2011 – A Personal Preview

Friday 25th February: With no plans to attend a gig this weekend (never fear, though, I have one planned for Monday…), I thought I would treat my faithful reader(s) to a preview of which albums I’m looking forward to so far this year, along with one or two that I hope will see the light of day sometime in 2011.

So, in no particular order, here are my “must buys” so far…

First up is Out Of An Ancient World, by Marc Atkinson’s Riversea. I’ve seen Marc play live a couple of times and have both his solo, acoustic albums, but this has all the hallmark’s of a big project. Ex-York resident (and biggest Dr Who fan… ever!) Marc will, once again, be playing acoustic guitar and has been joined by Brendan Eyre on keyboards, along with a whole host of guest’s (from the York area and further afield) to provide the rest of the music and backing vocals. I’ve heard just the one track, played live back in December and haven’t taken advantage of any of the preview clips available on MySpace or dotted around Facebook but, with the project billed as acoustic/progressive/rock, as well as with the amount of talent to be found in the project, there’s something about this album which is calling out to me, helped in no small part by the stunning cover by Ed Unitsky. Out Of An Ancient World was due to be released around Easter time, but I think that may have slipped slightly recently.

Marc is also involved in Sangreal, the second release from the new, third version of Mandalaband. This album sounds very much a concept piece, as were the first three, and tells the story of the Holy Grail as seen in the Romano-Spanish version – the history of the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper (as opposed to the King Arthur version). Marc seems to have upped his contribution from the last album, providing lead vocals for five or six of the fourteen tracks and backing vocals for others. The album also includes the last song Woolly Wolstenholme (Barclay James Harvest) recorded before his death last year. The previous album, BC – Ancestors, was one of my favourites of recent times and the newly re-mastered re-releases of the original 70s albums may sound a little dated now compared to the prog rock being released today but that doesn’t matter to me (after all, I’ve only just discovered Camel and Caravan…)

I like to think that I’ve been a fan of Chantel McGregor from the beginning of her career but I know that, although I first saw her live while she was still playing The Roman Bath, with no entry charge, she had been performing for quite some time. On a personal note, she was the first artist to put a link to this blog on her website, an act that I was honoured by. The pocket prodigy plays guitar like nobody else I have seen and now, after completing her degree, she has had the time to concentrate on writing her own music and has recently been recording her debut album which is due for release in April. Some of the new songs have already made it into her live set and sat comfortably with the Hendrix, Cream, Trower, Fleetwood Mac, Bonamassa, etc. covers that she was known for performing. With details of the recording being blogged on a daily basis, we are promised the likes of a “13 minute epic”, a “swampy, bluesy thang” and “progging it up a bit”. The only downside is that we won’t get Chantel’s rambling monologues, usually about dresses, take-away food or equipment malfunctions, between songs. (Unless she goes down the Seasick Steve route, of course…)  If you are a fan of the blues, this is one album you must look out for.

The first and, so far, only time I saw Haze play live was back in 2003, in the Bay Horse (now Stereo) in York and they were, therefore, my initiation into the world of live prog-rock. A magazine review of a more recent gig jogged my memory and alerted me to the fact that they were still around, if only sporadically. I had a brief email conversation/trip down memory lane with bass-player and vocalist Chris McMahon before buying a copy of a double live CD from their 30th anniversary tour, only to find that some of the songs had been lodged in the back of my brain for all those intervening years. Now performing more regularly  as Treebeard, a more folky, “heavy wood” ensemble, Chris recently decided to write a new Haze album, their first studio album since 1987’s Stoat And Bottle, although an album named Haze was released in 1994 by World Turtle (Chris and his brother Paul) and contained material that would have been on Haze’s third album. A new album so soon after I get in touch? Coincidence? Almost certainly, but I’m still looking forward to it.

As the year goes on, there are bound to be other releases that I look forward to as eagerly as the ones above, they are just the ones I know that are on the horizon. I also know that Hope & Social have started work on their third album, but that’s as much detail as I have at the moment.

If I could have a wish list, however, it would probably include the following (some of which may be in the pipeline already):

A second album from Boss Caine – it’s hard to imagine a better album than last year’s The Ship That Sailed but if main man GT Turbo can put together another mix of old and new and manage to include some of my favourites from his live sets, it might just be possible.

A debut from Stolen Earth – formed from the ashes of the recently disbanded Breathing Space and featuring the writers of the new songs we heard live during that band’s final gig back in December Stolen Earth are, arguably, the most exciting new band in York at the moment. I don’t know whether the band has enough output for an album yet, but they are trying to get on the bill for this Summer’s Cambridge Rock Festival and, I’m told, are aiming to put together some demo material to help promote the band.

A second album from Parade, or whatever they are going to call themselves to avoid confusion with the same-named pop band. New material is being written, but a release date (and new name) has yet to be announced.

