Reflectors of Light is a phrase from the lyrics of A Mead Hall in Winter, the same goes for Merchants of Light. Both phrases suggest the world of Big Big Train (BBT) and are therefore extremely suitable as a title…
View More Big Big Train – Reflectors of Light
Shock! Horror! On Robert Wyatt’s birthday, 28th January 2020, Kellen Mills and Nic Barnes have announced that they have disbanded Alex’s Hand. I feel somewhat shortchanged as I found the band only after what has turned out to be their…
View More Alex’s Hand – Hungarian Spa
“Make a wish, ride a bike, you can do anything you like”, says the third optimistic line from opening track Just Bloody Lovely. It carries an extra poignancy, given its writer’s precarious condition. One half of Churn Milk Joan is…
View More Churn Milk Joan – I’m nearly 60 miles high
I think we can all admit that there are some albums which speak to us more than others. Last year there were two such, which became favourite releases of 2019, not just because they were amazing works of art (which…
View More Oceanica – OneDark
In this update we feature: • Seven That Spells – The Trilogy Live at Roadburn • Casimir Liberski – Cosmic Liberty • Petbrick – I • Jeffrey Brooks with Bang On A Can All-Stars & Contemporaneous – The Passion •…
View More A Different Aspect #33
To put it very simply, John Holden has done it again. Lightning has indeed struck twice, after 2018’s Capture Light. In Rise And Fall, John Holden has released a very fine album, encompassing a range of fascinating stories, packed with…
View More John Holden – Rise And Fall
The quartet from Warsaw, founded in 1969, celebrated its 50th anniversary last year, an ideal opportunity to re-release a number of older albums and to bring them to the attention with, in addition to Mrowisko, also Senne wędrówki (Polish for…
View More Klan – Senne Wędrówki
There are many bands playing the almost oxymoronic styled retro-prog, and few do it in a way that interests me. If the music is too honorific, derivative or comparable with the greats of the past, I can’t really see the…
View More Guranfoe – Sum of Erda
I’m not sure what I was expecting from Mariana Semkina’s first solo outing, but it wasn’t the opening track of Sleepwalking. Dark Matter treads the same neo-classical approach of iamthemorning, though Gleb’s piano is noticeably absent, of course. It’s an…
View More Mariana Semkina – Sleepwalking
The second studio release of Croatian band Doringo, Gužva u Svemiru is described by the band as their first venture into a form of world music they are calling ‘geographical rock’, or geo-rock. It’s an interesting premise, certainly, and apparently…
View More Doringo – Gužva u Svemiru