What does it sound like?:

Is it prog, is it folk, is it rock? Well all three of those elements are present to a greater or lesser extent on this album which has been given a 50th Anniversary makeover. So named because it was the band’s sixth album and they had recruited a sixth member, this Ian Anderson produced effort is to be honest something of a mixed bag. There’s some good music to be sure, notably Thomas the Rhymer and The Mooncoin Jig, but there’s also a few oddities that rather spoil the flow – a bizarre attempt at Twinkle Twinkle Little Star performed as a make believe children’s choir and a bog standard rendition of To Know Him Is To Love Him add nothing to proceedings even if the latter does feature a certain David Bowie on sax. The real gold of this reissue is in the bonus material – alongside a rather superfluous single edit of Thomas are four excellent BBC recordings from 1974 taken from sessions for the Bob Harris show and Sounds of the Seventies which are worth the price of admission alone. Overall then, a middling album in the band’s back catalogue lifted » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Here is the latest instalment in Joni Mitchell’s reissue programme; a beautifully packaged box set incorporating the studio albums Hejira, Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter and Mingus, and the double live album, Shadows And Light. It’s a 5CD or 6LP set, featuring more of Joni’s artwork in a gorgeous book, a full size print of the painting on the outer box, and an updated cover for Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter, to replace the original featuring Joni in blackface. The new cover is only an improvement in that it’s less offensive. This time, Meryl Streep writes the essay in the booklet. Bernie Grundman, who engineered the records at the time, is responsible for a tasteful remaster. In the UK, the CD price isn’t too bad at £54 but the vinyl box costs £172.

It all starts in November 1975, with Joni joining Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Review and indulging in the vices of the road, in Joni’s case a prodigious cocaine habit and an affair with a cowboy lothario, Sam Shepard. Naturally, she wrote a song about it, the sinewy and sexy Coyote, a disarmingly frank, participant’s view of the “passion play” that occurs on tour. It’s » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Unlike its predecessors the newly released third album from Petty’s sideman-in-chief, Mike Campbell and his Dirty Knobs possesses some of that unmistakeable Heartbreakers sound. The Dirty Knobs slipped in (where IS Moose?) under the radar during Covid, and their first two albums consisted largely of fairly uninspired blues workouts and sub-Springsteen stompers. This time though, Campbell has ratcheted up the Byrdsian guitar flourishes to deliver the band’s best offering yet. Heartbreakers Benmont Tench and Steve Ferrone guest on a couple of tracks, and Lucinda Williams and Graham Nash provide duet vocals on Hell or High Water and Dare to Dream respectively. Opening song The Greatest is apparently a message of thanks to the audience that turns up at gigs, but it could equally be about Petty himself. Angel of Mercy and Hands are Tied could easily have been penned for the Heartbreakers, and Campbell’s vocals have never sounded more Petty-esque than they do here. There’s a rattling guitar mashup on Shake These Blues, and although the momentum slips a bit towards the end, this is 43 minutes well worth spending in the company of an old friend.

What does it all *mean*?

Mike Campbell » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

When the full 1978 Bern show was included as part of the Heavy Horses box set a few years ago, I for one thought this live set from the same period would be excluded from the reissue series. How wrong I was, as here it is in this 3cd and 3 dvd set in the now tried and trusted book format. Steven Wilson once again handles the remix of the original double album, a good chunk of which originates from the aforementioned Swiss concert, with other tracks being recorded at other venues on the tour, and the whole thing having some studio fairy dust sprinkled over it by Ian Anderson that summer at Maison Rouge. The album restores to the running order a couple of songs omitted from the original release, and each of the two cds ends with a handful of previously unreleased soundcheck recordings, which are ok but fairly inessential overall – the most interesting is an early run through of 4WD (Low Ratio) which turned up a couple of years later on A. The third cd is the Madison Square Garden show from later the same year – this is the » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

In David Bowie’s universe, all the stars aligned for The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, catapulting him into superstar status. However, as this 5CD + Blu-Ray box demonstrates, its gestation was far from straightforward. A ragbag of songs were only pulled together thematically at the last minute. Some had been released under a different name and more were intended for other artists. It was less of a carefully calculated concept and more a string of serependitious events. However, the final dystopian product, delivered by the outrageous, charismatic persona Bowie adopted, filled a cultural void in the early, pessimistic seventies, and launched his career.

