Table of contents for Issue 112 in Prog

Hello, and welcome to the new issue of Prog. This afternoon I spent a very enjoyable hour or so chatting with cover star Fish about his final album, Weltschmerz, his impending retirement and his plans post-making music. Towards the end it struck me that for the best part of the last 40 years, he’s been a constant in my musical enjoyment, given that Marillion’s Market Square Heroes was my gateway to progressive music. Over the years we’ve had more than our fair share of laughs, and while I totally understand his reasons for calling time on an impressive career, and certainly don’t begrudge that decision, I couldn’t help feeling a tinge of sadness. Johnny Sharp delves far deeper into Weltschmerz, those reasons and the ups and downs of the big…

Prog is in rude health, I think we can all agree with that, however we choose to define the music. The great and the good continue to release new music or, at least, to tour their old music. New bands, judging by the Limelight pages and plethora of album reviews, continue to spring up. But what has happened to the UK bands holding the middle ground? admit some of this is personal opinion and may be related to where I live – in terms of live music, York had gone downhill rapidly even before Covid – but when I first got back into live music after an extended break, it didn’t take me long to discover (belatedly) Mostly Autumn, and from there Breathing Space, Odin Dragonfly, Panic Room, Touchstone, Manning,…

“I was invited to do the opening guitar on Pink Floyd’s One Slip on A Momentary Lapse of Reason. It was one of those signature David Gilmour parts. He couldn’t have been sweeter – we spent more time hanging out than playing. “However, I was a massive Yes fan when I was 14. I had a band with some of the neighbourhood kids, the drummer’s father worked for a record label and was always bringing home promo copies of albums by bands like Yes, which gave us great exposure to this amazing music. “We heard Close To The Edge, which blew us away, because, whereas The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix were playing the blues, Steve Howe was playing jazz. Nobody had ever heard anyone play the bass like Chris Squire…

IT WAS NOT the debut album release City Of Souls had planned. When the forward-thinking New Zealand alt-proggers unveiled Synæsthesia at the start of May, the world was in the midst of a debilitating global pandemic and, as the world was placed in lockdown, it left the group without a tour to plug the record on. A career-swelling support slot with Deftones slated for mid-March had also fallen on the wrong side of the virus crisis – by about a week – and was pulled. Vocalist Richie Simpson, though, is optimistic. “We’re kind of aiming at shows in August once we’re free of lockdown level two, so that’ll be nice,” he says. “We were in the middle of a massive tour, and we didn’t have an album to peddle, but…

Judy Dyble once told me that although she’d left music behind, music kept on trying to find her. This comment was typical of her self-effacing personality, down-playing her contribution to various line-ups and combinations. In discussing her time with Fairport Convention, a pre-King Crimson Giles, Giles & Fripp, the slow-burning cultish success of Trader Horne or the late flowering of her solo career from the 00s, Judy was always very generous about her collaborators past and present, frequently giving the impression that she couldn’t quite understand why all these people wanted her to work with them. Her self-deprecating instincts aside, people wanted to work with Judy primarily for her beautiful voice with its gorgeously precise diction: shimmering purity threaded with a hint of vulnerability. Through her poems, lyrics, and her…

If you’re of the opinion that an artist needs to be put through life’s wringer in order to be sufficiently inspired, well, Fish could write a book about it. In fact, that’s what he’s already doing, aiming to publish his memoirs once he’s finally put this pesky music career behind him. Seasoned Marillion fans will surely have read chapter and verse on that band’s story over the years, much of it in these very pages. But as for what happened next for their original frontman – it’s a less well-documented tale. With next year’s tour (pandemics permitting) celebrating the two bookends of Fish’s solo career, focusing on new album Weltschmerz and his 1990 debut Vigil In A Wilderness Of Mirrors, and his imminent retirement from music still on the horizon,…

Locked down in his London home, Steve Hackett is missing the roar of the crowd… if not the smell of the proverbial greasepaint. And when talking to Prog over a temperamental phone line about one particular show, he still has fond memories. It was the last time he trod the boards alongside all four fellow members of Genesis’ classic line-up. The occasion was October 2, 1982 when, in order to raise money to bail out the seriously debt-stricken WOMAD festival, the event’s curator Peter Gabriel asked his old bandmates to reform for a benefit show. “It was done for all the right reasons,” says Hackett, “and I was very happy to be a part of it. And apart from my own role in it [he didn’t have time to rehearse,…

For Emerson, Lake & Palmer the year 1971 represented an opportunity to establish that this union of three giant talents was more than a mere transient supergroup, but had the chance to become a firm fixture on the prog scene. Their self-titled debut album from the previous year had displayed some consummate musicianship and spectacular performances, yet had also been rather inconsistent. But it did create a solid base from which the trio were now ready to launch innovative and challenging thoughts. As was to be proven on Tarkus. What was to give this album its tone, timbre and colouring was the epic title track, which took up the whole of the first side of the original vinyl, being split into seven movements. This was a bold, adventurous step for…

