Cairo will be playing Boston Music Rooms on 31st March with the prog-metal power trio Kyrbgrinder as support, billed as “Scarab Spring”. The band also confirm that Lisa Driscoll, who stepped in at very short notice for the November launch shows is now a permanent member of the band.

We are pleased to be playing this London show in advance of the Nineteen-73 Promotions Stephen Lambe Birthday Special at Bilston on 2nd April.

We are even more pleased that the mighty Kyrbgrinder, who are enjoying something of a renaissance, will be launching proceedings with their powerful sound and massive drumming from one of the best in the business – the inimitable Johanne James, also, of course, of Threshold fame. With Lisa Driscoll now a permanent fixture in Cairo – this will very much be a ‘Beauty and the Beast’ show, although whether that reflects band playing order will be for others to decide…!”.

It’s released on March 2nd, but you can pre-order it now from the above links.

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.

Thursday night is traditionally the warm-up for the festival proper, with tribute acts on the main stage, and local bands on stage two. While I don’t normally go in for tribute bands I did watch Fleetwood Bac, featuring former Karnataka lead singer Lisa Fury. They put on a great show, not only great musicians but staying in character for the whole set, acting out the tension between Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham.

On on stage two, bonkers prog-metal trio Kyrbgrinder headlined and kicked up a storm, Johanne James performing the near-impossible feat of playing full-on metal drums and singing lead at the same time. To add to the fun he had a sizeable proportion of the audience dancing behind the band.

Friday had a blues theme on the main stage, and stage two hosted by the Classic Rock Society. The CRS stage opened with Airbridge, a trio with an interesting instrumental sound. They had an intricate Canterbury-scene feel, but were let down by very weak vocals. They gave the impression that if only they got themselves a proper lead singer there was a lot of potential there. Over on the main stage, The Detours were playing some excellent old school twin-guitar hard rock, throwing in a killer cover of Kansas’ “Carry On Wayward Son”, which was great, but didn’t completely overshadow their own songs.

Then it was back to the CRS stage, for three-piece The Tirith making neo-prog sounds with some impressively fluid lead guitar. After them, Dead at Eleven’s hard rock/electronica crossover featured some strong songwriting and an energetic performance, and made quite an impact. 25 Yard Screamer were less impressive. Their prog-metal ticked all the right boxes but there was something missing, let down by ordinary vocals and a weak rhythm section.

An intro tape featuring a hammed-up reading of “Jekell and Hyde” set the tone for the theatrical goth-metal of Symphony of Pain, who turned out to be the best band on the CRS stage up to that point. On record they’re a duo of vocalist Tracie Law and multi-instrumentalist Pam Chowdam, live they’re a five piece including Kyrbgrinder’s Johanne James on drums and a guitarist dressed as a monk. They indulged in some theatrics with a guest appearance from Nurse Whiplash, but it was Pam Chowdam’s virtuoso electric violin playing that really set them apart and grabbed the attention.

After a few songs from The Room’s highly melodic neo-prog it was over to the main stage for one of the festival regulars, blues-rock guitarist and singer-songwriter Chantel McGregor making her fourth appearance on the main stage. As expected her set was a mix of short punchy original numbers from her début album “Like No Other” and reworked standards used as vehicles for extended guitar workouts, with some spectacular playing on Hendrix’ “Voodoo Chile” and Robin Trower’s “Daydream”. We were also treated to an interesting cover of Prince’s “Purple Rain” and a brand new original that gave a tantalising glimpse of the long-awaited new album she’s currently working on. There was an electrifying intensity to the set that made this a headline-standard performance and then some.

The Jeff Green project were special guests on the CRS stage. Despite being up against blues-rock guitar-shredder Larry Miller on the main stage they still drew a sizeable crowd and didn’t disappoint. Formed by a one time member of an Eagles tribute band and featuring Big Big Train’s Sean Filkins on lead vocals for several songs, the seven-piece band had a multi-layered west coast rock meets prog sound, and despite the late start and shortened set they made a strong impression.