Disc one takes us back to the same wellspring as A Divine Symmetry in early 1971 and Bowie’s return from an eye-opening promotional tour of America, his head bursting with ideas for songs. Both Ziggy and Lady Stardust were there from the start, along with many Hunky Dory songs. Neither were part of a grand scheme. Lady Stardust was originally a tribute to Marc Bolan, entitled He Was Alright (Song For Marc), and could easily have worked its way onto side two of Hunky Dory. » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

It’s a very long time since I last heard this album, which was originally released in 2012 and now comes as a cd plus bluray set. It’s a one off collaboration between Chris Squire and Steve Hackett, recorded over four years as they exchanged ideas as and when their busy schedules permitted. As you’d expect from these two prog heavyweights, the best pieces of music here fall firmly within that genre, The highlight for me is the title track, although Tall Ships and Storm Chaser also stand out, the latter being the only song that was ever performed in a live setting, being played by Hackett on his 2009 tour. Aliens is a song that was written for Yes and played by the band on their 2008/9 tour although it never made it onto an album. The rest of the album is okay, but for me doesn’t quite maintain the high standard set by these songs. The bluray has a 5.1 mix of the album, but sadly there’s no bonus content on either disc, the cupboard presumably being bare.

What does it all *mean*?

A one off curio by two very talented musicians that’s » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

If I could have requested an opening to the new Blow Monkeys album then the first 20 seconds of the first track Stranger To Me Now would have been my order. An orchestral, lazy, jazzy, funky intro that is like the first sip of a cold pint on a summer’s day. You’re in, you’re set, all senses tuned in, this is going to be great. The song is gorgeous, the band perfect, Robert’s vocal comfortingly familiar yet more mature. It feels very personal. What a start.

If as the second track suggests Waking Up Is Hard To Do then this slice of pure funk might just be what you need to get yourself up and about. Not for the first time though a Dr Robert song is not what you imagine it to be. This song is about a struggle with a past that wasn’t always easy and I sense a theme developing.

Rope A Dope was the tactic adopted by Mohammad Ali to deal with the monster that was George Foreman. Reeling him in and exhausting him before cutting the man mountain down. Robert pleads with his darling to take a swing at » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This release is volume 12 of the Private Parts and Pieces series, the first new addition to it since 2012’s City of Dreams. It’s a collection of 23 mostly short, sometimes all too short, mainly instrumental pieces accumulated over the years that drifts along in a rather pleasant way on a warm summer’s evening. While there’s just one song featuring vocals, the remainder, although often disparate in nature, meld together to form a cohesive overall musical mood. The highlight for me is the opening four part Wynchmore Hill Suite, which brought to mind Mike Oldfield’s Hergest Ridge period. Sometimes one track does rather tend to blur into the next, but if you’re going to treat the album as one continuous piece that’s no bad thing really, although I wish some of the musical themes had been extended and explored a little further as they end just as they seem about to get going. An interesting laid back album full of inventive musical ideas that’s well worth investigating, although it does seem to run out of steam a bit in the latter stages.

What does it all *mean*?

