The Cambridge Rock Festival is a four-day event on the first weekend of August, with a focus on blues, classic rock and progressive rock. 2014 is the festival’s eleventh year, and the sixth to be held at the current location just outside the city. Continue reading
No, Geoff Tate. Firing you is not ‘career suicide’ for Queensrÿche. It may be different in other genres, but in the world of rock and metal, career suicide is releasing a string of substandard records, not getting rid of a prima donna once the band have long since jumped the shark.
A teaser from Purson’s forthcoming second album, recorded using genuine prog trousers.
Official video for Threshold’s new single, taken from the forthcoming album “For The Journey”.
One of Jump’s best songs. The story of John Henry, one of Jump frontman John Dexter Jones’ ancestors. A merchant seaman during World War One, he survived three sinkings, but never recovered from the trauma. He ended up as a beachcomber, haunted by memories.
Jump get labelled as prog, but despite John Dexter Jones having something in common with Fish in terms of vocal delivery, they’re not really a prog band. Despite being an electric rock band, they’ve got more in common with folk, especially the storytelling lyrical style.
We’ve already seen kickstarter-funded board games fail to deliver. Now it looks like the same has happened to a festival.
As reported by Metal Hammer:
The inaugural event in Kettering, Northampton, was to take place in just over two weeks – on the weekend of August 15-17. Headliners included Fields Of The Nephilim, Marilyn Manson and The Cult. Also lined up were Gary Numan, Killing Joke and over 170 others.
Manson tonight updated the gig listings on his official website and on Facebook, with Alt-Fest now marked as “cancelled”. Other acts due to play, including Cradle Of Filth, have also reported that they have been told the event is off.
While there has been no confirmation by the organisers, this slow-motion collapse seems very reminiscent of Memories of Woodstock back in 2009, when an over-ambitious promoter bit off more than he could chew, booked a lot of big-name bands and then failed to sell enough tickets to cover their fees.
With the way news is leaking out via the bands while the organisers have merely promised some sort of announcement on Monday, I’m seeing a lot of recriminations flying online. It’s very difficult to imagine the festival actually taking place.
In retrospect, the whole thing looks ridiculously over-ambitious, with 170 bands across seven stages in an already saturated UK festival scene.
Update: Altfest have posted on Facebook confirming the festival is cancelled. As suspected, lack of ticket sales is the reason, and reading between the lines it looks as though poor financial planning played a part. It does look as though the organisers lacked the necessary experience to put on a festival of that size.
Maschine have announced the departure of keyboard player Georgia Lewis
The rising-star prog outfit say Lewis wants to concentrate more fully on her folk music career, and describe their new member as an “elegant” addition to their lineup.
Luke Maschin’s outfit say: “Georgia has been a major asset and has played an important part in all of our achievements to date. Unfortunately, her energy cannot stretch as far as the role currently requires, as her true identity and full attention lies within her folk music.
The band’s new keyboard player will be Marie-Eve de Gaultier.
This was a rather special gig. When multi-instrumentalist Anne-Marie Helder rejoined the touring band at the beginning of the year the band stated that there were a handful of shows she would not be able to do because of prior commitments. Then a few days before the show the band announced that former member Angela Gordon, who Anne-Marie replaced back in 2008 would be standing in for her for the two shows in Cardiff and Bath.
It was lovely to see Angela on stage with the band again. She just handled just backing vocals and flute, with rhythm guitarist Chris Johnson covering additional keyboard parts on the handful of songs where two keyboard players were needed to avoid holes in the sound. Angela’s distinctive voice gave the harmonies a different feel, something noticeable on “Evergreen”, a song that Olivia Sparnenn has long since taken and made her own.
The setlist was the same as at Crewe a couple of weeks before. The first half was a mix of highlights from recent albums and standards from the early years. The flute showcase “The Last Climb” was naturally a highlight, with a very different solo from the one we’ve been used to. The first set ended with what has long been Olivia’s signature song, “Questioning Eyes”.
For the second half of the show the band played the new album “Dressed in Voices”. It’s one of the most musically ambitious records the band have ever made, the sort of album where the whole is far more than the sum of the parts, and benefits from being performed in its entirety. Which is precisely what they did. As at Crewe the songs come over very powerfully live. The whole thing packed a strong punch, but if I had to pick one standout it would be “Skin on Skin” with Alex Cromarty making his mark with some remarkable percussive pyrotechnics. It’s not often you can say that a drum solo was the high point of a set, and it’s certainly not the sort of thing you would have expected from a band like Mostly Autumn.
This is a band currently at the top of their game, coming back very strongly after last year’s occasional wobbles. Mostly Autumn now play a couple of festival dates before returning for a further series of gigs in the Autumn.
It has not been a good day for Dream Theater t-shirts. First there is this story of dodgy vet struck off for knowing animals in the (ahem) Biblical sense, with the BBC News story showing the guy wearing a Dream Theater shirt. (And if you click on that link, don’t say I ddn’t warn you).
Then there is this ridiculous story about Mike Portnoy.
You know how it’s a faux pas to wear a band’s shirt to see them live? It seems like it’s an even bigger faux pas to wear a Dream Theater shirt that was printed in the last four years to a Mike Portnoy signing.
Portnoy is of course the former drummer for DT, and left with a bit of drama behind it. So, when a fan showed up to a signing this weekend wearing a Dream Theater shirt with the artwork for Dramatic Turn Of Events on it, Portnoy was none too pleased.
Rather than letting it go, he decided to hop onto social media and rant…
Now, knowing a few members or former members of bands that went through acrimonous splits or worse, and I own quite a few t-shirts that I would never wear to some other band’s gigs, especially if I’m going to be anywhere near the front.
But I’d still expect musicians to behave professionally should they meet any fan wearing the “wrong” shirt at a gig.
So a bunch of gamers are celebrating the release of the 5th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons by burning their 4th Edition books. It seems the D&D Edition Warriors now make Yes lineup purists look like rank amateurs. Accusing me of being the president of their record company for writing a three-star review of their new album just can’t compete.