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Hey indeed, another bag load of albums that have passed our way recently, just a few, cherry picked, jsut a taste of soem of what has been explored here in recent days, the never ending mountain of music that piles up and up and up and the almost impossible task of dealing with it all in some kind of reasonable way. Mostly it really is about the sign posts, the hey, this is happening, here’s a taste of the music, here’s the link, go explore, our work is done here, no need to dance around the architecture of it all…

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Hey Colossus – Live in Leige – A beautifully raw recording of a full live show recorded at La Zone, Liege, on the band’s ‘In Blood / 20th anniversary’ tour on the 10th November, 2023 and made available as a download at a pay whatever the hell you want price via Bandcamp (you might like to note that all money goes to Crisis, the UK Based homelessness charity). This is great, this is warm, a warm sound, Hey Colossus have a warm flow, something that kind of wraps itself around you, I;m guessing if you don’t know the nalready then this really is;nt the place to start, then again, it might just be, that mean rumble of a bass riff that brings Oktave Dokkter to your ears could be the perfect place to get on the Hey Colossus ride and those fifteen minutes at the end that make up A Trembling Rose are worth every locked on progressively heavy alternative Kraut-rock flavoured second of the quarter of an hour it takes them to play it. Find the album on Bandcamp

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French TV – A Ghastly State Of Affairs (Cuneiform) –  “French TV’s newest album, A Ghastly State Of Affairs, is their 15th in their long history. It is also their first album not to be self-released. Headed up by charter member bassist/composer Mike Sary, he is joined again by guitarist Kasumi Yoneda (also from the Japanese band TEE), keyboardist Patrick Strawser (best known for his work in the 90’s band Volare), and now by the original drummer from FTV’s first three abums, Fenner Castner. The new album displays their ingenious knack for tricky arrangements, blazing solos, surprising left-turns, and their ability to tell a well-crafted yarn musically without words. Blending elements of progressive rock, fusion, cartoon music, and Rock-in-Opposition, the music of his group can be simultaneously hilarious and highly challenging, making it one of the most original American prog rock outfits and also one of the longest lived, having created 14 albums, toured Europe and the US a few times, and played many festivals” so reads the press release.

The album itself is entirely instrumental, some of it is classic fusion-flavoured 70’s jazz rock, always complex, never difficult or too hard boiled, maybe a little too “nice” and fluid in places. The best bits sound like the instrumental bits in classic 70’s Genesis songs that you wanted the band to expand on a bit more then they did, that bit these sounds like an instrumental passage from Jethro Tull’s Thick As A Brick and now things have gone a bit Santana shaped on us which may or may not be a good thing depend on your mood and the time of day. A Ghastly State of Affairs is an acquired taste (aren’t most things?), it is mostly noodling instrumental 70’s flavoured passages of prog rock and here comes a bit more of the press release…

“French TV began in Louisville, KY as an offshoot of an early ’80’s art-rock band Festung Amerika. Bassist Mike Sary and keyboardist/drummer Steve Roberts (currently with R.I.O. band Ut Gret) recruited guitarist Artie Bratton and drummer Fenner Castner, and the first album was released in 1984. Steve left the band to concentrate on his mail order CD business ZNR Records and his growing family, so Mike shepherded the band through many different members, tours, phases, and recordings through the present day.

The band’s current trajectory roughly began four albums ago with their 2016 release Ambassadors Of Good Health And Clean Living, when Mike was joined by guitarist Katsumi Yoneda. Pat Strawser signed up with their following CD, Operation: MOCKINGBIRD and brought more of a “clarity” to Mike’s slightly-less-than-coherent arrangements, as well as bringing in his own pieces (encouraged by the band!).

A Ghastly State Of Affairs opens with Patrick’s 18-minute opus Every Morning, I Wake Up And Take My Hat Off To All The Beauty In The World and could be considered FTV’s finest moment, with a haunting main theme, various sub-themes, powerful solos, especially the ones featuring the flute of Katsumi’s TEE bandmate Kenji Imai…” I think you get the picture. jazz flavoured  prog rock pieces for those who love that kind of thing, most won’t. you might, Here’s the Bandcamp link.