London psych-proggers Goldray were formed when Reef guitarist Kenwyn House hooked up with vocalist Leah Rasmussen and played an informal drunken jam at a Christmas party. Their partnership was formidable and they’ve been writing ever since. “It was hilarious but the funny thing was, we jammed it and when we finished everyone clapped and asked when we’d written all the songs but we’d literally just made them up there and then,” says Rasmussen with a laugh. “We bullshit our way through stuff and we’ve been doing it like that ever since,” adds a chuckling House. “It took a while for us to find our voice. I was doing Reef again and life gets in the way but we kept writing and eventually we realised we loved it so much and…

Asia offshoot’s stumbling attempt to resurrect that band’s legacy. Those with good memories will recall the Great Asia Wars that flared after the AOR-prog kingpins slid off the charts and splintered apart. In 1991, keyboard player Geoff Downes brought the franchise spluttering back to life with singer John Payne to make the unremarkable Aqua album. Painful wrangles over the Asia brand followed, but now the dust has settled, the Dukes Of The Orient are proclaiming themselves “the legitimate successors of John Payne’s Asia”. It’s not clear how much competition there actually was for that title, but Payne and keyboardist Erik Norlander make a decent fist of aping Asia’s crossover sound. There’s enough pomp and histrionics, but what there isn’t is John Wetton’s songwriting smarts or anything with the unassailable clout…

Acclaimed Faroese vocalist/instrumentalist sets sail on a new course. Fans of the shipping forecast might know the Faroe Islands as the North Atlantic archipelago located between Scotland, Iceland and Norway; a volcanic land dense with wildlife in its mountains, heathland and cliffs. It’s also where singer and multi-instrumentalist Eivør Pálsdóttir started her career, passing through rock, folk, trip-hop and smooth jazz before hitting her stride in 2010 with the electronic gnarl of Larva and 2015’s excellent folktronic Slør. She continues to bring the ambient drama of her homeland to her ninth album, Segl (‘Sail’), which gathers influences old and new, starting with Manasegl (‘Hopesail’), a heavily treated, atmospheric meld of Massive Attack’s Teardrop and Laurie Anderson’s O, Superman. Eivør’s voice is astonishing; throaty and soulful on Truth, a fluttering soprano…

Long-awaited debut from lively Aussie proggers. This Sydney quintet have gained quite a few friends on the live circuit Down Under thanks to an energetic stage act, led by charismatic frontman Tobias Atkins, that makes more ponderous prog counterparts look a little too studious for their own good. This debut album belatedly follows the two EPs they released back in 2014 and 2015, and proves there’s substance behind their stage bluster. The melodramatic strokes of the synth-led single Bolero recall the more adventurous, artful end of the early 80s pop spectrum – amplified by the moody black and white promo video that accompanies it – but as well as hitting you with an emotional gut punch via yearning choruses and arena rock swells, there’s a palpable inner conflict within many…

German trio hit home with their dramatic second full-length set. Listening to the follow-up to Koj’s 2017 debut All We Have Is Gold, it’s understandable why they have been dubbed ‘dark indie’. They favour minor keys and low-to-mid tempos; their guitars are angular and echoing, their synths modern-vintage. Singer Alina von der Gathen is breathy and controlled, more at home with sub-Liz Fraser vocalisations and reverb-soaked lines rather than anything resembling a singalong chorus. But however one labels them, Koj are an oddly uplifting and revitalising proposition. There’s craft and musicality in the emotional ebb and dramatic flow of opener Stars, the title track and single Jenny (apparently inspired by Hollywood actress Jennifer Lawrence). Those retro cool keyboards are put to good use on the wonky pop of Pamela (as…

Third time’s a charm for the brothers D’Addario. Rock was once a magnet for weirdos. Long Island siblings Brian and Michael D’Addario – aka The Lemon Twigs – know this. Multi-instrumentalists schooled in 70s rock auteurs, they’re playful, astonishingly adept at laying gleaming melodies over filthy rhythms and utterly unfazed at trying anything beyond their particular vision. As such, 2016’s debut Do Hollywood was exciting in its pomp, but disjointed, while 2018’s Go To School – a concept record about a chimp who’s raised as a human – often felt outstretched by its premise. So it’s this, their third album, where things have irrefutably come good. They’re aware of it, too – even the title is a confident nod to the approachability that runs throughout, but it’s tempered with cocky…

Texan prog metallers rebuild themselves on album number four. Since recruiting singer Cammie Gilbert in 2014, Oceans Of Slumber have been writing progressive metal that flips between death, black and gothic markers. What ties their sound together are Gilbert’s extraordinary vocals, which are clear, soulful, and show strength through vulnerability. Half the band left before this record, yet it still shows an impressive unity of vision. Here, they synthesise their disparate subgenres in their most coherent way yet, adding a layer of drama that’s usually the preserve of symphonic metal bands. It says something about their fearlessness that the most epic song, the seven-minute Pray For Fire, is track number two. It evolves into a storm of anger, drummer Dobber Beverley’s harsh vocals rising up, until Gilbert breaks into a…

