What does it sound like?:

It’s hard to believe it’s over 50 years since this album was originally released – how the years hurry past, and how these box sets have a way of making you feel like an old man! It’s been reissued a few times already of course in various iterations with a variety of extra material, but this edition is surely the last word, with 5 cds, a bluray and a vinyl album, all accompanied by a lavish booklet. The first two cds have a remastered version of the original album, plus a super new 2025 mix by the ubiquitous Steven Wilson, which also adds instrumental versions of all 3 pieces. The third cd comprises rarities, including early run troughs of the songs. Most of these have been available before apart from 3 new edits which are interesting but fairly inessential when compared to the majesty of the full length songs. The 4th and 5th cds have a preciously unreleased live show from The Rainbow from December 1972, one of the shows used for the Yessongs film that appeared to tie in with the album of that name. If you’re familiar with that album or any » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

It’s 10 years since Chris Eckman called time on The Walkabouts’ 30-year career. During those years the band delivered a dozen albums that morphed from their initial punk sensibilities into a rich stew of string-enhanced songs that embraced a distinctly European vibe. Not surprisingly perhaps given The Walkabouts’ greater standing this side of the pond that Eckman decamped to Ljubljana once the band’s time was up. Since then he has intermittently released albums of which this is the third in an impeccable trilogy that began in 2013 with Harney County, progressed into the spare but sublime Where the Spirit Rests in 2021, and finally reached a career high point in this latest release.

Often described as evoking Jacques Brel, Eckman ploughs a similar furrow to Leonard Cohen and Nick Cave. He has worked with Willard Grant Conspiracy on two of their finer albums (Regard the End & Let it Roll), but while Robert Fisher’s musical collective latterly experimented with dissonance and minimalism, there is a strongly consistent melody and warmth underpinning Chris Eckman’s best work, exemplified in all three of these most recent albums. Harney County’s impressions of desert landscapes in Oregon are sparely » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

If you know Hawkwind, you already know what this sounds like; riffs, spacey wooshes, proto-punk/ metal/ rave riffs with space and fantasy-themed lyrics, declamatory vocals. Over the years, Hawkwind have become ever-tighter, which, like “The Fall”, is a reflection of discipline, not repetition (along with less jollop before the show, [possibly]). Wikipedia indicates this is Hawkwind’s 28th live album. A lot of them will have been much the same as my description. Whether you think this is excessive, is up to you. I couldn’t possibly comment. I certainly don’t have all of them, but there will be some proud TRUE FANS out there who do. Sir, we salute you.

I love the band, their attitude, and their fans, and their conscious and their shameless indifference to fashion or style, though, like many fans, I have a favourite era, personally missing Robert Calvert as Biggles in space. This 2023 gig was promoted as the 50th anniversary of “Space Ritual” – itself a live album, and definitive of the band. But 2023 concert here was not a full “Space Ritual” anniversary show – which occurred in 2014, and was later, yes, a live album. (Do keep » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

By 1975, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen retired from touring, kicked off their shoes, ensconced themselves in their studio and amused themselves putting crack session musicians through their paces recording their weird and peculiar songs. They’d had three Billboard top ten singles, still getting radio plays, and three well-received albums that sold well. The first, Can’t Buy A Thrill, sounded like a various artists showcase for their songwriting, with multiple lead vocalists and a bewildering range of musical styles, from Bossa Nova through Rock and Pop to Jazz and show tunes. Countdown To Ecstasy featured a tight band that really cooked with spectacular twin guitars. Pretzel Logic was polished and slick and damn near peerless.

