Partners in life and music, Jo Spratley and Bic Hayes snuck this album out in September with such a lack of fanfare that apart from those in the know, barely anyone registered its existence. The Lead Of Saturn Is Gold To The Wise is an album that is as alchemical as its title suggests, plucked out of the ether and forged by industry and songwriting on the hoof into something quite beguiling.
Attempt to stuff it into a pigeonhole and it will slip through your fingers like golden sand. Impressionistic to the last moment, herein lies nearly 40 minutes of dark psychedelic pop that glitters in the specks of gold dust it has created from nothing.
Jo’s lyrics are improvised to at least some degree and marry with Bic’s psychedelically-tinged music in a harmony of spheres. A creative Venn diagram where the overlapping proportion ebbs and flows akin to minor tidal movements on a lake shore.
We are led into a low-gravity swirling netherworld on opener BIMBO, an impressionistic creature that leaves clues just out of reach. “…the million calm in the back of your mind deeply it shines like a bunch of luck” sings Jo at the end. Damn! Why can’t I remember the pop song that IDIOT MILK is teasing me with? An upbeat affair, this gets to the heart of the matter in hand, its gloopy lyric is practically oozing out of the speakers.
THEY WHO KNEW gets all psychedelic-Gothic on us, and has a guitar break of all things, and if such concepts have a point these days, would make a good single. The title track T L O S I G T T W bounces along in a menacing fashion, Jo’s treated voice lending it an eerie ambience. This is just one more mysterious piece of a jigsaw that is slowly coming together to produce an album whose atmosphere nods to a more famous punky couple, namely Siouxsie and Budgie. Damn (again!), I made a comparison, I try not to do this. See, it’s having a disorienting effect on this scribbler.
My favourite song title on this is I WOOSH. The whole album wooshes if you ask me, but this confection follows on from the very odd NINEMILLION with a thrumming deep bass pulsebeat to a simple drum pattern, while Jo’s soft but distinctive tones tell another one of her impressionistic tales. The whole thing is quite hypnotic.
“…oh delicate long flung star dream of the deep lean in the steep incline of elegant love see her shards there in the thick of it…” goes DON’T ENCOURAGE HER, and it seems a lot of these lyrics are painterly sweeps at describing love in one way or another, and most often, just out of reach, or recently passed. I’m probably completely wrong. Possibly the most pop thing on the record, it is a great place to end.
The Lead Of Saturn Is Gold To The Wise is an unusual album, and it is certainly progressive but definitely not prog. Listen to it when the stars seem to be shimmering more than usual.
TRACKLIST
01. BIMBO (1:53)
02. IDIOT MILK (2:54)
03. DOLL HANDS (4:25)
04. THEY WHO KNEW (3:11)
05. T L O S I G T T W (6:41)
06. DROWNED IN MIRACLES (4:08)
07. NINEMILLION (1:07)
08. I WOOSH (4:21)
09. M U M M Y (5:45)
10. DON’T ENCOURAGE HER (3:59)
Total Time – 38:30
MUSICIANS
Jo Spratley – All Voices, Tenor Recorder, Bass, Drums, Percussion
Bic Hayes – Guitars, Keys, Synths, Bass, Drums, Production
ADDITIONAL INFO
Record Label: Independent
Country of Origin: UK
Date of Release: 5th September 2025