Phillips is something of a cottage industry, » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Macclesfield, 1974. I am 16, 3 years into learning the guitar and keen for new music. I pop into Barry White’s record shop in Brook Green, location of many cool sounds. On the counter there is a mysterious looking sleeve with a strange exotic font and what looks like an ear but closer examination reveals it is actually an unidentifiable morphing shape hinting at a depthless vortex into which to fall. The music fills the shop – at one moment funky, the next rocking and bluesy, then spacy with swirling effects and layers of guitars. I’ve heard of Robin Trower, mostly second hand and of the “Hendrix ripoff” variety, but have never actually heard him. It doesn’t sound at all like Hendrix, I love it and my carefully coveted pocked money and paper round pay is exchanged for a copy. I’ve come back to this album many times in the ensuing decades, particularly the live album he released a few years later and never tire of Robin’s playing and particularly Jim Dewar’s great bass playing and sensational singing.

And so to the 50th anniversary of Robin Trower’s 1974 album “Bridge of Sighs”. This is » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Maggie Rogers’ third official album, released on 12 April has been in my ears every day since then. I’ve been gradually getting familiar with her 10 new songs, letting them seep in, slowly noticing the differences between them, absorbing the words, noticing musical details. Like with each of the previous releases, there is a change in musical style. I would characterize them, sequentially, as folk, dance, rock and now MOR/country. This would normally put me off as being bland, and it seemed somewhat like that to me at first – a disappointing selection of songs after the catchy bangers that she strutted out. But this is Maggie Rogers, and I have found she really rewards repeat listening. It’s now my favourite of hers – a record where the singing isn’t afraid to take centre stage and not hide behind production. There are ‘tent post’ songs, that are more immediately catchy – Drunk, The Kill, Don’t Forget Me. The 5 songs between those last two to start with, slipped past without grabbing my attention at all, such is the contrasting pop appeal of them. Apparently all songs were written and recorded in 5 days total, » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

There is a case to be made that Sam Cooke’s DNA is the basis of Soul Music. He sang with an unequalled style and grace. His rich, velvety tenor, powerful and smooth even in the high notes, was one of nature’s wonders. His tone was so pure and effortless, he had no need to resort to melisma or histrionics. He began singing in a Baptist choir, advanced into a Gospel group, transitioned to secular music, then added some sugar for a wider Pop audience. His songwriting was exemplary. A Change Is Gonna Come, for example, is a candidate for the song of its century.

However, he was much more than a superstar who met a sordid end. Smokey Robinson credits him with legitimising the afro. He was an active campaigner for black rights, close friend to Muhammad Ali and Malcom X. He was also business savvy, negotiating his own recording contracts with close attention to detail. Keen to avoid white “sharecroppers” in the music industry, he formed SAR Records with his friend, J.W. Alexander, and road manager, Roy Crain, to produce, promote and publish black artists.

SAR Records Story, a summation of their » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

I’ve a confession to make.

Our esteemed contributor Colin-h asked me to consider reviewing this beast about two years ago, and this is how long it’s taken me to finish off these notes. Sorry about that Colin!

So here we are at last, these are my copious notes, written a little at a time over the last two years, and finally edited now into a hopefully coherent overview of what is after all a gargantuan collection of wonderful material.

This little (13 CDs!) boxed set of BBC recordings features Ian Carr’s celebrated Nucleus ensemble. I’m not going to wade in with a humungous retrospective of the man’s jazz pedigree with various well known serious alumni, I’m going to react only to the contents of these discs.

For many music fans the music they contain might be expected to be what we might term jazz-rock. But don’t let the Vertigo label connections fool you. This is first and foremost jazz. Repertoire, with Colin’s guiding hand, have assembled 13 CDs worth of BBC sessions from the band – in various constellations – across the years from 1970 to 1991; it’s an ocean » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This new box set comprising 3 cds, a bluray, and a book looks back at the career of the sole surviving member of ELP, encompassing his work with that band alongside other outfits he has worked with such as Atomic Rooster and Asia. The first two cds are actually a slightly rejigged version of the 2001 compilation ‘Do You Wanna Play Carl’. Kicking off with the unused Works Vol 1 piece Concerto For Percussion, ultimately dropped in favour of a number of shorter pieces, the selections focus on music that Palmer feels best showcases his contributions to the band rather than necessarily their best combined work as a unit. Annoyingly, two other unreleased pieces have been dropped for this release to accommodate a section of Karn Evil 9, which seems a shame. The second cd focuses on his work in other contexts, covering a whole gamut of artists from Arthur Brown and Atomic Rooster through to Mike Oldfield and the mega selling Asia years. It also touches on his work with his own band, PM, and the ELP offshoot 3, which also featured Keith Emerson but no Greg Lake, the latter being replaced by » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