A second release from blues-rockers 98Pages – they will almost certainly always be better to see live than listen to recorded but the new songs performed recently are part of a batch that have been written with an eye to either release a second album or a series of EPs. My vote goes to the album format.

There’s bound to be more. I’ve concentrated on smaller and, for the most part, local bands, most of whom I have seen perform and some of whom I have become friends with (if only through social networking). Bigger, more “established” bands that I like are bound to be working on new albums and, when they arrive, there is a very good chance that they will be added to my collection, but the ones I have listed are, in my opinion, bands that deserve supporting. I realise I’ve leaned somewhat in the direction of progressive rock but, given my tastes, that’s to be expected. I doubt that any of the albums will be inaccessible to general music fans, though. So, if you like music why not keep an eye out for one (or more) of the albums and try something a bit different?

Parading, In Spades

Saturday 25th September: After the disappointment of Tuesday's very late cancellation of Oceansize's gig at the newly refurbished Fibbers, which would have seen all of us out, tonight it's a solo outing for me to Stereo to get a second dose of some of the band members from last Saturday.

Tonight's support act, In Spades Inc, were only playing their second gig and, in some ways, it showed. There was an air of nervousness surrounding Stewart King's self-depreciating banter, almost as though he was apologising for the band turning up. He needn't have worried. While their music couldn't be said to be completely original, there was something just a little bit different about it which made it interesting and entertaining. Their forty minute, seven song set (including one cover, which I recognised but, for the life of me can't remember...) contained a nice mixture of material from the slow, haunting opening of Hurricane, which eventually built to a much louder climax, to the brash heaviness of Sucker Punch. But it was the guitar work that really caught my ear - each song seemed to contain an intricate piece of guitar, from either King or fellow guitarist Adam Brady, which sometimes didn't seem to fit in with the rest of the music but in all cases enhanced it.

This may have only been the band's second outing but, in researching this post, I realised that we had, in fact, seen another of King's bands, Satori, supporting Panic Room at the Duchess almost a year ago to the day. Both Roj and I enjoyed that performance so much that we bought the album that night. In a strange piece of symmetry, I picked up two copies of In Spades Inc's free EP preview tonight, one copy of which I have passed on to Roj. I don't think I could honestly say that I liked tonight's performance as much as I did that of Satori, but i certainly wouldn't be averse to seeing In Spades Inc again. Definitely one to watch out for.

...and now a confession. In order to remember thoughts and set-lists at gigs and to help write these posts, I make notes on my phone. Tonight there was a human/technology interface failure (I forgot to save the note I made for the headline act and subsequently managed to inadvertently delete it while the phone was in my pocket) which means that the following review is based solely on my somewhat poor recollections.

Parade are (or, possibly, were - their website says that they are changing their name) another band that we saw last year and so impressed us that we bought the album. One of the loose family of bands centred around Mostly Autumn, Parade was, at the time, made up of current MA members Ann-Marie Helder and Gavin Griffiths, past member Chris Johnson and two long-time collaborators of Johnson, Paddy Berry and Simon Snaize. Tonight ex-Yards guitarist Chris Farrell stood in for Snaize, whose name is strangely absent from the above website. Anyway, The Fabric ended up being one of my top five albums from last year and, therefore, I wasn't going to miss seeing them live again.

Tonight's set featured most, if not all, of the songs from The Fabric, including all my favourites - the epic The Diamond, the nasty The Dogs, pop-tinged but very rocky Start Again and the fantastic Feedline - along with an encore comprising of an acoustic song which I feel I should remember and a full band version of Science and Machinery. Chris Johnson played an acoustic version of the latter last Saturday. It's a song which appeared on the special edition of Mostly Autumn's Heart Full Of Sky album but which, apparently started life years before with Chris J, Chris F and Paddy, providing a nice link with tonight's line-up.

As expected the musicianship was superb. Chris Farrell played some incredible guitar, Paddy's bass was superb, at times making even the floor vibrate and Gavin's drumming was brilliant. Anne-Marie performed some pretty impressive vocal gymnastics - particularly during the wordless ending to High Life - despite apparently having voice problems during the whole of both this (very short) tour and the Panic Room one she had just completed. She and Chris perform some wonderful harmonies, which are just one of the high points of the album and live performance.

There is a reliance on technology, with a laptop tied into Anne-Marie's keyboards in order to produce some of the more unusual sounds. (There are enough pops and whistles on the album to make R2-D2 wonder if it contains a message for him...) Normally, for me, this would be enough to make me a little sceptical about the quality of the music - is it being "played" or just reproduced? But, somehow, I can forgive Parade this extravagance. Maybe it's because of the pedigree of the band members.

Anyway, the whole performance was brilliant and the whole band seemed to be enjoying themselves, playing off each other and practically pushing each other around while still managing to make wonderful music.