Once described as a ‘prog-jazz super trio,’ Rymden more than live up to the hype on their second album, Space Sailors (Jazzlands). Bassist Dan Berglund, drummer Magnus Öström – both formerly with EST – and Norwegian keyboard maestro Bugge Wesseltoft apply themselves to thoughtful compositions. Each track’s deep seam of melodicism brings it variously into post-jazz quietudes, with reflective, moving cadences and stirring ascending themes. There’s plenty of grit here as well. A Led Zep, Kashmir-style stomper saws and gnaws, while the explosive Arriving At Ramajay Part 2 is a fast-moving synth wigout that could almost be paying homage to Keith Emerson’s windmilling stabs at the pitch bend control. Rymden’s instrumental command and surging momentum make this album irresistible. The second album from Sheffield-based trio Das Rad, Adios Al Futuro…

Dense yet beautiful instrumental jams from Australian trio. Originally released as a series of three limited edition EPs, Australian trio Sleepmakeswaves’ fourth album plays out like the soundtrack to an especially vivid fever dream. From the crushingly heavy The Endings That We Write, with distorted peaks going so far into the red it almost caused Prog’s speaker to judder off its shelf, to the undulating, slo-mo fade of the title track, it’s a near flawless listen. Part 65daysofstatic, part Explosions In the Sky, These Are Not Your Dreams possesses a frenzied dynamic that makes your head whirl like you’ve driven too fast over a hump back bridge. Yet there’s a delicacy in the joyful Zelda where the rare vocal parts, layered across the music as another instrument, and the dizzying…

Four track taste of jazz-fusion titans’ final line-up. Founded in 1970, Weather Report were among the most successful of the fusion bands to emerge from Miles Davis’ star-studded jazz boot camp. By the early 80s, Austrian-born keyboardist Joe Zawinul had taken control, exploring electronic keyboards over funky, world music-inflected rhythms, with saxophonist Wayne Shorter deploying gadgetry to sound like a horn section. Live In London stems from that period. The blurb states recording dates are “lost in the mists of time!” but the location and the presence of bassist Victor Bailey, drummer Omar Hakim and percussionists Jose Rossy and Mino Cinelu pinpoints its four lengthy tracks to two June 1983 appearances at the capital’s Hammersmith Odeon or June 1984’s show at the Dominion Theatre. Slow-burning funky grooves underpin glistening keyboards…

Expanded reboot of cult Californian psychsters’ gnarly lo-fi debut. Originally recorded in a windowless San Francisco rehearsal space in 2009 and released the following year, the psychedelic duo’s debut mini-album seems to have gained an extra layer of claustrophobic dust in the decade since it emerged, as well as the three extra tracks added on this reissue. Neither development does it any harm. Now based in Portland, over the years the couple have gradually opened the windows on their sound, including a positively disco-friendly sparkle to the trippy electronica of last year’s Stars Are The Light, but there’s a timeless psych-inspired simplicity to Escape that still grabs you. Shrouded in a muddy sonic wall constructed by Wooden Shjips guitarist Ripley Johnson and the fuzzy organ lines of Sanae Yamada, there’s…

BECAUSE HE’S WORTH IT I was having difficulty finding Prog 110 in my local supermarket when I finally spotted it had been filed in the women’s magazine section. This was no doubt due to the rather fetching cover photo of a young Mr Wakeman. I wonder if any housewives bought Prog hoping to find Rick’s tips on haircare and this season’s fashion essentials: a cape. In future I will check the women’s section just in case you ever put David Sylvian on the cover. Kevin Buttery, via email TURNED ON TO BIRO’S TUNES Nice interview with Colin Bass in Prog 111. Colin’s membership of Camel inevitably makes him the key draw for Prog readers, but I just wanted to point people towards Daniel Biro’s own catalogue, especially from a prog…

“I love to play guitar and I wanted the spirit of that to be heard.” Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci reveals that the sense of joy emanating from his new solo album, Terminal Velocity, has come partly from his reunion with the band’s former drummer Mike Portnoy. The musician’s latest nine-track recording is out on August 28 via The Orchard Music. The follow-up to his 2005 solo debut, Suspended Animation, marks the first time the pair have worked together since Portnoy’s unexpected departure from Dream Theater in 2010. Up until that point, he’d been a key figure in every step of the prog metal band’s development since co-founding them as Majesty in the 1980s. “If you’re friends with somebody for 25 years, it doesn’t go away,” Petrucci says. “Our families…

