Music Blog

All the music-related posts gathered together in one place.

Mostly Autumn announce details of October Leamington show

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Tim Hall

Mostly Autumn have announced detials of the Leamington Spa show in October

We have a very special gig coming up at The Assembly, Leamington Spa on Sunday 9th October. This will be from 3pm until 10pm and will feature a Mostly Autumn acoustic set, where there will be performances by individual members, as well as the full band. This was received extremely well last year at the same venue – who knew Alex could play the guitar and sing?

We also have the absolutely amazing Papillon (Anna Phoebe and Nicolas Rizzi) – they captivate us every time we hear them, as I’m sure all of you who have seen them will agree.

Mostly Autumn will play two sets, the first being a set of songs which have inspired the band members – guaranteed some Pink Floyd and who knows what else!!! The second, a set of their own music in their own inimitable style, with Anna Phoebe as guest on a few numbers .

There will be an hour or so interval, during which there will be some time to say hello to the band.

Please join us for this festival of Mostly Autumn – back following the overwhelmingly positive feedback from last year. We’re looking forward to seeing you.

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What next for the music blog?

Posted on September 20, 2016 by Tim Hall

I know I write about this band a lot. But this blog is more than just a fan-site for one band

Here’s a question for readers of the music posts on this blog. Over the past couple of years I’ve focussed on album and concert reviews, news items focussing on the independent prog scene, and short opinion pieces which are often part of the ongoing music conversation of the day.

Are there other sorts of things you’d like to see on here? Here are some of the thoughts I’ve had.

  • Retrospective reviews of older records, either classic albums revisited or overlooked gems. I did one of these recently, for The Fire Sermon by The Violet Hour, which came out 25 years ago but was new to me. There are many more such pieces that could be written.
  • Overviews of bands, a bit like the “Cult Heroes” column in The Guardian, but with bands from the underground progressive rock scene, with the emphasis on bands who are no longer active.
  • I’ve written a couple of “Ten of the Best” features for The Guardian for the likes of Yes, Black Sabbath and Ritchie Blackmore, and these things are fun to wrire. But what about some Ten of the Bests for the smaller bands that feature a lot on this blog? It would have to be bands who have been going long enough to have produced a significant body of work, probably four albums at a minimum.
  • More news pieces. I tend to restrict news announcements to the bands I follow, like Panic Room or Mostly Autumn or their various spinoffs. But I get loads of press releases from PR agencies, often for higher profile acts. While the indie and pop announcements aren’t really relevant for this blog’s audience, a lot more are for the rock, metal and prog scenes. Should I published a few more of them?

Over to you. Any other things you’d love me to write about?

Posted in Music Opinion | 6 Comments

Voodoo Vegas – Freak Show Candy Floss

Posted on September 19, 2016 by Tim Hall

voodoo-vegas-freak-show-candy-flossVoodoo Vegas play old school twin guitar hard rock, and their second full-length album “Freak Show Candy Floss” makes a powerful statement of intent. The title reflects life on the road, driving hours to play high energy rock’n'roll in places like Merthyr Tydfil and Basingstoke, and how that dedication to live music must seem incomprehensible to those with 9-5 lifestyles.

From the opening chords of “Backstabber”, this is the sound of a band who mean business. Laurence Case has a classic hard rock voice, Ash Moulton and Jonno Smyth make a hard rocking rhythm section, and guitarists Meryl Hamilton and Jon Dawson serve up monstrous riffs and shredding solos. Which would all count for little unless the songs were there, but Voodoo Vegas have the songwriting chops to match.

It’s one of those albums where it’s hard to single out highlights. “Killing Joke” with its references to dancing with The Devil in the pale moonlight along with freaks and candyfloss is almost the title track. Then there’s there’s the blues-rock stomp of “Lady Divine” with Lawrence Case throwing in a harmonica solo. Some of the strongest songs appear on what would in the days of vinyl have been the second side of the record. “Black Heart Woman”, “I Hear You Scream” and the album closer “Walk Away” are driving hard rockers with barrelling riffs. There are a couple of changes of pace, with the swampy blues of “Poison” and the acoustic “Sleeping in the Rain”, but there’s no filler here, every song on the album is a belter.

This is an album of no-nonsense no-frills rock and roll that does what it says on the tin. When working within a fairly traditional form, you have to be very good at what you do to avoid sounding like a derivative pastiche of other, better bands that came before. Voodoo Vegas pass that test with ease. To put it simply, they rock.

