What does it sound like?:

Tweeted by Prince (and what could be a greater statement of worth?), this is the 7th album by the artful pop maestros, showing Sunderland remains a centre of remarkable creativity. All those clever oblique pop artists you like; Talking Heads, XTC, Bowie, Ben Folds, Kate Bush, Beach Boys, proper (pre 1977) 10cc, Prince, Todd Rundgren when he wants to play to his strengths … some say they can hear Steely Dan (I don’t hear it, myself) and Pink Floyd (again, “maybe”, or maybe NOT). Beautifully played, composed, and recorded, this is ostensibly a song cycle about life after WW1, but to my ears doesn’t sound like it, maybe as the music is so contemporary. I hear a pile of corking, interesting songs with oblique musical bridges and directions. An gallant song about gender differences here, the 1919 Treaty of Versailles there, air traffic control … this is not “Whitesnake”. I’ve probably listened to it half a dozen times and am still trying to work out how such accessible music slips through given the twists and turns.

What does it all *mean*?

“Record collection rock” has been a working strategy for a number of bands; » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

“Hot Rats” is probably the most well-known and accessible album in Frank Zappa’s oeuvre. Mostly instrumental, he keeps the snorks and annoying gimmicks/ satirical cool outsidedom to the minimum, and instead highlights his interesting way with music, melody, and bring out the most creative chops in his fellow musicians. “Hot Rats” (dedicated to Dweezil, who was performing this in full (not the 6 hour box set) in the UK this week) was recorded in 1969 (2 days after man landed on the moon, fact fans). In that year Zappa also released “Uncle Meat”, produced “Trout Mask Replica”, the GTOs, and Jeff Simmons, toured the USA and Europe, jammed with “Pink Floyd”, edited a Lord Buckley album, and more. What was that Lou Reed said about “my week beats your year”? In 1969, FZ had ideas and music flowing out of him, and it didn’t stop.

The Hot Rats Sessions were over 6 weeks (doubtless with lots of other stuff being done) and used the then-fancy 16-track recording desk, and various new musicians, here including Lowell George, Jean-Luc Ponty, Don “SugarCane” Harris, and Shuggie Otis, along with various trusted Mothers, such as Ian Underwood. The » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

After a European tour that ended in September 1973, ever-moving Frank Zappa decided to liven up the band with a few new musicians. These included George Duke, Chester Thompson, and the rest of the chaps who became the “Roxy and Elsewhere” team. The band took a jazzier, funkier direction, with rather less skronk and snorks, and a a looser, more musical feel. Halloween, Zappa’s favourite holiday was an excuse for him to do some special gigs where audience participation, on-stage shenanigans, and long sets were favoured, and he always seemed to be in a good mood, which makes for a warmer feel to his music, staggeringly intricate and intelligent though it us (behind the pervert songs and irreverence). On Halloween 1973 these shows were performed in Chicago, and they were really quite something.

This CD set comprises two gigs, the second marginally longer and with some different tracks (and of course different solos and stage banter), and a disc of the rehearsals (where you can hear them trying to nail the new tracks without the anxiety of the performance or the unpredictability of the fans and equipment (at the gig Ruth Underwood’s marimba lost » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

“Afraid of Sunlight” was Marillion’s 8th album, and released in 1995. Though critically well-received (well, for Marillion), their appeal was becoming a little more selective at this time. some listeners not liking their band to write songs they want to, and mature with time and experience. The original album had a shiny 90s sound and the remaster makes them sound perhaps a little more indie, and their then current influences – John Lennon, U2, The Beach Boys, the better end of later Genesis – more apparent. Both have some well known tracks – “Beautiful” (a bit wet, if you ask me, but perhaps welcome when getting together with “your lady”), “King” (great), and “Out of this World”, which has Steve Rothery providing a typically tasteful/ lovely/ reassuringly brief solo. “Afraid of Sunlight” remains a rollicking, impassioned number. The edits and revisions of the remastered/ remixed versions of these tracks are really different emphases of the same thing; I found the older “Gazpacho” and “King” more congenial, but then my ears are older, and I like things a bit busier.

