A taster from Stolen Earth, whose new website goes live any day now. This is the first new song we’ve heard from them, and I like it a lot. Very strong echoes of Breathing Space, with a hint of recent Marillion for good measure.
Can’t wait to see them live at the Cambridge Rock Festival in August now – they’re playing on Saturday along with Panic Room, Chantel McGregor, Larry Miller and headliners The Quireboys.
With the retail release of The Phoenix Suite upon us, Heather Findlay has been busy setting up some tour dates to promote it.
A couple of festival dates with the full band (Heather, Chris Johnson, Dave Kilminster, Steve Vantsis and Alex Cromarty) had been announced earlier, the first being the Cambridge Rock Festival on Friday 5th August, followed by The Galtres Festival in Yorkshire on the 28th of the month. Long before that there’s an acoustic date at the Lincoln beer festival on 28th May, as a duo with Chris Johnson.
In October, Heather will be the special guest for Touchstone on their album launch tour, again performing an acoustic set accompanied by Chris Johnson. This certainly came as something as a surprise. Touchstone, as readers of this blog are aware, are a tremendous live act, very much a prog-rock band, albeit with the emphasis on “rock”. This promises to be a great tour.
Four dates are confirmed.
13 Oct 2011 – Mr Kips, Poole
14 Oct 2011 – The Borderline, London
15 Oct 2011 – Riverside, Newcastle
16 Oct 2011 – The Robin 2, Bilston
Heather then follows this with her own headlining tour with the full band, with three five gigs announced so far.
17 Nov 2011 – The Brook, Southampton
18 Nov 2011 – Fibbers, York
19 Nov 2011 – Classic Grand, Glasgow
26 Nov 2011 – The Borderline, London
27 Nov 2011 – The Robin 2, Bilston
I’m very much looking forward to these; it’s been far too long since we’ve seen Heather on stage, and she’s always an exciting and dynamic performer. I’m sure the five songs from The Phoenix Suite are going to come over very well live. With the EP only 25 minutes in length it will be very interested to see what else she’ll play to make up a headline-length set. More new material which will appear on future EPs? A few reworked Mostly Autumn and Odin Dragonfly favourites? Some interesting and eclectic covers? Extended Dave Kilminster guitar wig-outs? Or perhaps all of the above?
I’m sure it’s going to be well worth the wait.
Updated 14/5/11 with additional tour dates
Great showing for both Mostly Autumn and Panic Room at the Classic Rock Society awards, where they all but swept the poll.
That’s a whopping five-and-a-half awards for Mostly Autumn!
While the CRS awards are less significant that things like the Classic Rock Presents Prog readers poll (in which MA and PR also did very well indeed, against far broader competition), it’s still a very strong endorsement of the new-era Mostly Autumn from a wider community than the hardcore fans.
This ought to serve as a reminder to the small but vocal minority of disillusioned former fans who don’t care for the new lineup that while they may be honest and sincere in their opinions, they are still in the minority.
Including some brief sound clips from a song which I believe is called “Mirror Mirror”. Whether there is some association with prog band Spock’s Beard, I have no idea. Adam Dawson’s guitar certainly sounds very Floydy on this one.
Here’s Breathing Space premièring the song “Lips Are Too Dry” at the 2010 Cambridge Rock Festival. It’s a song written by bassist Paul Teasdale, which I hope will become part of the Stolen Earth songbook
The 2011 Cambridge Rock Festival is looking like another good one! Return appearances by Panic Room and Chantel McGregor following their great sets last year; hopefully both will be higher up the bill. Mostly Autumn are on the bill yet again for the fourth year running.
And perhaps most significant of all, Heather Findlay will be playing with her new band, featuring Chris Johnson, Dave Kilminster, Steve Vantsis and Alex Cromarty, for what will be one of her first appearances as a solo artist. I remember some rather heated arguments on her forum over whether she ought to start off her solo career with high profile headline sets or to play some supports to build up an audience; it didn’t occur to anyone that she’s launch her career as a solo artist by playing some of the summer festivals. But it does make a lot of sense given that she won’t have a full album’s worth of material to promote.
Love to see both Stolen Earth and whatever Chris Johnson’s Parade (or whatever they’re renamed to now some “ciphers of budget rave-tinged Auto-Tuned dance muzak” backed by a lot of hype have stolen their name) on the bill. Stolen Earth are certainly up for it, and most of Parade will be there anyway.
Update: Not on the CRF website yet, but Stolen Earth are apparently now on the bill! Gets even better.
There was an announcement on Facebook a couple of days ago about a new band, “Stolen Earth”, with the following lineup:
Regular readers of this blog (all four of you) will probably notice that four out of the five members of the band were in the final incarnation of Breathing Space.