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Peel and Prog

Posted on September 16, 2016 by Tim Hall

Haze

It was suggested on Twitter than the revival of progressive rock over the past decade and a bit was a consequence of the death of John Peel.

I’m not buying it.

It’s true that Peel, who famously dismissed Emerson Lake and Palmer as “A waste of talent and electricity” wasn’t a big friend of progressive rock. Any progressive band he did champion in the early days he dropped like a stone as soon as punk came along. And it’s also undeniably true that he had an enormous and possibly unhealthily excessive influence as a gatekeeper across several decades.

But the timing simply doesn’t support the hypothesis. Peel died in 2004, and the progressive rock revival began in the late 1990s with the emergence of bands from Porcupine Tree to Mostly Autumn. Surely the revival of a grassroots progressive scene has more to do with the rise of the internet allowing music fans and artists to bypass gatekeepers altogether? And possibly the 90s peak of Britpop was a factor too; that was a revival of precisely the sort of one-dimensional guitar pop that the original generation of progressive rock was a response to.

Anyway. I’m sure Peel would be playing bands like The Fierce and The Dead and Knifeworld if he was still alive.

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The Greying of Rock Fandom?

Posted on September 15, 2016 by Tim Hall

The Mentulls

Some thoughts struck me about the Cambridge Rock Festival back in August, which saw some discussion on Twitter.

There were one or two very young bands, such as The Mentulls, playing music in a very traditional classic rock style dating from before any of them were born. But the audience was overwhelmingly middle-aged, old enough to remember the heyday of blues-rock and prog from the first time around.

You see a lot of this in the progressive rock world. There are plenty of young bands like Haken, Maschine or Synaesthesia. Maybe it’s just an artefact of the festivals where I’ve seen them, but there don’t seem to be many of their own generation in the audiences. And the blues-rock scene is even worse. It’s as if anyone under the age of 35 who actually loves “old” music is already in a band.

As the existing audience continues to grey, who will replace them when they’re too old and infirm to get out to gigs?

Maybe I’m just being pessimistic here. Perhaps the bands would rather establish a niche than compete in a much more crowded market playing generic contemporary indie or pop. And maybe an audience of fiftysomethings whose kids have grown up and left home will actually age out more slowly than an audience of twentysomethings most of whom will drop out of music fandom when they get married and have kids?

What do you think?

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An Endless Sporadic – Magic Machine

Posted on September 15, 2016 by Tim Hall

endless-sporadic-metal-machine An Endless Sporadic is an instrumental project from composer and multi-instrumetalist Zach Kamins, On the album “Magic Machine”, he’s joined by guests including Dream Theater keyboard player Jordan Rudess and The Flower Kings guitarist Roine Stolt, with instrumentation going beyond standard rock and orchestral instruments to include such things as hand hammered lasagne trays.

The opener “Agile Descent” sets the tone. It starts with moody film-score atmospherics including violin and brass, then switches to jazz-fusion electric piano, before exploding into guitar-driven prog-metal. It goes on like that, a splendidly bonkers record, blending modern jazz, metal and symphonic rock with occasional hints of spaghetti western soundtracks and even Bavarian oompah music. Like the late, great Frank Zappa at his most inventive Kamins mixes disparate genres with gleeful abandon. You can sense the musicians enjoying themselves whilst making this record,

The music constantly twists and turns in unexpected directions, a reflective woodwind section or jazz piano run will lead into a spiralling metal riff, then to something else entirely. Often the first few bars give little indication of what’s to follow, a full orchestra on the intro can lead into a jagged prog-metal power-trio number, until it takes off on yet another tangent later on. But despite the undoubted virtuosity of the musicians involved, the complex, swirling kaleidoscopic arrangements emphasise composition over soloing.

One standout is “The Assembly” towards the end of the album, with it’s main theme first played on brass, including tuba for bass, then after some swelling strings the main theme returns, but this time played on metal guitars.

Titles like “Agile Descent”, “Galactic Tactic” and “Impulse II” imply a science-fiction theme, and “Sky Run”, “The Departure” and “Through the Fog” imply a picaresque journey, the whole thing could be the soundtrack for an imaginary space opera adventure, and the ever-changing music certainly takes you on an exhilarating journey through many musical moods and styles.

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Chantel McGregor at The Tropic at Ruislip

Posted on September 12, 2016 by Tim Hall

Chantel McGregor

Some photos of Chantel McGregor at The Tropic at Ruislip a few days ago, a part-seated gig in a small club in the West London suburbs.

Chantel McGregor

Rather than begin with the usual guitar-shredding fireworks, Chantel opted for a gentle start with the two solo acoustic numbers from her latest album before bringing in the rest of the band.