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Yama Uba – Silhouettes (Psychic Eye/Ratskin Records) –  Yama Uba, the Oakland darkwave/post-punk goth-flavoured thing founded by Akiko Sampson (Ötzi) with Winter Zora (Ötzi, Mystic Priestess) have their debut full-length, Silhouettes, out January 2024. They’ve been around in one for or another since 2017 and the duo’s musical collaborations have, so we’re told, been extensive over the past decade. This debut album is pretty much standards issue late 80’s early 90’s dark wave electro goth, they both handle vocals, the drum machines are doing just what you want gothy drum machines to do,the sound is swirling in that way you want these kind of darkly purple synthpop things to swirl, all Batcave smoke and you kind of know where they’re going well before they get there.  I guess they do their chosen thing rather well, there goes  a rather decent version of German Film Star, the old Passions song, that’ll give you more than a clue as to where they’re at  The album will be available on vinyl, CD, and digital formats via Psychic Eye and Ratskin Records. Find it on Bandcamp or wherever you like to go to find these things

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Jef Bek – Distant Starlight – It’s all very well exploring the outer limits of that thing they call progressive rock – go off on avant garde tangents, get atonal, get glitchy or wrap it up in pop or metal – but if any of you want a pure, unadulterated, undemanding but uplifting oldschool Yes-immersed prog, Chicagoan composer/multi-instrumentalist Jef Bek has just delivered that very thing. Distant Starlight is packed with analogue synths, Melotrons, orchestral journeys, sweet harmonies and all the other trimmings of bright, breezy, innocent big old oldschool prog.  The album is along the lines of veteran Yes/Jon Anderson-influenced bands like the rather underrated Starcastle or cult post-77 UK prog band England. Thankfully not a shred of watered down neo-prog, this is second generation proper proggy prog.  Jef Bek (no relation to his phonetic twin)  has commandeered a lot of very good Chicago avant/prog and rock musician friends to lend a hand, including members of Cheer Accident and Star Period Star. Yes, It is very much a labour of love, it maybe has a few awkward “home-made” moments but then there’s also great big joyous passages (including one that is way, way more than just a nod to Awaken!) so if you are craving a deep dive into absolutely unsullied 70s classic, optimistic prog this rather hits spot.  Find it on Bandcamp

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Lagern – Motion (Cold Smoke Records) – An Instrumental alternative rock band formed in 2017 by two experienced Swiss musicians, Pablo Lagares (guitar) and Simon Prongué (drums), quickly joined by Téo Lagares (keyboards and bass). “All three come from different projects such as AOTB, Weebee Weebee or Jetzt”, don’t ask us.  This is  Lagern’s debut full-length album called Motion, it kind of feel like motion, solid, fluid, focused, uncluttered, economic, lean. Focused alternative hard rock instrumentals that kind of cut to the chase, the pieces are repetitive, dare we say simple in terms of construction? That does feel like a positive in this case though, they’re certainly tight, nothing sloppy here. They talk of Prog but really this isn’t that, this is a solid muscular, thing, a healthy set of rather masculine musical workouts, things like this don’t really excite me that much but there is something about this one. Once again, find it on Bandcamp.    

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Otnig Monajet – Partner (Cold Smoke Records) – Another Swiss band, that’s brooding opening track, bodes well. There’s very little information available, it was only Lagern and seeing what else Cold Smoke had to offer that brought us here. This is raw, kind of Kraut flavoured alternative hard rock, was that a hint of raw late 70’s period Hawkwind there? That bit bore the Doors-ish keyboard and the positively messy drums and the raw scratch guitar? Sounds like these might be live recordings, jams even? When the almost spoke word vocals kick in it does feel dark, it feels good actually, those keyboards are meaty, healthy forward movement, positively charged energy. hey look, this is good, you go explore it, I got places to be, paint to throw… Here’s the Bandcamp 

 

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