Cadogan Hall, London Friday, 29th September 2017 A quick question about gig etiquette: Is it ever acceptable to stand at the edge of the balcony and shout at the band in mid-song because you can’t hear them properly? That’s what…
View More Big Big Train
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a prog album recorded in the 1970s must be in want of a Steven Wilson remix. Nowhere is that more true than with the Gentle Giant catalogue, in which complex, challenging compositions and…
View More Gentle Giant – Three Piece Suite (The Steven Wilson Remixes)
ANDY TILLISON GOES OFF ON ONE… We are living in troubled times. Brexit, Trump, terrorism and racism are threatening to tear our world apart – and, inevitably, that is reflected in some of the music our favourite prog artists are…
View More Andy Tillison – The Tangent
Andy Tillison has always been a composer who wears his heart on his sleeve, and on The Slow Rust Of Forgotten Machinery he’s in full-on political commentary mode, lashing the Brexiteers and the anti-refugee brigade with whip-like lyrics. It stands…
View More The Tangent – The Slow Rust Of Forgotten Machinery
Well, shiver me timbers and splice the mainbrace (whatever that is). Our favourite pirate-cum-vampire, Nad Sylvan, has risen from the grave with another cracking musical collection that shows he’s more than just a heavily made-up face. Step aboard me hearties…
View More Nad Sylvan – The Bride Said No
“Hello, is that the police? I’d like to report some missing guitar. No, not my guitars. They’re not worth anything, especially the classical guitar I bought from Lidl. No, the victim is Jarkka Rissanen and Sons of the Desert. I’ve…
View More Jarkka Rissanen & Sons of the Desert – Hybrid Soul
In 1985 Djam Karet released an album called No Commercial Potential. Thirteen years later they released an album called Still No Commercial Potential. They produced challenging, blistering, atmospheric instrumental music in outlandish time signatures – and they positively gloried in…
View More Djam Karet – Sonic Celluloid
As a reviewer, I try to wield the Sword of Truth while wearing the Trousers of Objectivity. No fawning and grovelling from me – fearless, searing honesty is my only approach. Publish and be damned is my philosophy. Just because…
View More Big Big Train – Grimspound
John Mitchell’s first Lonely Robot album, Please Come Home, was a big hit when it was released in 2015. Some reviewers even whispered – out of Steven Wilson’s earshot, obvs – that it might even be better than Hand. Cannot.…
View More Lonely Robot – The Big Dream
HERE’S how we roll at TPA – our editor offers up tasty morsels of all the new releases and we fall upon them like ravenous prog vultures, before deciding whether to scoff the entire meal. On this occasion, he dangled…
View More Freedom Fuel – Happy People