crimson King (PANEGYRIC) 12 JETHRO TULL Stormwatch (RHINO) 13 SWANS Leaving Meaning (MUTE) 14 MIKE + THE MECHANICS Out Of The Blue (BMG) 15 DEVIN TOWNSEND Empath (INSIDEOUT) 16 KATE BUSH The Other…

“I thought: ‘My God, Robin sounds more like Jon Anderson than I do!’” IT WAS THE wonders of Facebook that led to the formation of Life In Digital, when ex-Blue Shift singer Robin Schell heard some material that Glass Hammer collaborator John Beagley had posted, liked it and invited Beagley to listen to some of his own material. The musical admiration proved mutual, with Beagley particularly struck by Schell’s voice. “It’s funny, because I’ve had comparisons in the past to Jon Anderson,” Beagley says, “but I can’t sing as high as him. And I thought: ‘My God, Robin sounds more like Jon Anderson than I do!’” Having written a song earmarked for a female singer, Beagley road-tested Schell. The duo were sufficiently pleased with the result that they cemented their…

Few live rock shows saw open displays of air drumming quite like a Rush concert. And the reason was the high regard in which Rush drummer Neil Peart was held by the band’s legions of fans. Almost as soon as he joined the group, Peart made an impact. The colourful, lyrical impact of 1975’s Fly By Night matched the awe in which fans delighted in his drumming prowess. It was an awe and admiration that would last for the ensuing 46 years, and which still shows no signs of abating. I mean, we all know what to do at two minutes and 35 seconds into Tom Sawyer, right? By-Tor And The Snow Dog FLY BY NIGHT (1975) Alongside album opener Anthem, By-tor And The Snow Dog announced Neil Peart’s arrival…

In the autumn of 1970 Robert Wyatt, Elton Dean, Hugh Hopper and Mike Ratledge were ensconced in Barnes, London at Olympic Studios. The quartet spent six days in the smaller of the two studios, adjacent to the space where pop and rock royalty such as The Beatles, The Who, The Rolling Stones and others had recorded. It was common enough for those acts to be photographed or be interviewed while they were recording at Olympic. While Soft Machine may not have had the kind of visibility of those illustrious acts or able to command of column inches in the music press in their native UK, their reputation and stock was high enough in France that, upon hearing the news that the Softs were busy with a new record, TV executives…

“A lot of the songs were born from weird, algorithmic, generative music experiments, but actually, everything on the record itself now was built by hand, manually.” 65daysofstatic have never been a conventional rock band. Though for most of their career their nominal line-up has consisted of Joe Shrewsbury and Paul Wolinski on guitar, Simon Wright on bass and Rob Jones on drums, this doesn’t tell you anything about the army of keyboards, synths, beats and laptops getting torn up behind the scenes. They’re most often described as a ‘post-rock’ band, though guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Paul Wolinski laughs off this description. “It’s used so often as a shorthand to describe bands with delay pedals that want to sound like Mogwai.” That comparison is apt in at least one way however –…

“I personally look to the stars and I look to Carl Sagan. The cosmos is a fantastic and wonderful and mysterious and knowable thing, and I get comfort from that.” Ripley Johnson Ripley Johnson allows himself a gentle laugh that sits somewhere between pride and outright amusement. The guitarist and mainman of Wooden Shjips, San Franciscan purveyors of groove-based, fuzzed-up, garage psychedelia, and concurrently the guitarist and co-pilot with groove-based, fuzzed-up electro-psychedelic outfit Moon Duo, Johnson has been one of the key figures in reviving and refining modern psychedelia. And now, just under a decade since he formed the latter outfit with musical and life partner Sanae Yamada, the pair have dialled back the fuzz, ramped up the electronics, explored new beats and made the sharpest left turn in their…

Edited by Jo Kendall jo.kendall@futurenet.com Mariana Semkina’s debut solo album begins with her singing ‘One day I’ll find the hole inside what used to be my dark heart’ and ends with ‘I am laced in sadness’. As you might imagine, what occurs in-between isn’t exactly a frolicking funk-fest of upbeat party bangers. As with her mothership, St Petersburg duo Iamthemorning, melancholy sighs and swoops dominate the mood, creating a landscape that’s broody, introspective, melodramatic and deeply intense. Yet as Semkina herself has said, raising a toast to human misery is entirely normal in Russia, and when her influences aren’t patriotically stern, they’re jolly japers like Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf. “Dead girls” have been a recurring theme; others have ranged from fairy tales to mental illness to horror stories. All…

Come for the artwork and packaging, stay for the songs. As physical media continues to struggle in the face of streaming, Pendragon provide every possible incentive to pick up Love Over Fear. As they did for The First 40 Years compilation, the new release comes in a beautiful hardback book, this one filled with photographs, song lyrics, and sumptuous paintings by Liz Saddington. Plus, there are two extra discs featuring acoustic and instrumental versions of the album, the latter perfect for a spot of progaoke. It’s a wonderful package, although ultimately that wouldn’t matter if the music wasn’t compelling. The opening track, Everything, sees the band channelling early Genesis, with Clive Nolan’s pumping organ locking in with drummer Jan Vincent Velazco, who’s taken over that role from Craig Blundell. What’s…

Aussie poptician returns with more Utopian beats and euphoric futurism. After two albums of well-received retro psychedelia, Tame Impala – essentially the solo project of Australian wunderkind Kevin Parker – made what for many fans felt like a pretty radical change in direction on 2015’s Currents, an album that embraced modern R&B-infused pop with gusto. Out went the trippy guitar riffs and Beatles-esque arrangements, in came thumping beats and a euphoric electro-funk vibe. Slowly but surely, Tame Impala has become a global music phenomenon, one that, judging by even a casual perusal of comments on YouTube, has connected deeply with a generation of young people seeking something meaningful in a troubled world. Dizzyingly lush and often dazzlingly intense. Unsurprisingly, Parker continues this trajectory on The Slow Rush, but delves even…

Prog-blues landmark deserves its 50th anniversary medal of honour. Groundhogs are without doubt the most overlooked piece in the jigsaw of progressive rock’s history. If they’re referenced at all, it’s usually as the blues band that backed John Lee Hooker when he toured Britain in the 60s. But frankly, that’s a bit like defining the Beatles purely on the basis of Love Me Do. The title of 1969’s Blues Obituary called time on the first phase of Groundhogs’ career, and the following year’s Thank Christ For The Bomb heralded a radical rethinking of their direction and sound, partly inspired by early exposure to the newly formed King Crimson. A radical rethinking, partly inspired by King Crimson. While their music still remained rooted in the blues, it’s as though its DNA…

VENUE THE ROUNDHOUSE, LONDON DATE 12/12/2019 SUPPORT HAKEN With the results of the UK’s general election rolling in, it doesn’t take much more than a look at our phones, social media feeds or news coverage on TV to feel affected by emotional conflict and political tension. But over at the Roundhouse in London, sanctuary appears in the form of a Canadian enigma in a Hawaiian shirt, armed with a kaleidoscope of progressive sounds. Not to mention the kind of variety and weapons-grade eccentricity of which Frank Zappa would approve. There are whimsical quirks and crushing heaviness. Metallic death-roars and operatic grandeur. Light relief and tear-jerking intimacy. Cuddly toys and thoughtful meditations on mental health. And such pearls of insight as: “I smell like a yak’s balls!” Of course there are.…