Hopefully, whatever the future holds for the band, they will continue to make and play such quality music.

Almost Time To Catch A Breath

Sunday 6th December: ...and as the weekend draws to a close, another three of us head of to the Duchess to attend the final gig of "Mostly-fest". This is one of those rare occasions when I can convince my wife to go to a gig with me as Breathing Space are a band she likes.

At least that's who we were expecting. No support act had been mentioned or otherwise advertised. So, it was a bit of a surprise to find that, very late in the day, Chris Johnson and Anne-Marie Helder had been booked as openers.

Those of you keeping up will recognise those name as two of the members of The Parade, who also opened here on Friday evening. Tonight, the duo performed songs from the band's album The Fabric, acoustically and for the first time (you couldn't tell...).

For this set Chris played guitar and Anne-Marie played, errrm, an egg and a banana. I knew she was talented but, but, a banana??? Yes, and there's untampered photographic proof opposite. Both of them sang and the acoustic versions of the songs were just as good as the full band versions we heard on Friday. It really is a cracking album (I managed to grab a few words with Chris to tell him so and got him to sign my copy) and it must have been hard to pick which tracks to play, but they certainly managed to pick some of my favourites, including Cut, The Dogs, The Diamond and the excellent Start Again.

This was a set of brilliant musicianship, tinged with more than a dab of humour (most of it involving the banana - you can guess). Chris and Anne-Marie obviously enjoy being on stage with each other as there was an over-riding sense of comfort and friendship in their performance. An unexpected and very pleasant start to the evening.

So, to the final act of the weekend. Breathing Space were performing the last date of their Below The Radar tour, promoting their third album of the same name. We've seen the band so many times (although this is only the second time that we have paid for a ticket - not that I'm complaining) that watching them perform is getting to be like slipping into a comfortable, if somewhat loud and increasingly hard-edged, dressing gown. As with my last posting, there is little to add to any past reviews, so I'm going to fill a bit of space up with some photos.

Blasting onto stage with a triumphant version of Forgive Or Surrender, the band performed many favourites from the first two albums, including Wasted All The Time, Coming Up For Air, Searching For My Shadow, the sublime Belief (which can now never be sung without bringing a tear to the eye) and a incredible version of You Still Linger, which ended the first set with a superb instrumental section. Mixed in with these were a number of songs from the new album (obviously). Some of these were already vaguely familiar - I hadn't bought the album until tonight but the band had played some of the songs the last time we saw them in the Roman Bath and the "light" version of the band had also performed some acoustically in the Punchbowl a few weeks back.

Songs from Below The Radar included Paul Teasdale's Clear, and the Sparnenn/Jennings penned The Night Takes You Home and Questioning Eyes. I'm sure there were more but, once again, my memory fails me.

However, every track, no matter what album it came from, sounded brilliant (possibly due to my proximity to the stage and speakers) and the larger stage area and sound system in the Duchess allowed the band a lot more freedom to express themselves than the Roman Bath.

Livvy's voice, while still losing the vocals behind the music at times, seems to get clearer every time we see her perform. The Jennings brothers are near-maestros on the keyboards, while Teasdale's bass-playing is excellent (if a little funky in one place). Cassells' drumming provided the perfect base for the songs (and it was nice to finally see a different drummer during the weekend) and Bryan Josh once again played guitar almost in the background, coming forwards for just a few solos when required rather than dominating the stage as he does with Mostly Autumn.

The gig ended on a somewhat bizarre note. Almost as the final note of encore song Questioning Eyes faded from the speakers and the band moved forward to take their bows, the lights went out and an alarm started sounding. (To be honest, if it was a fire alarm, it was a little ineffective - I could hardly hear it until somebody pointed it out to me and nobody seemed to make a move for the exits...). The end result was the band taking the applause and cheers in almost total darkness. I would love to know what happened when it was resolved but, alas, I left in a rush in a vain attempt to catch the last bus home. Debbie had left earlier to relieve our babysitter who was expecting us home at about the time the gig actually finished and I ended up paying a taxi-fare.

So, to summarise the weekend I would have to say it was totally and completely awesome. Despite the number of crossover artists in the four bands we saw, it was incredible how different the music from each was from the others. From the guitar-led prog rock of Mostly Autumn to the keyboard-led Breathing Space, with a mix of both in The Parade and a bit of a harder edge to Josh & Co, between us we managed to see some pretty impressive performances. But then, I would say that, wouldn't I?

It may have ended up costing me a small fortune in tickets, CDs, drinks and transport but would I do it again?

Of course I would. In a heartbeat.

Bryan's Company and Chris's Parade

Friday 4th December: The Countdown to the festive season has started and tonight is the beginning of a weekend of three gigs in three days for me. All of them are related in some way to York's most famous prog-rock giants Mostly Autumn, so this weekend can only be described in one way - Mostly Awesome!!