In the summer of 1972, Jethro Tull decamped to France to record a follow up to the highly successful Thick As A Brick album, choosing the studio du jour, recently occupied by luminaries such as Elton and Bowie. Alas, the sessions were marred by technical and logistical issues, so the band returned to the UK with three sides of a planned double album on tape. In the cold light of day, second thoughts prevailed and Ian Anderson chose to go in a different direction and start over with a clean slate eventually producing A Passion Play, with the previously recorded music being set aside. This abandoned material gradually dripped out over the years, with the first side appearing on the 20 Years of Jethro Tull compilation in 1988, and the remainder showing up on 1993’s rarities set Nightcap. Eventually of course, the whole lot was inevitably remixed by Steven Wilson and included on the Passion Play – Extended Performance box set a few years ago. This release is simply a vinyl edition of what was on that box set, so if you already own that then there’s nothing to see here. Like last year’s » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

“Has there been a better reunion in recent times than Slowdive?”, asks my boy moselymoles in his excellent concert review. Well, one candidate might be British dub pioneers™️ Creation Rebel, who returned last year after a brief four decade hiatus with the very wonderful Hostile Environment album.

One reason why I don’t post reviews more regularly is that, whenever something tickles me enough, I always assume, probably correctly, that there are plenty of people on here who know more about the act than I do who are waiting to pounce on any slip up. Tiggs’ reviews routinely feature potted bios of that guy that filled the drum stool for one song; mine, not so much. However, as I was the only person to vote for Hostile Environment in our end of year poll, I’m going to stick my head above the parapet.

I was thinking about writing up an overdue review of that particular album when I saw that those nice people at On-U Sound are releasing a sensibly priced 6 disc box set (yes, a BOX! SET! – with a wee book! That’s got your antennae twitching!) called High Above Harlesden which » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

There are plenty of new items on the Departures Board on this, the fifteenth album from Big Big Train:

It marks the first with Italian singer, Alberto Bravin, (ex-PFM,) who replaces the much-loved David Longdon following his tragic death in late 2021.

It is the band’s first album on Inside Out, Sony’s premier prog label, (their previous recordings being self-released on English Electric.)

It is also a first in the modern history of the band in that the tracks were recorded with the musicians all playing together, in one room, with songs being changed, extended and polished as they were captured by the engineers.

It is a departure from previous BBT albums in that there are less storytelling-songs than usual. This time, with the passing of Longdon, family bereavement and individual upheaval, the songs are more personal and more introspective than before. Greg Spawton’s strap-line for the album, ‘this time it’s personal,’ rings so true as you immerse yourself into it.

Long-time fans of the band need have no concerns though. This is most definitely a Big Big Train album; and one of their very best.

I will also say that it is the » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

In February 2023 Rick Wakeman, accompanied by the English Rock Ensemble and the English Chamber Choir, performed two sold out shows at the Palladium, which are captured on this four cd set. He showcases his three most well known, and best, solo efforts, plus of course a smattering of classic Yes songs. I remember buying each of the featured solo albums, Six Wives, Journey and Myths and Legends, back in the day, all resplendent in their gatefold covers. The Six Wives is an album I was very fond of back then, and I think it still stands up today – here it’s faultlessly reproduced down to the last note. The second cd is devoted to the Myths and Legends – I was disappointed with this one on release, and I still find it rather underwhelming to this day. To be fair, this version has more energy than the studio one, but the music doesn’t quite live up to what was on paper a great idea for a concept album. Next up comes the reworkings of some Yes classics. We get the usual suspects – Roundabout, And You and I and Starship Trooper – all » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Like an alternative soundtrack to the first season of True Detective – as though someone has reimagined the work of David Lynch, Nancy Sinatra, Lana Del Rey, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Ry Cooder and Aldous Harding — but also inscrutable and arch, theatrical and very, very cinematic.