Anna von Hausswolff (right) will release an instrumental pipe organ album, All Thoughts Fly, on September 25 via Southern Lord. It’s inspired by the Italian garden Sacro Bosco and she says the theme of the work is “love as a foundation for creation.” An album that started out as a Dave Brock solo title will be released under the Hawkind Light Orchestra banner. Carnivorous, out on October 16 via Cherry Red, also features drummer Richard Chadwick and guitarist/keyboardist Magnus Martin. Marshall Allen has directed the upcoming Sun Ra Arkestra album Swirling – their first in two decades. It includes new arrangements of previously released tracks along with new original recordings, and it arrives on October 9 via Strut.…

Compiled by June 2020 1 PINK FLOYD The Later Years 1987-2019 (RHINO) 2 TAME IMPALA The Slow Rush (FICTION) 3 HAKEN Virus (INSIDEOUT) 4 KANSAS The Absence Of Presence (INSIDEOUT) 5 BE-BOP DELUXE Axe Victim (CHERRY RED) 6 LONELY ROBOT Feelings Are Good (INSIDEOUT) 7 NIGHTWISH Human. :II: Nature. (NUCLEAR BLAST) 8 JULIANNA BARWICK Healing Is A Miracle (NINJA TUNE) 9 RUSH Permanent Waves (MERCURY/UMC) 10 MARILLION Script For A Jester’s Tear (RHINO) 11 TOOL Fear Inoculum (MUSIC FOR NATIONS) 12 PETER GABRIEL Flotsam And Jetsam (REAL WORLD) 13 BRIAN ENO Apollo – Atmospheres And Soundtracks (UMC) 14 JEFF LYNNE’S ELO From Out Of Nowhere (RCA) 15 KING CRIMSON In The Court Of The Crimson King (PANEGYRIC) 16 WIRE 10:20 (PINK FLAG) 17 FRANK ZAPPA Hot Rats (UMC) 18 MARILLION…

“The press had allegedly buried progressive rock. We had come up under the fucking radar into the Marquee club. Suddenly prog was back.”Fish “We were doing something really different. The press had allegedly buried progressive rock. We had come up under the fucking radar into the Marquee club. Suddenly prog was back. Of course Sounds would run the new progressive rock revival, the new wave of British prog and shit like that: it was your Solstice and IQ and all stuff like that. We were straight ahead of those bands.” This is how Fish, somewhat dismissively, described the early 80s musical playing field that was headed by Marillion to Prog towards the end of last year. While he’s not wrong that Marillion were leading the field, both musically and as…

“I love all the different styles on it – even during the first song alone, Dancing With The Moonlit Knight. Pete said he was influenced by Scottish plainsong at the beginning, then it goes into something vulgarian, anthemic, then we’re into tapping on guitars, fusion, then after masses of time signature changes it goes into a jam, like any rock’n’roll band has ever done, but arguably the quietest! I loved that – it was always different, but it always worked. Then you’ve got the epics, the small, romantic little things like More Fool Me, you’ve got the almost Gilbert & Sullivan style of The Battle Of Epping Forest, lots of humour, and the sweep and romance of The Cinema Show. Long form, short form, and also the first hit single…

“If Japan, Simple Minds, Tears for Fears, etc, are featured in your mag (I’m pleased they are) then Toyah fits the bill. The Changeling album has prog all over it including the cover. She’s also done gigs with her husband, not sure if they’ve recorded anything though, I’ll have to check one day.” Jason Richards “I’ll get the joke in first: Is Toyah prog? It’s a mystery…” Phil Gorner “She’s collaborated with Tony Banks from Genesis. That makes her prog in my opinion.” John Polston “Her costumes were a great innovation compared to the capes, fox heads, knight dresses and flower masks that everyone’s wearing in the prog world.” Bas Langereis “Her more recent material has definitely had a prog influence. I also love her version of 21st Century Schizoid…

Brit pair strike balance between melodic rock and symphonic prog. The musical relationship between vocalist Doris Brendel and guitarist Lee Dunham has been quietly blossoming over three albums, but with Mass Hysteria, it takes flight. The best comparisons are with the tuneful delicacy of Curved Air and Renaissance, though it’s overlaid with an expansive presentation nodding towards Nightwish. Mass Hysteria begins with the stridently hard rock Takes One To Know One, but this is misdirection, as the album soon settles into a purposeful mix of blissful melodies and formidable musicianship. On You Took My Breath Away, Brendel’s earthy vocals butt against Dunham’s classy riffs, as Jacob Stoney adds winsome flourishes of keyboard colour. Elsewhere, Wrong Time Wrong Place brings to mind Kate Bush circa Hounds Of Love with its dense…