Chantel McGregor

The fireworks came later, of course. The set combined highlights from her albums, along with a couple of extended instrumental improvisations, one of which had something of the feel of Steve Rothery’s recent solo album. A tantalising glimpse of where Chantel might go next, perhaps?

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Heather Findlay replaces Knight Area at Summer’s End

Posted on September 8, 2016 by Tim Hall

Dutch neo-proggers Knight Area are out of Summer’s End festival.

As reported by Prog

The band say: “Due to technical demands which cannot be met, we have to withdraw from Summer’s End. Both organising committee and we as a band decided together in good harmony that we would not be able to take care of a top-notch show as the technical conditions we need to give our audience the show they deserve could not be fulfilled.

“Knight Area will be part of the Summer’s End festival in a future edition of the festival and we look forward to this. We feel sorry not to play, especially for the fans who bought tickets, but we hope you will understand that we only want to play if we can perform to the standards we think are necessary for a good show.

One can only specululate as to what these technical demands might be. But those of us with long memories may remember The Classic Rock Society’s Octoberfest in Wath-upon-Dearne way back in 2009.

Knight Area were special guests, with Breathing Space headlining on a bill that also included Mermaid Kiss (playing a very rare electric set) and Tinyfish. Despite not being the headliner Knight Area insisted on using their own sound board and sound engineer. This caused a significant delay to the start, throwing out the entire schedule, and forcing the headliners to play a truncated set because of the venue’s curfew. None of the other bands on the bill were impressed.

The replacement on the bill for Summer’s End is The Heather Findlay band, who were on superb form at the Cambridge Rock Festival in August.

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Doris Brendel – The Devil Closed the Door on Me

Posted on September 8, 2016 by Tim Hall

A hilariously sllly video for the song from Doris Brendel’s most recent album “Upside Down World”. Doris will be supporting Wishbone Ash in October and November on the following dates:

  • Friday 14th October 2016 – Haymarket, Basingstoke
  • Saturday 15th October 2016 – Mick Jagger Centre, Dartford
  • Tuesday 18th October 2016 – Princess Theatre, Hunstanton
  • Friday 28th October 2016 – The Jam House, Edinburgh
  • Saturday 29th October 2016 – The Lochgelly Centre, Lochgelly
  • Sunday 30th October 2016 – The Iron Works, Inverness
  • Wednesday 2nd November 2016 – ARC, Stockton-on-Tees
  • Thursday 3rd November 2016 – 53 Degrees, Preston
  • Sunday 6th November 2016 – Pontardawe Arts Centre, Pontardawe
  • Tuesday 8th November 2016 – The Arts Centre, Swindon
  • Wednesday 9th November 2016 – Ropetackle Arts Centre, Shoreham-by-Sea
  • Saturday 12th November 2016 – Cheese & Grain, Frome
  • Wednesday 16th November 2016 – Harpenden Public Halls, Harpenden
  • Thursday 17th November 2016 – The Flowerpot, Derby
  • Friday 18th November 2016 – The Picturedrome, Holmfirth
  • Saturday 19th November 2016 – Ashcon, The Grand, Clitheroe

Posted in Music News | Tagged , | 2 Comments

What next for The Enid?

Posted on September 8, 2016 by Tim Hall

Max Read with The Enid at HRH Prog 3

Following on from the recent departure of vocalist Joe Payne, guitarist Max Read and drummer Dave Storey are now leaving the bamd.

The loss of half the band suggests that The Enid are in disarray, though the statement from Robert John Godfrey quoted in Prog Magazine is a little more upbeat.

“Big seismic events, such as those which have been going on within The Enid, always lead to changes in the landscape. These destructive upheavals are just a reflection of life itself. There is always a future in the aftermath and the unexpected nearly always happens.

“Dominic was due to take over from Dave at the end of the year. Unfortunately Dave’s planned hip operation was rescheduled, leaving him un able to do the gigs planned. Dom Tofield is now The Enid’s drummer.

“Max has decided to follow my example and step down from appearing on stage with the band.

“My personal goal is to help The Enid find the next generation of music fans who are passionate about change and could relate to The Enid as it goes forward with its plans.”

With mainman Robert John Godfrey himself stepping down from active duty a year ago, The Enid were always going to be navigating uncertain waters without him at the helm.

There is nobody else quite like The Enid, and their ambitious symphonic music is, in a sense, the very definition of Progressive Rock. Let us hope these “big seismic events” represent a new beginning rather than the beginning of the end.

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