While many fans were saddened that Breathing Space had decided to call it a day a month ago, there was always the expectation that at least some members of the band would continue to work together on new projects. Indeed, it soon became apparent to anyone with the ability to read between the lines that most of that final incarnation of the band were likely to continue as a band with a new name. Stolen Earth are that band.
Breathing Space’s final few gigs with new members Heidi and Adam showed us a very different band from the one fronted by Olivia Sparnenn, and it feels like the much of spirit of that final lineup will be continuing as Stolen Earth. Obviously with a different keyboard player and a new songwriting team Stolen Earth will have a changed sound and a new trajectory. Certainly I hope that the new songs premièred at the Cambridge Rock Festival, work of Adam and Paul, become part of the new band’s songbook. They’re too good to fall through the gap between bands.
It will be very interesting to see how they develop. Can’t wait to see them live.
Their new website will be up and running soon, they assure me. In the meantime, go and “Like” the Stolen Earth Facebook page.
A long-awaited announcement from Heather Findlay today:
The time has come to announce the imminent release of my debut solo recording ‘The Phoenix Suite’.
It is the first 5 track EP in a series of 4.
Alongside myself and guitarist Chris Johnson, The Phoenix Suite features performances from Dave Kilminster on guitars, Steve Vantsis on bass and Alex Cromarty on drums and will be available to order very soon!
Thank you all for your patience and enthusiasm!
More details very, VERY soon…
Love Heather xxx
I’m very much looking forward to this release. Heather always had a distinctively melodic songwriting style within Mostly Autumn, and in the past we’d heard the sort of songs that have fitted comfortably within Mostly Autumn’s sound. While she’s recorded the excellent acoustic album “Offerings” with Angela Gordon as Odin Dragonfly, it will be very interesting to hear her stretch her musical wings with a full electric band. No real idea quite what it’s going to sound like, and Heather’s deliberately been giving us very few clues, but given the nature of the musicians involved I’m expecting it to be quite rocky. And I do have to say naming it a “suite” is a more than a bit Prog as a concept.
Interesting to see that Heather’s mapped out a further three EPs, which (depending on the song length of course) will amount to a double-album’s worth of material.
The latest issue of Classic Rock Presents Prog came out today, containing the results of 2010 readers poll, in which I remembered to vote this time!
It’s great so see so many of the bands I’ve travelled around the country to see feature a lot in the results. Both Mostly Autumn and The Reasoning did well, with MA’s “Go Well Diamond Heart” and The Reasoning’s “Adverse Camber at #3 and #5 in Best Album. The Reasoning also made #4 in Best Band, and Mostly Autumn’s “The Night In Leamington” at #5 in Best DVD, the latter very creditable when you consider the other four were Rush, Transatlantic, Porcupine Tree and Opeth, all bands of far higher profile
Not only that, Anne-Marie Helder, Kim Servior and Olivia Sparnenn took the top three positions in Best Female Vocalist. Not only lovely people, but three are great singers who have paid their dues slogging around what’s euphemistically knows as “the toilet circuit” for several years, and it’s certainly time to see them start to get the recognition they deserve. They’re all real singers who don’t need auto-tune and can very definitely cut it live, which is more than can be said for far too many of today’s chart-toppers. Forget X-Factor, it’s the Prog Factor that really counts.
And we shouldn’t underestimate the significance either. Classic Rock Presents Prog is not a subscription-only niche publication with a limited audience, it’s a widely-available newsstand publication with a readership of more than half that of the NME.
The other big prog news this week is the announcement of the several of the bands who will the playing the Classic Rock Presents Prog stage at High Voltage in July. Jethro Tull will be one of the headliners, with Mostly Autumn, Spock’s Beard, The Enid, Caravan and Pallas also on the bill. This is looking like a fantastic weekend already.
Cambridge Rock Festival 2009, with Mostly Autumn’s Bryan Josh on guitar
A sad announcement today is that York progressive rock band Breathing Space are calling it a day. As said on their official website:
After a lot of thought and deliberation, we are sorry to announce that Breathing Space has decided to disband.
We would like to thank everyone that has supported us over the last few years. It has been an exciting and wonderful journey and we have all enjoyed every moment. Whereas I am very sad that this project has come to an end, as one door closes another door opens, so watch this space…
All the best,
Iain Jennings
Iain Jennings, The Riga, Southend, March 2010
For those of you who aren’t regular readers of this blog, Breathing Space are the band Mostly Autumn keyboardist Iain Jennings and vocalist Olivia Sparnenn put together to promote Iain’s 2005 solo album “Breathing Space”. After Iain left Mostly Autumn at the beginning of 2006, the project took on a life of it’s own and became a band in it’s own right. Like many bands at their level, they’ve been though a number of lineup changes over the years. Barry Cassells replaced original drummer, Iain’s brother Andy in 2007. There was the departure of guitarist Mark Rowen in 2009, and most significantly of all the departure of Olivia Sparnenn in 2010 to take up a new role as lead singer for Mostly Autumn. The final incarnation of the band featured Heidi Widdop on vocals, and Adam Dawson on guitar.