After that, main stage headliners Snakecharmer were a little disappointing. The supergroup with former UK Whitesnake members Micky Moody and Neil Murray have outgrown being a glorified Whitesnake tribute act by recording an album of brand new material which featured heavily in the set alongside late 70s Whitesnake standards, and though the new songs are good, the set didn’t quite have the buzz they’d had headlining on previous years.

The main stage took a rock theme for Saturday, with the second stage becoming the blues stage. First up on the main stage were Roolz, a band so young none of them had shaved, and very good for their age. They played 80s-style hard rock with an occasional touch of U2 and 70s Elton John. It will be interesting to watch how they develop. Hopefully they will avoid getting chewed up and dumbed-down by the corporate music biz. Following them came Northsyde, who made a very strong impression with their blend of hard rock, blues and funk. The gutsy vocals of Lorna Fothergill sounding more than a little like a youthful Robert Plant.

The rather generic blues of Split Whiskers wasn’t quite as strong, though they were still entertaining enough aside from having far too much harmonica. By comparison, Walkway’s hard rock by numbers didn’t really impress. Their set contained rather too many covers, which showed up their own writing, and Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way” just doesn’t work with male vocals. Fireroad were a little better with their heads down no nonsense four chord boogie, shades of Status Quo with added psychedelic solos and the occasional touch of ZZ Top.

Things improved a lot with Pearl Handled Revolver. Their organ-driven psychedelic blues was the first real break from the guitar-dominated sounds of the earlier acts of the day. Without a bassist keyboardist Simon Rinaldo filled in basslines on pedals, which wasn’t the only comparison with The Doors. At times the swirling Hammond recalled Uriah Heep. This is a band who have received quite a bit of hype, and they were certainly interestingly different.

Nobody was quite sure what to expect from Leon Hendrix, brother of the legendary Jimi Hendrix. Sadly his set turned out to be the nadir of the day. Leon is no guitar player, just about capable of strumming a couple of chords, and not much of a singer either, and he was carried by a competent if unexceptional band featuring a guitarist from a Hendrix tribute act and two backing vocalists to carry the tune when he couldn’t. The set was a mix of Hendrix standards and formless jams, and the only good moments were when Chantel McGregor and Ben Poole joined him briefly on stage and ran rings around his own guitarist. The whole thing left the impression that this was a complete non-musician cynically trying to cash in the family name.

1980s AOR veterans FM headlined the main stage and were everything the preceding act were not, with a tight, professional and energetic set. With Steve Overland on fine form vocally and “new” guitarist Jim Kirkpatrick shredding with the best of them, and vastly better sound than Snakecharmer the previous night. Bernie Marsden guested with the band for the encore, a cover of Whitesnake’s “Here I Go Again”. They were easily the best band of the day, despite me not knowing any of their songs bar that final encore.

To all fans and followers of Kyrbgrinder,

We apologise for the slowness in our response to address the issue of Kyrbgrinder and Kyrbgrinder250, but that’s not to say we’ve forgotten or taken for granted your earnest and most generous support and contributions.. In fact, far from it!

The band will make good ALL funds contributed towards K250, (a fund devised and implemented by our then manager Nick) which was intended to partially fund the recording of the next album. For the sake of clarity, we (The band) concluded that the announcement posted some weeks ago (regarding our dis-bandment) may have been a little premature. We have decided to delete it, in order to allow ourselves some well overdue time to think, breath and create a little space so we can re-evaluate our goals and more importantly, decide whether or not we’re still going to be creating music together.

We don’t have an imminent announcement regarding the latter but as mentioned, we must address the fact that contributors who wish to be reimbursed must be addressed. An email has gone out with information to all those who contributed. One persons email has bounced, so if you contributed and didn’t receive an email from us already, please contact kyrbgrinder@gmail.com and confirm your previous email address (to confirm identity) and we’ll sort it out.

