The one and only time I saw Todd Rundgren live was on the 4th August 1979 supporting Led Zeppelin at what would turn out to be the mighty Zep’s penultimate gig on home soil. Back then I knew nothing about…
View More Todd Rundgren & Utopia – Live At The Electric Ballroom, Milwaukee, 23rd October 1978 / Live At The Old Waldorf
Mostly Norwegian sonic explorers Ulver have over the two decades and more of their existence steadily built a reputation for never standing still, of always looking to see where that rugged path over there – yes, that one disappearing into…
View More Ulver – ATGCLVLSSCAP
It is always a treat to be reviewing anything beamed down from the rarefied world of Karda Estra, and the new(ish) EP Future Sounds is no exception to that rule. Karda Estra, aka Richard Wileman, has followed up their last…
View More Karda Estra – Future Sounds EP
Ikarus are based in Zurich and variously describe themselves as “minimal groove”, “Nordic soundscape”, and “prog jazz”, and they are indeed all of these and more. Chief among the self-penned descriptions on their Facebook page is “EVOCATIVE MUSIC”. The uppercase…
View More Ikarus – Echo
Three years on from their first album, Lightships, London avant-folk band Firefly have struck a match and become Firefly Burning for their second album Skeleton Hill. The resulting sulphurous heat produced has warmed their sound with an added urgency and…
View More Firefly Burning – Skeleton Hill
Three years after 2012’s Quickly, Quickly, Quickly, a rather lopsided release dominated by a somewhat disjointed sprawling epic, and an album that seemed to let its sheer ambition get the better of it, these New Jersey nu-proggers by the name…
View More The Tea Club – Grappling
I have had this album at the top of the “to do” pile for a while, but as the Yuletide season of merriment was then upon us, it seemed entirely wrong to disrupt any warm festive glow you may have…
View More Transport Aerian – Darkblue
Hold on to your hat, for you are about to take a thrill-a-minute rollercoaster ride through the untrammelled imagination of Jacopo Costa and friends. Calling at all stations, from doo-wop through pop, Euro-folk, classic RIO moves, and on eighth track…
View More Loomings – Everyday Mythology
As a stop gap between his fourth solo album Hand.Cannot.Erase. and whatever is coming next, The Hardest Working Man In Showbiz is keeping his audience sated with this mini-album. 4½ comprises four tracks recorded at the H.C.E. sessions, one from…
View More Steven Wilson – 4½
I have been meaning to write about this truly visionary piece of work all year, but what with one thing and another have never found the time. As the album became a year old on 1st December, it is now…
View More Peter Hammill – …all that might have been…