Electronic iconoclast crafts astonishing psychedelic folk opus. Renowned electronic sound designer Amon Tobin has released 10 albums under his name over the last 23 years, while his aliases thrive at a staggeringly-prolific rate: 2020 has already seen his Two Fingers hip-hop project, the ambient Ghostcards EP and now Figueroa. His first vocal venture, The World As We Know It is psych-folk as it’s never been heard before. Working with producer Sylvia Massey (Tool, Johnny Cash), Tobin has taken songs he imagined into life 10 years ago in a Northern California cabin and reworked them into Byrds-like chorales, except the luminescent swathes of ‘guitars’ are actually his enhanced and meticulously programmed keyboards. Kicking off with the mesmerising Weather Girl, Tobin journeys through the Bad Seeds-esque twang of If You Knew My…

Sheffield’s cult neo-proggers return to the fold in fine style. In the 80s heyday of the neo-prog scene one would see Sheffield’s Haze on the bill at the Marquee with Solstice or Pendragon, or playing clubs up and down the UK with the likes of IQ and Pallas. Led by brothers Paul and Chris McMahon, the defiantly indie unit gave it their all but never really broke past cult status, calling it quits in 1988. A slight return with 2013’s The Last Battle – packed with flutes, rocky riffs and an almost heraldic approach – showed Haze still had some juice, and this new album only confirms it. Back To The Bones is by turns raw and refined, and always steeped in good old-fashioned prog values. Paul’s eager, lyrical guitar…

Norwegian maverick pivots from dark to light on second EP of 2020. Considering his journey from black metal malcontent to prog metal linchpin, nothing Vegard ‘Ihsahn’ Tveitan does should come as a surprise. So it proves on the second of three EPs he plans to release this year. Where the first of the trio, Telemark, was an inky, jagged callback to his days in Emperor, Pharos throws open the curtains and lets the light flood in. It follows the same format as its predecessor – three originals, two covers. The former smooth out Telemark’s sharp edges without losing any of its power. Despite its title, the graceful Losing Altitude charts an upwards trajectory. Spectre At The Feast finds space for a tasteful guitar solo amid the soaring strings and mid-paced…

It’s 34 years since Throwing Muses’ debut revealed a band whose music took startling switchbacks and twists, and the current trio, together since ’92, just keep getting bolder. Sun Racket (Fire), their first for seven years, merely tries to (in Kristin Hersh’s words) “commingle two completely disparate sonic vocabularies”: in short, heavy and delicate. Few groups could pull off this high-wire act while still presenting songs of emotional intensity and psychological acuity. Water’s a recurring theme. Bridges too. Something’s said about today’s traumatised world among these devilish, oddly euphoric currents as Hersh and allies, with fierce fragility, keep on redefining “alternative”. One never knows what to expect from The Waterboys, whose Good Luck, Seeker (Cooking Vinyl) is a maverick mash-up: one side of (excellent) soulful pop, followed by a proggy…

London proggers tackle some “dark, ugly” realities in bright, pleasing style. The Mighty Handful’s compelling concept collection Still Sitting In Danny’s Car consisted of five albums released from 2013-17. For the follow-up they’ve freed themselves of the strictures of such a layered story piece, but there’s still an ambitious theme to Touchy Subjects. The album broaches some “dark and ugly realities about relationships”, setting witty lyrics to imaginative music that ticks plenty of genre boxes, from pop to fusion. I Knew Your Game is a moody rocker about wanting the thing that’ll do you harm (with ‘a snake-eyed Slytherin charm’). Distant As The Stars sets unattainable love on a cosmic scale with clever, melodic guitar lines to boot, while Same Old Story gives the simple tale of ‘boy loses girl’…

Urban spacemen return after more than a decade in the wilderness. When guitarist and founder member Benjamin Curtis left Secret Machines in 2007, the New York-based band puttered to a halt the following year. Sadly, Curtis died of cancer in 2013, but his posthumous contributions do appear on this, the band’s belated fourth album. With Awake In The Brain Chamber, Curtis’ bassist/vocalist brother Brandon, drummer Josh Garza and assorted guest musicians have delivered an album that honours their late bandmate’s memory. The tight and powerful rhythm section gives a feeling of juggernaut momentum, like driving around the tight grid patterns of their adoptive home, while leaving sonic vapour trails in their wake. On Dreaming Alright and Everything Under the band deliver Neu-like propulsion, while the chiming keyboards on the anthemic…

Andy Tillison and crew cook up more bubbly gems. The follow-up to 2018’s Proxy upholds The Tangent’s flair for lively prog rock voyages packed with shifting styles and humorous social commentaries. Once again, mastermind Andy Tillison is joined by Steve Roberts, Luke Machin (of Maschine), Theo Travis, and Jonas Reingold, who do a fine job of mixing the vintage vibes of Yes, Steely Dan, and Return To Forever with their 21st century attitude. Beyond that, they evoke the mellowness of The Grateful Dead (particularly on Jinxed In Jersey and Under Your Spell). Elsewhere, the relatively succinct Life On Hold – apparently not inspired by the current pandemic – and The Tower Of Babel are among the group’s catchiest compositions. In contrast, the near half hour-long Lie Back & Think Of…