I’m slightly addicted at the moment. She’s one of those artists who creates her own world and I can’t stay away. I listened to the much-hyped Last Dinner Party album and it just seemed like Vera-lite to me (although that could be a symptom of my affliction).

What does it all *mean*?

It seems almost a shame to mention that she’s Dan Ackroyd’s daughter. But there you have it.

Goes well with…

Splitting for Jackson.

Release Date:

Out now

Might suit people who like…

Those artists mentioned above.

What does it sound like?:

More a word of warning than a review. Released on CD for the first time, this is a recording of a radio broadcast of a live performance of TB from very shortly after its release and I was interested primarily due to the musicians involved (see below) and, of course because I love this album.

• Mike Oldfield – Lowery Organ, Bass, Acoustic and Electric Guitar and Mandolin. • David Bedford – Grand Piano, Accordian, Organ, Choir Master, String Arrangement. • John Greaves – Farfisa Organ, Electric Piano, Tin Whistle • Fred Frith – Electric and Bass Guitars • Tim Hodginson – Organ, Electric Piano, Fender Rhodes • Mick Taylor – Electric Guitar • Steve Hillage – Electric Guitar • Pierre Moerlen – Glockenspiel, Timpani, Tubular Bells, Gongs, Cymbals, Tam Tam • Steve Broughton – Drums • Ted Speight – Electric Guitar • Kevin Ayers – Bass • (and others that I am rudely missing off the list)

If it sounds like there’s a “but” coming, it’s because there is. I did buy this but I might not have done if I’d read the Amazon reviews – the “digitally remastered” recording is not great » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

If the Who had recorded this, we’d all be saying it was the best thing they’d done since ‘Who’s Next’ (1971). We’d be saying ‘It’s a masterpiece!’ – and it is, but it’s Kirk Brandon’s masterpiece, and as both the singer and writer in Spear of Destiny, he manages to be Daltry and Townshend in one person, albeit Adrian Portas does the (concise) guitar hero stuff when it’s required.

Stretching the metaphor, fishing in a neighbouring lake, Kirk manages to compress the whole essence of ‘Quadrophenia’ into one song, opening number ‘Brighton’. Beginning with a woozy snatch of post-war end-of-the-pier kingpin Max Miller doing his thing and ending with vintage seaside verité, what happens in between is colossal, portentous, epic – scattershot reportage and impressionism of mods and rockers, gangsters and chancers back in the day. Very little rhymes but it doesn’t need to – and the town’s name gets stretched to a barnstorming howl of (literally) 20 syllables. These are recurring, distinguishing traits in Brandon’s songwriting – having the chutzpah to be liberated from Moon/June shackles to say what he wants to say in amazingly direct, real language and compensating for those conventional » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

The seventh and final album by Family is reissued as a 2cd remastered set with an illustrated booklet featuring a new essay on it’s making. Tony Ashton and Jim Cregan joined the band but rather than revitalising the group they produced one of their least essential albums. This is leagues away from the heights of Bandstand and Music From A Doll’s House. The songs are pretty run of the mill and uninspired and it’s hard to pick a stand out track really. In fact it’s a set where the extras are better than the original album. There’s a generous 19 tracks added, five being studio cuts and the remainder coming from BBC sessions from a 1973 In Concert and a Top Gear appearance from later in the same year. The jaded sound of a band reaching the end of the road really, with their heyday behind them.

What does it all *mean*?

It was no surprise when the band split not long after the album’s release as they sound rather uninspired and unsure of what direction to take.