Tonight there's three of us (just not quite the usual three) attending the Duchess for one of a very limited series of shows for which Mostly's Bryan Josh has put a band together to perform his 2008 solo(ish) album Through These Eyes. More of that later.

First up, however, were Parade. Chris Johnson has been a busy boy since the last time I saw him perform. Not only has he put together this band, featuring Anne-Marie Helder, Gavin Griffiths, Simon Snaize, Patrick Berry and Chris himself (basically the band seems to be one possible outcome of a crash involving the tour buses of Panic Room and Hazzard County) but he has also managed to write, produce and release the band's debut CD, The Fabric. This is the band's second live show together (the first was also supporting Josh and Co) and I'm going to set my stall out straight away and say that they were superb.

The music was guitar-and-keyboard rock and the influences were probably many but while certain things were vaguely tugging at the dark recesses of my memory, very little results were forthcoming. Roj described the ending of one song (The Diamond, I think) as "like the dark chocolate version of Fleetwood Mac, while the lyric style of Cut reminded me a little of something by The Beautiful South. What was impressive was the diversity of material - no two songs sounded the same and they all sounded brilliant. With Anne-Marie and Chris switching around between lead vocals, guitar and keyboards (for one song both played keyboards, for another they both played guitar) and with Bryan Josh himself replacing Simon for one song, there was enough variety to keep even the most jaded music fan happy.

There's no doubt that the band is made up of some very talented musicians and the songs showcased that those talents - Simon produced some excellent guitar work, Gavin was brilliant on drums, it goes without saying that Anne-Marie's voice was stunning and, it has to be said, Paddy's bass-playing was leagues above what he ever did with Hazzard County. I have implied in a previous posting that Chris Johnson might have thought himself too good or too big for some of the acts he has previously worked with. I suspect he may have found his place as frontman for Parade. Not only does it allow a release for his undoubted creativity but, if they can perform this well so early in the band's career, there is a good possibility that the band can go on to bigger things. The only problem is, possibly, the commitments some of the members already have. While Paddy had dropped off my radar since the last time I saw the Hazzards, I believe that Simon is working on an album of his own. Gavin is drummer with Panic Room, Fish and played on the first Josh & Co album (of which there are supposed to be more to come) and Anne-Marie already performs with Panic Room, Mostly Autumn and solo (and there really should be a solo album sometime soon).

Personally, on the strength of tonight's performance, I hope they manage to find time to work together again. This was a very entertaining opening act and one that I would have been more than happy with if they had been the headline. I even bought the CD. On first impression, although I've only managed to listen it through once, at varying volumes and in the car, the live act seems to do what it should do with the recorded material. That is expand it and give the musicians a chance to cut loose. Hopefully, a fuller review will follow if and when I get time. In the meantime, however, it is my fervent hope that this Parade managed to avoid the rain for quite some time.

Strangely, when Josh & Co took to the stage, there was very little change in line-up. Ian Jennings had replaced Anne-Marie on keyboards, Bryan Josh had replaced Simon Snaize on guitar and Livvy Sparnenn was there to provide backing vocals. On the album, Bryan plays everything but the drums (and flute on one track).

The album itself, which came very close to being my favourite release of last year, deals with the idea that you can push your dreams back out through your eyes and step into the resulting dimension to meet the inhabitants of your dreams. Verging on a concept album, the songs relate Bryan's adventures in that dimension until he finds the one person who can bring him home (Livvy, I assume...)

That being the case, it's hard to perform the album without doing it all the way through and in the order the tracks were released on the album. So, as an introduction and as the band took to the stage we got what I assume was a recording of Merry She Goes. Then Bryan introduced the ideas and launched directly into Land Of The Gods and The Appian Way. What followed was an almost word for work performance of the album from beginning to end.

I say "almost". There were some small differences like different words during Through These Eyes (the original doesn't have a reference to Lee Van Cleef sticking his pistol up Hitler's backside...) and the "super-band" introduced at the end of that track was missing John Entwhistle and Freddie Mercury. However, Jimi Hendrix and John Bonham were introduced, which led to cover versions of All Along The Watchtower and Rock and Roll (the latter with Livvy on vocals, harking back to her guest appearances with Freeway). There was an extra song, which I didn't recognise from the album and, in hindsight, I think one or two tracks may have been left out of the performance. We did, however, get a second (sing-along) rendition of The Appian Way by way of a sort of encore (the band didn't actually leave the stage).

The songs themselves showcase Bryan's unquestioned poetic heart and, while there is undoubtedly a resemblance to the output of Mostly Autumn, his solo work shows what can happen when his creativity isn't tempered a bit by Heather Findlay, producing in places a harder edge to the songs.

This was, as expected, an excellent performance that was well received by the audience. Overall, a brilliant start to the weekend