More Swiss precision engineering on electro pioneers’ 14th studio album. At 75 and 68 respectively, Yello’s Dieter Meier and Boris Blank are growing old disgracefully. Part-playboys, part-mad scientists, theirs is one of the most singular sounds in pop, truly progressive and theatrical in the way they continually reinvent melody and lyric, yet they still make a noise unmistakably their own. Point is their first studio album since 2016’s Toy and it’s everything you would wish it to be. Opener Waba Duba is pure, undiluted Yello, referencing some of their greatest riffs. Meier’s trademark gobbledegook is appropriate for a band whose name means a ‘yelled hello’: his way with a narrative is always enthralling. Here, he tells of The Vanishing Of Peter Strong: ‘a man wearing a very strange hat came…

Fascinating dip into an overlooked period of the Spirit guitarist’s career. The late Randy California’s impact on American music, both as a solo performer and also with Spirit, was enormous. This six-CD box set concentrates on the years between 1979 and 1983, a period that languishes in the critical shadow of California’s earlier work. Four of the six discs were originally issued in 2006, also under the title The Euro-American Years. Now remastered, these feature not only California’s impressive 1982 second solo album, Euro-American, but also demos he recorded around that time. That album deserves way more credit than it gets for the way it brilliantly mixes American blues – always the heartland for California’s guitar style – with European hard rock and a clever pop touch. Also carried over…

Shape-shifting Norwegian jazz-rockers’ funky 1978 album revisited. Leading lights of the Norwegian prog scene in the 1970s, Oslo’s Ruphus went through a stylistic evolution during a recording career that spanned six albums in as many years. Their line-up was constantly changing, with their original chief songwriter departing, which may partly explain their shift from the nuggety, rock-centric style of their 1973 debut, New Born Day, into jazzier climes by time of 1976’s Let Your Light Shine. After Sylvi Lillegaard replaced vocalist Gudny Aspaas on similarly fusion-oriented 1977 set Inner Voice, Flying Colours represented another departure. Album opener Foodlover’s Diet is a positively funky affair, based around a wriggling synth riff that wouldn’t be at all out of place underpinning a Parliament or Funkadelic record. Lillegaard’s bluesy rasp and Kjell Larsen’s…

An Aussie prog metal milestone revived on vinyl. It remains a source of considerable embarrassment and regret that the prog world didn’t pick up on Voyager a lot sooner. Shimmying into the spotlight from the outer reaches of a post-djent universe, the Australians piqued much interest with their fifth album, V, in 2014, but it wasn’t until the release of Ghost Mile, in 2017, that their collective star quality was widely acknowledged. Looking back, those first five albums amounted to something of a masterclass in spontaneous evolution, as the band’s sound slowly edged away from formula and cliché and toward the dazzling, multi-layered explosion of melody and technique for which they’re now celebrated. Now receiving a vinyl release for the first time, Ghost Mile oozes the kind of confidence that…

JAKSZYK'S SECRETS AND LIES Jakko Jakszyk has recruited King Crimson bandmates including Robert Fripp and other guests for new solo album Secrets And Lies, which arrives on October 23. The 10-track is headed by lead single The Trouble With Angels, while three other tracks – Separation, Under Lock And Key and Uncertain Times – originated during King Crimson writing sessions. MINT FIELD ALBUM IS SENTIMENTAL Mexican band Mint Field will release new album Sentimiento Mundial on September 25. It’s described as a “heavy, scuzzy” work that’s delivered in their native tongue. Estrella del Sol, Estrella Sanchez, Amor Amezcua and Sebastian Neyra are joined by guests Callum Brown (Ulrika Spacek), Cathy Lucas (Vanishing Twin) and Nathan Pigott. It was recorded in London with producer Syd Kemp.…

SUBHARMONICON Moog’s new synthesiser takes its cues from two of the earliest electronic instruments, both built in the 1930s: the Trautonium – a hulking monophonic beast beloved of prolific German composer Paul Hindemith – and the Rhythmicon, the world’s first electronic drum machine. The Subharmonicon generates sequences based on the ideas of another musical pioneer, Joseph Schillinger, who devised a mathematical system of composition in the early 20th century. One review refers to the new device as a “happy accident machine.” It comes with serious retro pedigree. www.moogmusic.com WE ARE REWIND Hot on the heels of the Mystik featured in Prog 109, we have another 21st century attempt to rehabilitate the humble cassette. With typical Walkman stylings, We Are Rewind runs on a rechargeable battery, comes with Bluetooth built in…

