I will admit to being more than a bit chuffed when Malcolm Galloway of Hats Off Gentlemen Its Adequate offered early access to the band’s ninth and newest album, Parallel Lives. There’s always that moment of “what will I do if I don’t like it?” Having lived with the album for the last month or so, I can assure Mr. Galloway and the rest of you that those fears were absolutely misplaced. Parallel Lives is a beautiful, harrowing, dark and rewarding listen, beginning to end.
As Galloway explains on his Bandcamp page, he learned that he has a rare, progressive, incurable neurodegenerative retinal disease that is causing visual loss and distortion. Along with some mental challenges, the two diagnoses have informed the music on this album. Cohort Mark Gatland offers a form of sympathetic co-performance that can only come from years of friendship (the pair have performed together since their school days). Together, they have created an album that does not wallow in self-pity, but neither does it shy away from the harsh realities that life throws at us.
My Blistering Mind tosses the listener into the deep end right at the start. Breathless musical delivery and rapid-fire vocal melodies conjure the difficulties of a mind overwhelmed by both circumstance and mental challenges. Pulsing bass, skittering guitar and Pet Shop Boys-style synths draw you into the maelstrom.
The Mandatory Prize offers no respite from the turmoil. Forceful, fat synths and off-kilter rhythms wrestle with shifting time signatures and a bass-heavy mix to generate the uneasy feeling of someone forced to play a role they have not chosen but must appear grateful for. Never Really Felt Like Home provides a rest from the jitters, but not from the existential dread. The first of several instrumental tracks, the melody is carried by Kathryn Thomas’ (Galloway’s wife) woodwinds. There is an undisguised sense of otherness, of discomfort and an inability to fit in. That perception is taken further by the guitar lead, rendering the song’s title frightfully tangible.
Picking up where the opening track left off, both musically and stylistically, Smile, Smile, Smile is all nervous drums and disconnected vocals, its minor key building on the darkness. Lyrics like Nobody knows who you are/You never existed and I wish I’d heard of you so I could be impressed are both self-deprecating and soul crushing.
The somber tones of Smile are followed by another instrumental track, Intermission, which does nothing to lift the veil. The tune is driven by acoustic piano and an unusually funky bass line, jazzy keys, and a hint of atonality. The sustained organ chords that follow offer a moment of breathing room before the keys go all sorts of bonkers to take the song home. The title track is a relatively spare piano piece which feels all the more haunting for the room it leaves, like the echoes in an empty house. It deals with two people whose lives no longer intersect, so the arrangement and Thomas’ vocal harmonies on the chorus only serve to deepen the meaning of “haunted”.
The proggiest piece on the album, Eversion begins with a repeatedly whispered “wake up”. The tale of a surgeon who is forced to live through similar circumstances across timelines, the music appropriately jumps from one mood to another. The short guitar solo cuts like the proverbial scalpel. Simultaneously nerve wracking and empathetic, the mood of devastation continues apace. Instrumental Pretty Blue Fox is an exercise in electronica that would not be out of place on an Enigma album. Slinky bass and sullen atmospherics push the song toward a rewarding, cinematic climax. Guitars move to the fore on Just Another Thing, featuring yet one more hyperactive vocal. The propulsive rhythm underlines the sensation of being overwhelmed by everything that life throws your way, while the synth solo cuts through it all to remind you of the band’s pop sensibilities. Shifting tempos mark the final instrumental piece, Dropping The Mask. Its electric piano trades leads with synths in a very Alan Parsons Project manner. An almost subliminal guitar solo piles on the mysterious vibes.
The album’s centrepiece and emotional resolution is Just Hold On (Parts I and II). Drawing from Galloway’s modern classical well, the choral introduction is perceived as disembodied, floating above the elegantly spare orchestration, untethered and searching. It is beautiful, ethereal and troubling all at once.
When subsumed by an electric guitar, a ray of hope finally shines down on the proceedings. Bass and synths eventually fill in the background. When the drums kick in, the song finds its footing, setting the stage for the album’s best vocal performance. Whether Galloway is trying to convince himself or someone else, the pathos and emotion are real. He sings, Just hold on, it’s not too late/To keep on, to hold on… You’re not alone. Just Hold On is a powerful capstone to an album that finds reasons to push forward when everything around you is pulling you down.
The album concludes with radio edits of both My Blistering Mind and The Mandatory Prize, neither of which feels significantly different from the album versions.
Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate have walked through the fire and forged a record of those hard truths and unflinching observations, yet still see the light at the end of the tunnel. Parallel Lives is not an easy listen lyrically, and its ability to musically telegraph the unease and tribulations that accompany those words is impressive. You might want to dance, cry or roar along with the songs on this album, but you will not be disengaged. This time it’s personal.
TRACK LISTING
01. My Blistering Mind (3:36)
02. The Mandatory Prize (4:17)
03. Never Really Felt Like Home (4:26)
04. Smile, Smile, Smile (4:37)
05. Intermission (2:40)
06. Parallel Lives (3:45)
07. Eversion (6:59)
08. Pretty Blue Fox (5:52)
09. Just Another Thing (4:21)
10. Dropping The Mask (3:43)
11. Just Hold On (Pts 1 & 2) (9:08)
12. My Blistering Mind (Radio Edit) (3:42)
13. The Mandatory Prize (Radio Edit) (4:17)
Total Time – 61:23
MUSICIANS
Malcolm Galloway – Lead Guitar, Synths
Mark Gatland – Bass Guitar, Vocal Engineer, Additional Guitars, Synths
~ With:
Kathryn Thomas – Flute, Bass Flute, Piccolo, Vocals
ADDITIONAL INFO
Record Label: Independent
Country of Origin: UK
Date of Release: 4th September 2026
LINKS
Hats Off Gentlemen It’s Adequate – Website | Facebook | Bandcamp | YouTube | Instagram