They reinvented the notion of Rock band as a faceless entity, one without any kind of frontman. For many, the only photo of the band was in hazy black and white on the back of Countdown To Ecstasy, and that charisma-free collection of hairy herberts tells you everything. Their songs demanded an arms-length semi-detachment. They were criticised for emotional sterility but if your subject matter includes ruthless corporate greed, alienation, a sordid affair, a missing drunken father, a » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

In Richard Ashcroft’s mind, he performed stratospheric anthems to enraptured stadiums, lighters aloft, even when playing to three figure audiences in a town hall. You can’t fault his ambition, his self belief and his ego. For a brief period of time, with the release of Urban Hymns in 1997, his vision was realised. The Verve’s third album replaced Oasis’s third at number one in the UK and threatened to supplant them altogether. The comparisons were uncanny. Both bands were from greater Manchester, the friction between singer and guitarist was often unbearable, and the songs churned away at the same steady beat. In September, The Verve were the support for Oasis at Earl’s Court, but the success of Bittersweet Symphony and The Drugs Don’t Work made it into a battle of the bands event that many thought The Verve won. For the first two albums, Nick McCabe’s guitar was relied upon to light up the music. But, he left in a huff and the replacement, a much easier going gentleman called Simon Tong, was handy for keyboards as well. McCabe returned to help record Urban Hymns, by which time Ashcroft had discovered it was much » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This is an album that looks back at the earliest years of Thin Lizzy’s career, reimagining some of their most iconic tracks from that period. While scouring the archives for bonus material for a reissue of Vagabonds of the Western World, work in progress versions of a number of songs were unearthed. It’s these pieces, featuring original vocals and instrumentation, that have now been bolstered by Eric Bell’s new acoustic guitar overdubs to form the basis of this album. At first it feels rather strange to hear the music in this format, but familiar songs such as Shades of a Blue Orphanage, A Song For While I’m Away and of course Whiskey in the Jar are given something of a new lease of life, with Phil Lynott’s vocals appearing more sensitive and intimate, a facet which was perhaps rather lost in the hard rock years that were to eventually follow. Overall, the whole project has been created very respectfully, staying true to the band’s roots and, while it’s not essential, if it brings more attention to their often overlooked early recordings and bolsters their overall legacy then that surely can only be a good » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

A bit of a Christmas curiosity, a first time vinyl release of a 2 cd set that originally appeared way back in 2002. Stevie’s run of albums in the seventies, climaxing with the mighty Songs In The Key of Life, is unparalleled really (I’m drawing a veil over his last release of that decade the frankly rather odd The Secret Life of Plants!) Although the original cd set had a generous 38 tracks, this has been pared to a mere 21 here, presumably to fit on a double album, and frustratingly a few of the pieces are edited single versions rather than the full length versions, meaning songs like Living For The City and As are somewhat lacking their full majesty. The first three sides are full of great music, but the set is somewhat let down by a rather insipid last side, which concentrates on his rather less than inspiring later work. Nevertheless, there’s plenty of super music to focus on, all of which has been remastered for the occasion, with the likes of Superstition, Higher Ground and You Haven’t Done Nuthin’, but points must be deducted for omitting Pastime Paradise, Happy Birthday » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This album, originally released back in 1997, was the band’s ninth and their first after parting company with EMI. It’s now reissued in the same book format as previous efforts, with 4 cds plus a bluray and an informative 52 page book. The first cd has a new mix of the album, while the next two discs are devoted to a previously unreleased live show from Grand Rapids recorded in 1997. Disc four has a generous and comprehensive selection of B sides and bonus tracks, which are a welcome addition to any collection and it’s useful to have them all collected together in one place at last. The bluray, audio wise, along with the usual high resolution and surround mixes, has a further 25 tracks of jam sessions and early versions of the songs that ultimately appeared on the finished album. As with all these things, they are not something I would play on a regular basis but nevertheless it’s nice to know they’re there and to be able to trace the development of the songs over time. Finally the video element of the bluray encompasses an 85 minute documentary on the making of » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Three years ago, when Madfish issued American Dreamer, an 8 LP box of her first seven studio albums plus an extra platter of bonus material, Laura Nyro fans cried, “What about CD?” Now, Madfish have gone all in with this gargantuan 19 CD limited edition box set: 10 remastered original studio albums, each with their own disc, 6 live albums including 2 previously unreleased live concerts, Laura’s original demo tape from 1966 and a bonus disc of rarities including mono versions, alternative takes and live tracks, plus a 90-page coffee-table book with liner notes by Vivien Goldman and a foreword from mega-fan Elton John. They won’t be crying now, except maybe over the expense.