Olivia Sparnenn, 2009 Cambridge Rock Festival
I first became of fan of the band after I met Olivia after a Mostly Autumn gig in February 2007, and she personally invited me to their gig at The Roman Baths in York the following weekend. At the time the band were without a permanent drummer, and Olivia’s father Howard was standing in; I remember him remarking to me that he didn’t want to occupy the drumstool on a permanent basis, since he thought having her dad on drums would rather cramp her style. That gig was plagued with severe technical gremlins, but I could see the potential there, and I thought Olivia Sparnenn was a real star in the making, A month later I saw them play a superb set at the Mostly Autumn fan convention in Ringwood, Hampshire, and said to bassist Paul Teasdale that give them a couple of years they’d be giving Mostly Autumn a run for their money. And I think I was right.
Paul Teasdale, The Riga, Southend, March 2010
Over the course of the following four years the band recorded two excellent studio albums, “Coming Up for Air” and “Below the Radar”, and played a great many memorable gigs. Among those that stick in the mind are the very emotional performance in Mansfield in May 2008, the stunning show at the Cambridge Rock Festival in 2009, and what appeared at the time to be a spectacular rebirth of the band with a brand new lineup at the same festival in 2010. Over the years their sound evolved, from the dominance of big soaring ballads and jazz-rock workouts in the Mark Rowen era, to the tougher hard rock orientated approach they took over the last couple of years. Even after Olivia left the band they managed to reinvent themselves once more with new singer Heidi Widdop, and things looked set for another chapter in the story.
Mark Rowen, 2008 Cambridge Rock Festival
In terms of the number of their gigs I’ve attended, Breathing Space are second only to Mostly Autumn. I’ve likened being a fan of a band at this level to being an away supporter of a lower-division football team. It involves travelling to towns like Crewe, Mansfield or Southend, often staying in dodgy B&Bs when it’s not possible to arrange lifts home. But there’s a great camaraderie amongst fellow fans, many of whom have become friends, as have some of the band. It’s quite different from being a fan of someone like Oasis. Part of being a loyal fan is you stick with them through the bad times as well as the good. Yes, there were times when a cloth-eared house soundman from a toilet of a venue rendered their finely-crafted music all but unlistenable to a sparse crowd. But there were times when they delivered mesmerising performances to appreciative audiences, or went down a storm at festivals. Sadly they were a band who I always felt deserved far more success than they ever achieved; they were worth far more than playing for sixty people in working-mens clubs in the East Midlands.
Heidi Widdop at the 2010 Cambridge Rock Festival
At the time of writing, nobody from the band has given any specific reason for the split, and since I know some of the band personally I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to speculate about it on a public forum. So here’s to the past four years. Let’s remember the good times, and I hope to see all the band involved in exciting new projects over the coming months and years. There may not be any more chapters in the Breathing Space story, but I hope for and expect at a sequel.
2010 has been an annus horribilis for the prog scene. It started with Heather leaving Mostly Autumn, with knock-on effects on Breathing Space. Touchstone parted company with their drummer. Crimson Sky parted company with their singer. And Karnataka imploded altogether, just days before a gig. Even Panic Room had to find a new bass player. And that’s before we get to the major league bands like Dream Theater losing Mike Portnoy. It’s got to the point where I daren’t speculate on what might happen next lest it happens.
And now there’s one more.
As announced today on The Reasoning’s website, guitarist, vocalist and founder member Dylan Thompson is leaving the band.
We are saddened to advise you all that Dylan Thompson has resigned from The Reasoning with immediate effect. His decision is a personal one and we all respect that. Over the past five years we have shared much fun and creativity together. All of The Reasoning wish Dylan every happiness and success for the future.
Whilst this event has obviously come as a surprise, The Reasoning’s November tour dates will very definitely be going ahead.
It’s a real shock. I know that The Reasoning have gone through a lot of lineup changes since I first saw them live at The Uplands Tavern in Swansea in January 2007, but Dylan, as well as being a really great guy was always part of the creative heart of the band, co-writing almost all of their material. He will surely be missed.
When a core member leaves a band, there are always going to be fears for the future. But look at how many people wrote off Mostly Autumn after a similar enforced lineup change at the beginning of the year, and even those of us who were guardedly optimistic had our doubts. Then look how strongly they bounced back.
As the announcement says, the November tour will be going ahead, with a slimmed-down 5-piece version of the band.