• Music

    Eclectic Maybe Band – Again Alors?

    April 4, 2022 - By 

    Bassist GS was once a member of the legendary rock-in-opposition band Univers Zéro, and he has continued on his incredible music journey with a new project, the Eclectic Maybe Band. From the Discus Records Bandcamp site: “Again Alors? is the third release by the band, which brings together detailed studio work with the creativity of real time improvisation. Using different groupings from within a large ensemble cast, which includes many well-known names, Guy has created an album where half the tracks are drawn from live improvisation in the studio and half are created from the ground up with players adding their composed…

  • Music

    Stick Men – Tentacles EP

    April 2, 2022 - By 

    It’s hard to imagine a more technically proficient power trio than the Stick Men. Tony Levin, Markus Reuter and Pat Mastelotto are all King Crimson alumni or associates, and each bring their superlative talents to their instruments of choice. It’s the band’s first new music in six years. Amazing work.

  • Music - Music Articles - Press Releases

    [Press Release] Robert Fripp “Exposures” 32-Disc Box Set To Be Released May 27, 2022

    March 30, 2022 - By 

    I normally don’t post press releases (that may change soon), but this is a monumental event for me.  Our friends at Glass Onyon PR explain further: 25 CDs, 3 DVDs (audio only), 4 Blu-Ray discs (audio only) Packaged in a 12” boxed set with 48-page booklet including extensive notes by Sid Smith and Al Okada plus press releases, photos and memorabilia. The long-awaited 32-disc boxed set of Robert Fripp in the studio and in concert 1977 – 1983 will be released on 27th May 2022. The set will feature many previously unreleased tracks, outtakes and rarities as well as numbers…

  • Music

    Kombinat M – Hybrid Beat

    March 14, 2022 - By 

    Cuneiform Records has a great program where they announce that an album in their back catalogue gets offered at half-price, and as I had been wanting to hear this band (they feature drummer, composer and friend Lukas Ligeti) for a long time, I decided to risk it.  It was well worth it. From the release’s Bandcamp site: “The Austrian five-piece band, Kombinat M, was founded in 1987 by Walter Hollinetz, Andreas Leikauf, and Erwin Redl. The group’s members, all of whom are trained in music or visual arts, share an interest in rock and jazz-based music, classical minimalism, and fine…

  • Music

    Nick Sudnick – Opera of the Fifteenth Hour

    March 10, 2022 - By 

    24 Rush Hours is a series done by Zga composer and multi-instrumentalist Nick Sudnick, and this is #15 of 24.  The two long pieces are a pastiche of art-rock (think Rock-In-Opposition like Art Bears or the composers Alfred ’23’Harth and Heiner Goebbels).  Add an element of Bertolt Brecht-like lyrics for theater and you have a fine series of avant-opera Sudnick keeps producing..

  • Music

    Ángel Ontalva – October Equus Guitar Project Vol. 1

    February 26, 2022 - By 

    Ángel Ontalva is a Spanish guitarist who spends a great deal of time working in Russia whom we’ve featured here in the past, and he surprises us with a release of an album full of Rock-In-Opposition and chamber-rock influences. From his Bandcamp site: “The origin of this album is in the Rock In Opposition Festival 2014. For our participation I wrote new arrangements for some of the group’s compositions that, due to the difficulty of the scores and the lack of time to prepare them properly, were discarded. During these years I have fantasized about the idea of ​​recording these…

  • Music

    Sunset Wings and Brodsky – Songs of Love, Madness and Sleep

    January 25, 2022 - By 

    From Kaliningrad, Russia (formerly my material ancestral Linn homeland of Koenigsberg, East Prussia) hail one of the most impressive psychedelic folk records I’ve heard in some time.  From the cacophony of the violin starting the album, it morphs into a Beatlesque horn arrangement.  Those few seconds set the tone for what I figured would be a very heavy listening experience. Sunset Wings, led by singer and multi-instrumentalist Aleks Popov team on this album with fellow singer Evgeniy Brodsky.  What makes the album crucial listening, along with the impressive instrumental array you will see below, is the adaptations by poets and…

  • Music

    Cergy-Pontoise – CP01

    January 17, 2022 - By 

    This is a curious release.  Cergy-Pontoise are an Italian duo, and their albim starts out with drone-y ambient sounds but then falls into atmospheric progressive-folk at times, sounding like a better recorded lo-fi artist out of New Zealand, perhaps.  There are also elements of space rock, prog and psychedelic music in this.  It’s a mixed bag in the positive sense of the word.

  • Music

    Autumn Tears / Zeresh – Widowing / Possessing

    January 9, 2022 - By 

    What a strikingly good album this is.  Autumn Tears is a collective of musicians from Billerica, Massachusetts who make an ethereal sound that blends the best of bands who would have fit well on 4AD Records during their 1980s heyday and progressive rock, especially for those who are fans of the Russian symphonic group iamthemorning.  Zeresh are beloved friends whose work has been reviewed on this blog in the past, and Tamar Singer’s vocals sound utterly sublime here.  This crosses neofolk with a restrained but foreboding metal vibe.  Dark, but magically so. Of special note, the mastering on this album…