Laura Nyro began her career as a quiet, introspective teenager with prodigious talent, recording her first album at 19 years old. Her songs seem to be wrung from her very being, burning with an intensity that belies her years. They stand out for her unconventional use of meter and rhythm, and dramatic emotional range. Her lyrics are routinely referred to as “poetic” because they are both beautiful and elusive. If you allow her to, she will scorch your soul and » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Living In The Material World is a lovely, lovely LP that defined the George Harrison sound for the rest of his career. From conception to execution, it is quintessential George, capturing his struggles to reconcile his deeply held faith with the trappings of an ex-Beatle. All the guitars are played by him: acoustic, Leslie’d electric rhythm and lead, plus his signature slide. He also plays sitar. His singing is the best of his career. He doesn’t have the natural vocal talent of his ex bandmates but he can hit a wide variety of notes with accuracy and, more importantly, he expresses himself with genuine feeling. A choir is deployed sparingly but he sings the rest of the backing vocals, too. In addition, he is the sole producer. Phil Spector gets a credit for the backing track for Try Some, Buy Some, recorded during an aborted Ronnie Spector project, but, otherwise, George is decisively in charge.

Perhaps as a reaction to the extremes of All Things Must Pass, on which there were at least twenty-four musicians, he gathered together a trusted few. Nicky Hopkins and Gary Wright play keyboards, Klaus Voorman bass, and Jim Keltner » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This album, originally released in 1978, marked the end of the band’s classic run of albums with the mad axeman Michael Schenker on guitar. It’s now been remastered and reissued as part of a two cd set, the second disc being a contemporaneous live show. The original cd still sounds great – real classic British hard rock – and is augmented by four bonus tracks, two of which are the studio recordings of Mother Mary and This Kid’s which were surreptiously sneaked on to the Strangers in the Night live release, cunningly augmented by crowd noise. The live set included here is a new mix of a gig from Cleveland recorded in October 1978, which has a similar content to Strangers, and indeed parts of this show were apparently used on that album which appears to have been an amalgam of various performances supplemented by numerous studio overdubs, apart from Schenker’s guitar parts which he apparently refused to redo. The band are in top form, wheeling out some of their best material with the likes of Love to Love, Only You Can Rock Me and Natural Thing, and there’s a great end to the » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Hawkwind’s epic 1972 “Doremi Fasol Latido” is choc-full of bikerdelic belters; “Brainstorm”, “Space Is Deep”, “Lord of Light”, “Time we left the World today”, The Watcher,” are just some of the spicy little numbers. A single of the time – proto-punk “Born to Go” is added, along with the naughty “Urban Gorilla”, and “Brainbox Pollution”. Yes, an awful lot of this ended up on the mighty and still formidable “Space Ritual”, not that this is a bad thing. I still wonder how, given the band’s alleged consumption of hallucinogens, they kept the show as tight as they did – maybe Lemmy mostly keeping to speed helped. If you know Hawkwind, you know this album or the tracks, many of which remain mainstays of their live set. Not uncoincidentally, a legendary live set at the Greasy Truckers Party on 13th February 1972 is also included – note my observation re keeping it together.

The album has been give a remix which makes it a bit cleaner, enabling a spot of definition in the synths and bass, but over my aged ears and mediocre computer speakers, it was wasted (which I wasn’t – another problem » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

A year ago Adams released a live 3 album retrospective which pulled together “Cuts Like A Knife”, “Into The Fire” and “Waking Up The Neighbours”, recorded at the Royal Albert Hall. He broke the chronology as “Reckless” was skipped, but even before the det was released, Adams was back at the RAH to give “Reckless”, “18 ‘Til I Die” and his most recent studio release “So Happy It Hurts” the same treatment.