CAPTURING ESSENCES OF the natural world, Tirill Mohn blends raw baseline melodies with ethereal overtones on her otherworldly music. The Norwegian musician’s compositions take simple sounds and ideas and transform them into unique songs. Asked to detail the inspirations and influences behind her music, Mohn highlights a number of connected elements. “Being born in the 70s meant that I was naturally influenced by music from that decade,” she begins. “Today, however, I’m essentially inspired by nature and by the sound of archaic and folk instruments.” These aren’t the only elements that have inspired Mohn’s music; poetry has also guided her and influences many of her lyrics. Work by Brit Kathleen Jessie Raine, Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner (as translated by Owen Barfield), and Mark Strand, as well as Irish scholar Patrick…

When Brian Eno was walking through New York’s Washington Park Square one day, he happened upon Edward Larry Gordon playing a zither. Laraaji, as he was better known, had been performing in that same spot for several months, enchanting those passing with his tuneful, mesmeric repetitions and cascades of echoing notes. Entranced by what he heard that day, Eno passed Laraaji his phone number and a few weeks later they were in the studio working on what would be the third in Eno’s Ambient series of releases, 1980’s Day Of Radiance. Since then, Laraaji has released many more records all bearing his trademark spacey improvisations on electric and acoustic zither. However, his latest release, Sun Piano, finds Laraaji returning to piano with an album of improvisations recorded in a church.…

“I loved doing Spectral Mornings. By then I felt like I had a band who were really good, young and the record company were behind it so there was a freshness to it. And there was a strong spiritual theme, which meant a lot to me. I love Michael Bentine’s book [focusing on the paranormal], The Door Marked Summer – stories about healers, materialisations, ghosts, all those things we were told don’t really exist when we were kids but it’s like hold on a minute, all that stuff might be under the banner of that which is pagan and should be avoided… So I thought, well here’s a taboo waiting to be broken, here’s an area I can wander into and not be criticised for. It doesn’t have to be…

There are many splendid things about the new version of Gentle Giant epic Proclamation that the band posted online on July 15. But the biggest and best is surely the sight of all seven surviving members of the classic line-ups bellowing ‘Hail!’ onscreen together (albeit remotely, as is the way in 2020). Conceived and organised by Noah Shulman, filmmaker, Sony Music creative and son of Gentle Giant frontman Derek, the video is an absolute joy. Primarily performed by fans from all over the world, but featuring cameos from Jakko Jakszyk, Billy Sherwood and ARW/Steve Hackett bassist Lee Pomeroy, its chief selling point is the unexpected sight of Derek, Ray and Phil Shulman, Kerry Minnear, Gary Green, John Weathers and Malcolm Mortimore all performing together for the first time in four…

Djent denizen plunders his pioneering vaults. As the first of 10 releases compiling material recorded under Periphery founder Misha Mansoor’s Bulb moniker over the last 15 years, Archives: Volume 8 is as full of brilliant ideas and bendy riffs as you might expect from such a revered tech-metal pioneer. As he kick-starts this splurge with some of his most recent solo material, Mansoor’s endearingly wide-eyed fascination with heavy and progressive music’s possibilities is on full display. There are towering, more-riffs-than-seems-strictly-fair epics like the 11-minute Borthelcash (April Fools), succinct bursts of eccentric groove metal (Eat Me and HH2), symphonic pomp (Progressively), off-kilter jazz (Odd) and detours into eyeball-popping brutality with gravel-huffing vocals (erm, Fucking Fuck). In truth, little of it is as satisfying as the best of Periphery’s work, but as…

Prog supergroup’s set from December, crisply captured. No one imagined a day when live albums were more prevalent than actual shows. Still, if all stage recordings were as stirring as this one – from Shepherd’s Bush Empire in December 2019 – it might take the sting out of things. Flying Colors’ accessible, immediate songs are custom-made for belting out live, while also allowing the garlanded players involved to do some instrumental peacocking. On the flawlessly produced but ebullient Third Stage, they sound positively unleashed. Mike Portnoy’s choppy rhythms on Forever In A Daze have extra heft, and the freewheeling jazz-rock of Infinite Fire has a certain crackling kinetic energy. Elsewhere, the diversity of influences at play is striking. The multi-part harmonies and prog-pop bounce of Love Letter fizz with joy,…

French experimentalists use their lockdown time wisely. French trio Hifiklub recorded Rupture at their respective homes during quarantine yet still managed to collaborate with guest drummer Matt Cameron (Pearl Jam/Soundgarden), Australian improvisational trumpeter Reuben Lewis, plus producer and multi-instrumentalist Anthony ‘Daffodil’ Belguise. This EP plays as one continuous 25-minute piece of music, subdivided into six movements. Despite the presence of Cameron, it’s not a drum-heavy record and there are no big grungy rock fills. Instead, the sound is rich in synthesisers and electronics. Lewis’ languid trumpet is often used to add texture, floating over the musical soundscapes, and its muted tone on Navire De Sauvetage suggests the influence of Miles Davis. Le Temps Gagné is carried on an ambient electronic tide that swirls around the listener before concluding with Lewis’…