The two versions of “Afraid of Sunlight” come with a blu-ray of bits which » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

The last Hawkwind album was a bit of a disappointment; what could have been stentorian orchestrated selection of older tracks was a bit 70s Radio 2, and Hawkwind should NEVER be 70s Radio 2. One rarely uses the phrase “return to form” without irony when listening to new albums by a band 50 years old, but it must be said that “All Aboard the Skylark” draws on themes the mighty ‘Wind have covered previously in ways fans will be delighted to hear.

“Flesh Fondue” (perhaps a relative of “Clam Caravan by the equally estimable ‘Tap) is properly bikerdelic, a swashbuckling riff made for grebs doing that thumbs-in-belt loops dance, while ‘medicated’ viewers watch the lights. Further mellow-friendly content in “Nets of Space”, “In the Beginning”, and “the Road to” also indicate full-strength Capstans may be required for certain listeners. The title track (the spacecraft on the cover looking like a Bruce Pennington painted paperback from the mid-70s) is space rock of the type one would want from Hawkwind. With visuals, dancing aliens, Tim Blake back on board on synthesisers, you can expect this to be even more compelling live.

More ‘Tappery, Hawkwind go on knowingly » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Steve Howe is an endlessly inventive guitarist with a lovely tone. His solos with the current day band are now the best thing about them, and he has been semi-Zelig in his popping up to contribute to a classic psychedelic number here (“My White Bicycle”), or a post-progressive supergroup there (“Heat of the Moment”). A less known phase is his more recent jazz-trio with son, Dylan on drums, and Ross Stanley on pseudo-Hammond, and his album “The Haunted Melody” has all the groove, early 60s saloon-bar swelling organ (sorry, I always have to use that phrase), and wit you would hope without an elf, falsetto, glittery cape, or Roger Dean cover in sight. I had hoped that “New Frontiers” would be in that vein, but definitely not. This is good in that Howe was not staying still, and here, with his son (and occasionally, Bill Bruford) on drums, and Ross Stanley, the music is never less than well-played, interesting, and musical. But I personally felt it did not swing as much as I like. This may be a matter of expectations, as “New Frontiers” burbles along never less than nicely, but equally, nothing really » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Frank Zappa was a serious composer who found working in the rock n’ roll idiom and making complicated popular music with knob jokes enabled him to subsidise his artistic work that had less commercial potential. He once observed that “some artists put their money up their nose, I put my money in my ears”, and the concerts on this set of discs were paid for from the profits made from the single “Don’t eat the yellow snow”: there is something Platonic in that equation. I’ve been listening to the is album for almost 40 years, and in that time it has gone from “What is THAT?” to “Could be a film soundtrack” (admittedly an odd film).

For the uninitiated, this music is tunefully and busily abstract, self-consciously difficult and sometimes effortlessly cheesy (I love the big band “Duke of Prunes”), mostly made with an orchestra but occasional guitar, synthesiser, and bass art comedy music. Does that help? It would have led to energetic frugging at a Bauhaus ball (as in German art movement, not Northampton goths) and would surely appeal to hipsters and avant-rock types if it wasn’t for the terminally unwoke cachet » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Take The Nice’s rhythm section plus Patrick Moraz on keyboards, and you’ve got another ELP knock-off (Germany had Triumvirat). Refugee only produced one album proper, as Moraz was offered Rick Wakeman’s place in Yes, where he added stellar contributions to “Relayer” and the live shows of the time. (Moraz was then unceremoniously dumped and Wakeman brought back in 1977, which I think was a bad move, Moraz being a better player than Wakeman – OOAA). But what a belter the first Refugee album is… frenetic instrumentals like “Papilon”, “Rit Mickley” (Moraz’s pronunciation of rhythmically, “Mind Your Language” fans of comedy foreigners, note), two epics, one “The Grand Canyon”, the other “Credo” (with church organ, natch), and more. There is a nice fusion feel to parts, as this was from 1974, and wibbly keyboard sounds were no longer enough; they had to be slightly funky wibbly keyboards. Lee Jackson’s vocals remain a sticking point for many, myself included, mixing to questionable appeal, Brian Johnson and Roger Chapman. However, there are not a lot of these, as this is mostly all about the music, man. The second and third discs are live recordings made a month » Continue Reading.