Available as 3 CDs or 4 LPs, there’s also a blu ray of each concert. I’ve bought a great many concert DVDs and watched them very little but, in this case, I found myself preferring them to the identical audio versions. “Reckless” is up first, and the band emerge from moody backstage monochrome onto a full colour stage, although the band are all decked out in black, white sneaker laces the only offset. Adams continues to sport a retro slicked back haircut and an equally vintage Gibson ES-295 and is in fine vocal form throughout.

Although Adams is reprising previous releases, he changes the playing order and here throws in tracks that didn’t make the original. He restores the song “Reckless” that » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

The reason this review is late is a simple one; Frost* albums take a while to absorb and take in, especially when it’s a double, like this one.

Their previous release, 2021’s Day and Age, was something of a departure because it contained songs with no solos. I absolutely loved it but I know that wasn’t the case for everyone. Life in the Wires is a return to the band’s roots; a proper concept album with an absolute plethora of fantastic melodies, virtuoso playing and terrific songs. Oh, and a solo or ten.

Jem Godfrey, Frosts*’s leader, keyboard player and co-singer, puts out hilarious ‘the making of’ videos which give fans the background and timeline to the gestation of each album and for this one, we can see that it is very much his baby, especially as he has taken all of the lead vocals. The whole ‘double concept-album’ is obviously his passion and that shines through in the music.

Ah, yes; the music.

The songs are almost universally glorious. There’s an intensity in many of them but without too much of the heavy, complicated time-signature stuff which I know turns some fans off. » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

It’s a dull weekend afternoon in early summer, 1972. I’m in the living room at my parent’s home in Plymouth, with the transistor radio on, likely listening to Rosko or Freeman. I’m not really paying any attention to the chat between tracks when on comes this dreamy little single driven by electric piano chords and a subtle bass part. Then there’s a breathy, slightly treated vocal from someone whose accent sounds as if maybe English is not their first language. It builds nicely and then the chords part and there is an utterly wonderful guitar solo break that unfolds magically and leads into another vocal verse. This verse then leads directly to the close, where the whole thing fades to a silence that just leaves me wanting to hear it again, immediately. 2 minutes 55 seconds of perfect. What. The. Heck. Was. That?

I fail to gather any information except the name of the track: ‘Break’ and that of the artist: a bunch called Aphrodite’s Child, apparently. Dimly I recall a couple of singles a few years past, poppy and fun, but not anything I’d longed to own at the time. I store » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

No-one thumps a drumkit as robustly as Chris Frantz. The highlight of this 3 CD + 1 Blu-Ray is a live recording at CBGBs on 10th October 1977. It sounds fantastic and features Frantz walloping away with gusto, the missing link between the weedy production of the debut album and the power unleashed on More Songs About Buildings And Food. His battering introduction to the opening song, Love -> Building On Fire, is both deafening and gasp-inducing. Martina Weymouth, as she is credited on Talking Heads 77, a keen student of Bootsy Collins’s basslines for James Brown, sounds equally beefy, providing the core strength of Take Me To The River, already fully constructed well before Brian Eno added his adjustments. Thank You For Sending Me Angel is present and fully formed, but Stay Hungry is yet to lose a few extra parts. The boys on guitars, +/- keyboards, are wonderful, too. David Byrne’s vocals are as quirky and dynamic as they ever were. It’s great to hear his introductions, always the same for every song; “This name of this song is…” Disc Three is a familiar experience for those of us lucky enough to » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Keith Jarrett was a singular talent. A child prodigy, he began piano lessons at the age of three. Early on, his first experiment with composing was to add a note to a Mozart piece. He played the original to his teacher and his own version to himself at home. From the very beginning, he combined the classicist’s ambidextrous ability to wring every emotion from little squiggles on a page with the jazz musician’s ear for improvisation and adventure. His talent was so huge, his taste so mercurial and his personality so prickly, he struggled to fit into groups with other musicians. It’s no coincidence that it was his solo pieces made him famous, my favourite being Bremen/Lausanne rather than the big seller, Köln. Charles Lloyd, a saxophonist leaning towards Coltrane experimentation, accommodated him early in his career by giving him plenty of space to extemporise. He served a stint in Miles Davis’s electric band of the early seventies, where he worked alongside Jack DeJohnette, a powerhouse of a drummer who found a way to provoke and cajole Jarrett on to greater heights. The pair combined with Gary Peacock, a patient and melodic bass player, » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Rave music of the late eighties/early nineties was designed for immediate consumption. Its purpose to enhance the moment a sea of bodies moves as one as they glimpse heaven in a collective trance. It’s best experienced in a field or a warehouse with hundreds of others. There is a science behind it. A maximal beats per minute, combined with a certain harmonic amplitude and a rhythmic peak and drop, added to the social setting and various substances, creates delta waves in the brain normally associated with deep relaxation and a loss of sense of self. In other words, rave music blows the mind. The Hartnell brothers looked like boffins with matching bald heads. They named themselves after the M25. People used to drive round it waiting for the message with the venue of that night’s event. Social media was in its infancy and it was the era of the CD. The extra space, compared to vinyl, meant the recorded music could stretch out, building relentlessly, increasing the tension up to the dramatic drop and blissful release. John Major’s government was highly suspicious of an outsider culture that involved youngsters enjoying themselves, taking drugs and » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