Neo-prog veterans in top live form. A couple of months ago, IQ decided to stream a recent live performance from Germany to make up for having to cancel shows due to the pandemic. Now, they’ve gone one stage further and released the audio from the gig as a double CD, as part of their ongoing Archive Collection series. Naturally, what they’re trying to do is make some money to offset losses suffered as a result of not being on the road. While that might have been part of the reason for the decision to release A Show Of Resistance, there’s no doubting the quality of a show that spans IQ’s illustrious 40-year career. Neatly opening with Alampandri, one of four songs from their 2019 album Resistance, the band are at…

Predictably profound companion to 2007’s Sola Scriptura. Since becoming a born again Christian almost 20 years ago, Neal Morse has been imparting theological solo prog rock statements while keeping a foot in the secular world via supergroups Transatlantic and Flying Colors. He’s clearly of the mind that there’s no need to fix what isn’t broken. His 11th solo album is a belated companion piece to 2007’s Sola Scriptura, doubling down on his tried-and-tested lyrical and musical formula. Opener Preface is a folky ballad – it regards how God can ‘change the world with just one willing soul’ – that sets up the central theme of persecution and the Biblical story of Paul the Apostle. Ballyhoo (The Chosen Ones) and Building A Wall both blend soothing orchestration and the roaring percussion…

Swedish prog polymath revels in the power of three. There are few more thrilling things than the sound of a great band surfing on waves of shared chemistry. The third Gungfly album since the demise of Sjöblom’s former band Beardfish, Alone Together shares its predecessors’ melodic and instrumental opulence, but it’s the exuberance of these performances – by the Swede and the rhythm section of brothers Rasmus and Petter Diamant – that sets it apart from previous efforts. Opener Traveler’s 13 minutes whizz by in a blur of exquisite ensemble interplay and souped-up prog tropes, before Happy Somewhere In Between captures the trio in a state of sustained, melodious euphoria, with re-purposed old-school hooks by the truckload. The title track’s melodramatic fuzz guitar overture, shape-shifting grooves and Sjöblom’s explosive organ…

For the glory of shred. Nine years after their last collaboration on 2011’s excellent Oceana, keyboard player Derek Sherinian and drummer/producer Simon Phillips have reunited for another blast of high energy progressive fusion. Joined by an all-star cast of guitarists and bassists, including Sons Of Apollo’s Billy Sheehan and Bumblefoot, Sherinian leans hard into the rock side of fusion, eschewing the lighter touch of Weather Report for the much punchier approach of mid-70s Jeff Beck. He can bring an impressive amount of bite to his playing, slugging it out with Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Zakk Wylde on the title track, and going toe-to-toe with Megadeth’s Kiko Loureiro in Pasadelo, which finds the band smartly shift gears into an acoustic Brazilian Bossa Nova in the midsection. Bluesman Joe Bonamassa shows up for…

New studio album plus the 2018 Quiet Room session. Still Alive was born in lockdown but Peter Jones clearly realises that an album of material that just addresses the current state of the world would be about the last thing that listeners emerging out of it would want to hear. Instead, he delivers a wide range of new recordings plus a bonus DVD with live in the studio versions of Tiger Moth Tales favourites. The song Still Alive finds Jones reminding us of what we still have, while he taps back into a feeling of home and nostalgia, and projects these thoughts towards the future. The sentiments are positive, the tune strong and Jones’ vocals typically heartfelt. A further shot in the arm comes with The Mighty Fallen, a lengthy…

As the singer for the Steve Rothery Band and Dave Kerzner’s project In Continuum, Gabriel Agudo has been eclipsed by the ‘name’ members of these groups. With his self-released solo debut New Life (gabrielnewlife.bandcamp.com) however, Agudo can at last get some acclaim for his own soulful talent and songwriting skills. This is a gentle and thoughtful work of spiritual scope, and it certainly doesn’t hurt that he can call on Rothery, Kerzner, Arena’s Clive Nolan and other progerati to render his highly listenable tapestry. Keyboardist/musical director Ed Roth has a CV that includes Top 10 US jazz albums and sessions with the likes of the Eagles’ Joe Walsh, Judas Priest’s Rob Halford and ELP’s own Keith Emerson. Roth’s latest album, Can’t Find My Way Home (Funzalo) includes his own pianistic…

Double vinyl reissue for neo-proggers’ troubled third album. Originally released in 1995, Galahad’s third album had a rather tortuous and testing gestation. As the band tell it, producer Tony Arnold was working on King Crimson’s Frame By Frame box set concurrently with Sleepers, which caused delays to the latter record, driving Galahad into debt and almost ending their career. The incrimination and ire that resulted dragged on for years; the situation was only resolved after a bizarre and unseemly stand-off that involved handing over cash in exchange for the master tapes, by which time the neo-prog bubble that spawned them had long since burst, and the band were left high and dry. Despite the tumult and bad memories that surround it, time has been kind to Sleepers, released here for…