Goes well with…

Popcorn and Kia Ora.

Release Date:

26 Jan

Might suit people » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Maggie Rogers is a successful performance artist with a major label record contract, who headlines tours and plays festivals. It may be that many Afterworders already know her if not her music, but apart from one clip from KFD on Bingo’s ‘Music Makes Life Better’ thread in 2022, and a few comments from me in Blogger Takes Over threads last year, she doesn’t have any presence on this site. That’s OK – there is a lot of music out there, she is possibly in the Dido camp of being popular with mainstream audiences with limited AW appeal.

That’s understandable – although from a folky background, she undeniably is pop. I hadn’t heard of her at all until I watched a recording of her Glastonbury ’23 performance. In a turquoise dress with strawberry blonde crop, she was clearly having the time of her life, connecting with the audience, getting lost in dancing to the band and singing so joyfully songs I had never heard before.

There was something in that vibrant zest for life that was completely captivating and infectious. So I started to dig into her discography:

Two albums released independently during her » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Ah, the dilemma of presenting new soul* to the Afterword: if it’s too adventurous or too zeitgeisty then you’re all “Take that away Mack, it’s wick-wick-wack”; If it’s too wholemeal ale traditional, then it’s “Yawn, we’ve heard it all done better before”.

This, Danielle Ponder’s debut, had a lengthy gestation while she adjusted to turning professional having spent several years gaining a reputation as a singer while working full time as a public defender and advocate in the courts of Rochester, New York. It’s true, the arrangements do occasionally betray the fact that trip hop has been around for thirty years and some of the songs meander a little, but there’s not much here that’s going to frighten the horses and Danielle is not from the seven-notes-per-syllable singing school.

Instead, Some Of Us Are Brave (the title comes from a black women’s studies book All The Women Are White, All The Blacks Are Men, But Some Of Us Are Brave) is a collection of slow songs which are both musically and thematically from the familiar tradition of the emotional trials (SWIDT?) of the soulstress, mostly co-written with her keyboard player Avis Reese (her touring band » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

There’s a school of thought that Dave McLarnon is underrated – a modest, soft-spoken yet quietly Tiggerish man in a raffish beard (and very often a hat) who was musically intoxicated as a teenager and who has never lost that excitement for it, working within and eventually leading a series of Belfast bands from the mid-70s to the present. Let me be the first in the queue to say that the time is most definitely now for a resetting of the Dave McLarnon appreciation dial – and that this sensational new album by his 1979–82 band of Ulster punk ‘nearly men’ is all the evidence we need.

First, some history… Dave began his musical adventures with a school band in the 70s, Sunset – and their revival in recent years has been entirely down to his own effervescent ringmastering role. Sunset gig two or three times a year and rehearse the odd time in between (often with me sitting in on bass – if Brendan Ten-Bands or Petesy Burns aren’t available) at the sumptuous premises of drummer Chris Loughridge AKA Johnny Dental. They are a fascinating amalgam of almost Dickensian characters bedevilled by » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This isn’t really a review as such. I’ve just been listening to this album again today for the first time in a few years and forgot just how good it was, so I wanted to rave about it a bit and recommend it to anyone who hasn’t heard it.

Describing it is very very easy, and it’s the kind of record you know within about 2 minutes whether you’re going to like it or not – you could pretty much pick any track and just drop in there and see what you think. Basically, it’s like a mid-90s update of that Pet Sounds/ Smile Beach Boys sound (chamber pop with lush instrumentation), with a few electronic bells, whistles and Moogs blended in.

That makes it sound like a pastiche, but it’s adept enough to rise above that. I know next to nothing of the band, and this record passed me by when it first came out in 1996, but I understand they were kind of grouped somewhere between the trends for retro pop and easy listening, kind of Air meets Mike Flowers Pops.

What does it all *mean*?

It’s just a beautiful album. I » Continue Reading.