When an album has already had 30th and 40th anniversary reissues, as well as its own box set, The Road To Red, one wonders what’s left for the undoubted landmark of fifty years. Well quite a lot as it turns out, as this 2 cd plus 2 bluray set amply demonstrates. The main selling point for me is the new 2024 Atmos and 5.1 mixes once again produced by the estimable Steven Wilson, plus the elemental mixes created by David Singleton. The latter, featured on the second cd, have been prepared to create an alternative version of the album, with the emphasis on parts that were perhaps somewhat overlooked before, while also incorporating things that were ultimately never used in the final mix. In fact, all the surviving session material has been used, and these in depth examinations really shed new light on the music, providing a breath of fresh air to the familiar pieces. For good measure, the first cd, along with a new stereo mix, also has an instrumental version of the entire album. The Atmos mix, found on the second bluray with the other surround mixes, is breathtaking in its clarity, » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

What is the point of a Best Of collection in the era of streaming? Modern day megastars don’t bother with them any more. Just selecting two at random; Beyoncé and Taylor Swift have never released one. Instead, they have playlists on streaming sites or video collections. T.Rex, however, are a band of the seventies, when vinyl, TV and radio were the only ways to hear records and Best Ofs were a great way of collecting all the singles relatively cheaply. It’s no surprise that they are wedded to the concept, releasing no less than 28 compilations, all but four after Marc Bolan’s death. The last one was Gold in 2018, consisting of 45 tracks, most of which overlap with the 36 presented on this brand new, “definitive” collection. You can still buy a 3CD physical copy for less than a tenner. You can also stream all but two of its tracks, neither of which feature on Bolan Boogie.

This physical product is two discs, CD or vinyl, in “deluxe” gatefold packaging. You really can’t fail when Bolan’s pretty face fills the front sleeve. The music covers the whole period of T.Rex’s career and includes » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

By 1986, many Costello fans were confused. Where was the spittle-flecked, forehead-beaded ball of fury of This Year’s Model and Armed Forces? On Kings Of America, he is gazing cautiously through new facial hair and wire spectacles, with a crown on his head. His name has changed to The Costello Show or The Little Hands of Concrete when he plays guitar. The songs are credited to Declan MacManus but Declan Patrick Aloysius MacManus co-produced, the Aloysius appearing from nowhere. The Attractions, who had done so much to sharpen his music into a frenzy, are restricted to one song out of fifteen tracks on an album just shy of an hour long. A casual observer might think Costello was suffering an existential crisis. He was concluding a divorce, had fallen out with his band, was in a chaotic relationship with Cait O’Riordan, and had ‘retired’ after his previous album flopped. Musically, the enfant terrible of New Wave was unrecognisable, even so soon after a detour into Country Music, a shot at Pure Pop and an ill-judged effort at over production as art. Many of his post Punk fans may not have been able to name » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