For the rest of you!……………”Watch this space.”

Welcome news, and goes some way to clearing up the uncertainty following the disappearance of their earlier announcement.

It appears as though the prog-metal power trio Kyrbgrinder have split. A statement on The Kyrbgrinder Facebook page on Friday 29th March said that the band were calling it a day, and gathered a large number of tributes from fans. A couple of days later the announcement disappeared without explanation, and since then there’s been no unambiguous statement from either band or management on precisely what the true situation is. The official website at Kyrbgrinder.net is unreachable, and neither their MySpace or Twitter accounts have been updated for a very long time.

I never got to see Kyrbgrinder at one of their own gigs, but I was fortunate enough to see them no fewer than four times at the Cambridge Rock Festival, inccluding two headline spots on second stage. Kyrbgrinder were one of those bands for whom the recorded and live experiences were two quite different things. On record, examplified by their excellent album “Cold War Technology”, they packed a powerful metal punch, but they could also be quite melodic, even soulful. Live, they were visceral and in-your-face, with the intensity of something like Rage Against The Machine. Johanne James, fronting the band from behind the kit has a magnetic stage presense, singing lead and playing full-on metal drums at the same time. They were always a bit bonkers, and always entertaining, and I’ll never forget the way Johanne invited several young children on stage to sing backing vocals on one song.

If, as seems likely, they really have split, they will be much missed.

This is the fourth Cambridge Rock Festival and the third for which I’ve camped for the whole weekend. Held just outside Cambridge, it’s a small family-friendly festival with a strong emphasis on classic rock, progressive rock and blues. Sometimes it feels like stepping into a parallel universe where punk never happened and real musicianship is still respected.

Thursday night is really the warm-up, with a bill made up largely from tribute acts before the real business of the festival starts on Friday. I only caught the last three bands on Thursday night. The Pure Floyd Show were somewhat underwhelming, but The Ultimate Eagles, fronted by Danny Vaughan were a different deal. I’ve never been a huge Eagles fan, nor a fan of tribute bands in general, but I have to admit this lot were good – really tight and professional, and gave the impression they actually loved the music they were playing. The day ended with veterans The Hamsters with a great mix of originals and blues-rock standards; their entertaining set showed just why this hard-working band are so popular.

I spent much of Friday watching bands on the smaller second stage, run that day by the Classic Rock Society. I did catch the opening band on the main stage, metal five-piece Neuronspoiler. They were entertaining to watch; high energy level with all the right moves and shapes. Just what’s needed to wake everybody up first thing in the morning.

Then it was over to stage two to see two bands I was looking forward to seeing. First of them were Also Eden, playing old-school neo-prog. With frontman Rich Harding previously having sung with a Marillion tribute band, comparisons with Fish-era Marillion are I suppose inevitable, though I could also hear echoes of Pendragon in there, albeit with a far better singer. And hats off to Rich, on stage on crutches, for being able to give such an impassioned performance. He was very badly injured in a terrible motorbike accident a while back, and is lucky to be alive, let along on stage fronting a band.

Following them were self-styled NWOBHM revivalists Morpheus Rising. Their great twin-guitar harmonies owe a lot to Iron Maiden, given something of gothic twist. Again, a tight band with a lot of energy.

Then it was back to the main stage for The Heather Findlay Band. There was a lot riding on this gig for her. The first solo EP since leaving Mostly Autumn last year, “The Phoenix Suite” revealed a stripped-down sound far removed from the multi-layered richness of Mostly Autumn, and gathered decidedly mixed reactions from many fans. Over the last couple of months she’s played a handful of low-profile gigs in very small venues, most of them as an acoustic duo with Chris Johnson. This set marked her return to a bigger stage with a full band after far too long an absence.