I wasn’t too sure what to expect from this – presumably a lot of backstage chatter and some music clips, basically a promo for the upcoming tour, but we actually get quite a moving rumination on what being on the road means to Springsteen and the rest of the band after doing this for 50 years (one of our number watching with us was in actually tears at one point). I’m hesitating to say too much here as it would spoil the narrative, but it starts with the band getting together to rehearse after 6 years away from the stage. In that period Bruce released Letter to You and the soul album Only the Strong Survive, and we see him putting the set list together incorporating songs from those which have actually never been played live. We do hear that Bruce really isn’t one for rehearsing too much, and a lot is made of retaining the spontaneity in live performance, and there is one song they try out where Max Weinberg and Gary Tallent realise it is being played far too slowly! We also see the E Street Band expanding to include backing singers » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Julian Copes output in the noughties onwards is very variable at best. I made the mistake of buying his 70 minute ambient mellotron album last year that is an exercise of torture

However I read a few things that suggested this was a “proper” album and indeed it is. There’s only “Me and the Jews” that sounds like he made it up as he goes along The rest are proper vintage Cope with proper melodies and everything. Bits of it remind me of Fried

It doesn’t appear to be on any streaming services or been reviewed anywhere. I only knew it was coming out as I’m on his Twitter account. Would be a crying shame for it to disappear into the ether and not be heard, but I’d get why people gave up on him years ago considering the volume of dirge he puts out at times

It’s very low fi ala Skellington of course but I’d say this is his best album in 20 years plus. If only he’d tour again…

What does it all *mean*?

The old bugger still has it in there somewhere

Goes well with…

Release Date:

18th October

» Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

This is a fabulous live album, smooth and slick, everything you could hope for from Tears For Fears. It was recorded during the Tipping Point tour, promoting their excellent studio album released in 2022, eloquently reviewed on the Afterword by Dave Ross. They sound as young as they did over forty years ago, the baritone textures and tones of their vocals completely unchanged. They have upgraded their synthesisers, they can afford a real Fender Rhodes these days, but, nevertheless, the musicianship is flawless. Props to the band: Doug Petty keyboards, Charlton Pettus guitar, Jamie Wollam drums, Lauren Evans, Janae Sims and Jasmine Mullen vocals, plus of course Roland Orzabal guitar and Curt Smith bass. The sound is magnificent. They were never particularly prolific. In the eighties they released just three albums, split up for the nineties and managed only two this century, but, gradually, they have acquired a substantial catalogue of song choices. Tipping Point is a late career album of high quality, the equal of their early fresh-faced peak, and it provides almost a third of the set. They are so confident in it, one of their biggest songs, Everybody Wants To Rule » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

CSNY were drawn together by the ethereal beauty of their harmonies. They were also born out of conflict. David Crosby had fallen out from The Byrds partly because he sat in for Neil Young, at the request of Stephen Stills, after Young had quit Buffalo Springfield. Graham Nash’s exit from The Hollies was less of a gordian knot of turmoil but the strands that held CSNY together were gossamer thin. Nevertheless, CSN was a successful debut album released in May 1969. Stills had carried most of the musical load but needed help in order to tour. Young was recruited as a full band member and was allowed to continue pursuing his solo career with Crazy Horse. Dallas Taylor and Greg Reeves were brought in as the touring rhythm section.

Their first gig was on 16th August, opened by Joni Mitchell, at The Auditorium Theatre, Chicago. Their second, on the 18th August 1969, was at Woodstock, catapulting the new lineup into the spotlight. Footage from two performances at the Big Sur Folk Festival on September 13–14, 1969 appears in the movie Celebration at Big Sur. Their first tour also included a performance at the notorious Altamont Free Concert on December » Continue Reading.