With a very talented band including Dave Kilminster on guitar and Steve Vantsis on bass, they began with two songs from the EP, “Phoenix” itself, followed by the spikiest number, “Cellophane”. Although the arrangements were still very close to the recordings, these new songs benefited from a meatier guitar sound, and the energy and dynamics of the live performance really brought the songs to life. Then Chris Johnson switched from guitar to keys for the Mostly Autumn oldie “Half a World”, and Dave Kilminster really let rip with some shredding lead guitar, which banished any lingering fears that Heather might be abandoning rock in favour of indie.

The rest of the eleven-song set was a mix of the remaining songs from The Phoenix Suite with some of her older numbers. Her choice of Mostly Autumn songs was very interesting. With the odd exception, rather than play her much-loved signature songs she chose songs which the band hadn’t been playing live for many years; overlooked classics drawing heavily from “Storms Over Still Water” and “Heart Full Of Sky”. There were some imaginative re-arrangements, like Dave Kilminster playing all the flute and clarinet lines on guitar. High spots for me were the really hard-rocking “Red Dust”, a powerfully brooding “Seven”, and a fantastic re-imagining of “Black Rain” with a very different vibe to the original. They ended with an electric version of “Yellow Time”, still recognisable as the same song, but the groove provided by Steve Vantsis and Alex Cromarty transformed it into something completely different from the acoustic original.

While Heather appeared nervous at the start, by the end of the set the whole thing had turned into a triumph. Her vocal performance proves she’s still one of the best female rock vocalists out there, backed by a seriously talented band. And the setlist, both old and new, shows she’s got more than enough songwriting talent to succeed as a solo artist. A real class act that upstaged almost everyone else on the bill that day. Heather Findlay is back, and means business.

After that it was back to the CRS stage. Godsticks were something of a disappointment. I’d seen this three-piece play a short support set for Chris Johnson’s Parade a year ago and found them quite entertaining. The intricate interlocking Zappa-influenced guitar and bass is great for a short while, but for a longer set the lack of variety becomes more obvious. The high spot was their excellent cover of Zappa’s “RDUNZL”, which highlighted their biggest weakness. Despite being supremely talented musicians, the compositional side of things really needs more work. Still, I’m sure there’s potential for the future.

Paul Menel was a lot better. He’d been described, perhaps unfairly, as “The Blaze Bailey of IQ”, fronting the classic neo-prog band for two albums in the second half of the 1980s before the return of original singer Peter Nicholls. Returning to the music scene after a long absence, He opened with IQ’s “Falling Apart at the Seams”, complete with a bizarre insertion of the Cadbury’s Flake jingle. Excellent set, mixing IQ songs from his time in the band with songs from his forthcoming solo album “Three Sides to Every Story”.

Power-trio Kyrbgrinder played the main stage last year, quite low down the bill on the Sunday. This year they headlined the CRS stage, and simply tore up the stage with one of the most high-energy sets I’ve ever seen at a festival. Whether you class them as prog-metal, or just metal, they’re an amazing band to watch. I’m not quite sure Johannes James manages full-on metal drums and singing lead at the same time, and I can’t think of anyone else who fronts the band from behind a drumkit. He’s got such a magnetic stage presence it’s easy to overlook the other two guys, bassist Alberto Flaibani and guitarist Tommy Caris. Despite some tremendous virtuoso shredding from Caris, Johannes drums still come over as the band’s priciple lead instrument. Great audience too; the tent was packed, with several nine-year olds moshing down the front, and it was lovely to see Johannes invite them on stage to sing backing vocals.

The Cambridge Rock Festival has cultivated something of a retro 70s/80s vibe, which is part of the festival’s appeal. But it’s also great to hear a band who actually sound modern, and produce music which sounds like it comes from the 21st century. Kyrbgrinder are that sort of band.

And so ended the first full day of the festival. I missed the main stage headliners; the pub-rock of Eddie and the Hot Rods or the glam-punk of Bubblegum Screw really weren’t my thing. For me, the day really belonged to Heather Findlay and to Kyrbgrinder.