This has been called their Krautrock album and it smokes! I just can't get over how consistently great this album is with no weak tracks or even moments for me unless you consider hearing "rattlesnake" a hundred times on the opener. This album is a mood changer as is "I'm In Your Mind Fuzz" and "Nonagon Infinity" the two GIZZARD albums I've reviewed before this one. There's a ton of energy here that makes it difficult to keep still and I'm okay with that. They use an instrument called a zurna that brings the Middle east to mind with it's shrill sound and it adds a lot to the mood here.

"Rattlesnake" opens with the wind blowing fairly hard before it kicks into this energetic assault to the senses. This is an 8 minute blast! The zurna comes in taking no prisoners before 5 minutes then more wind gusts. "Melting" is such an awesome track. Kind of jazzy with those softer but urgent vocals but check out the opening drums. And how about those distorted keyboards, so good! Great track! "Open Water" is a top three with those ethnic sounds but man such a groove with beats and bass all over it. The zurna rips in before 3 minutes then back to vocals. The fast paced vocals before 4 1/2 minutes are cool. This might be my number one or at least tied with the next track "Sleep Drifter" a track I felt stood out above the rest from the first spin but "Open Water" has since come close at least.

"Sleep Drifter" just sounds amazing with the picked guitar, beats and high pitched vocals to start out. But come on this just blows me away. A high energy top tapper. It's pretty cool when we get a calm and your thinking it's over but it slowly builds to an even groovier piece of music and I'm just bobbing to this like nobody's business. Check it out 4 minutes in. Love that guitar. "Billabong Valley" has these high pitched distorted vocals with piano and beats. The zurna replaces the vocals. So good! Back to the vocals as the piano rips it up. Love that bass giving us some depth and how about the drumming. I'm laughing here then a calm with picked guitar that builds with all but the vocals returning including the zurna. Vocals replace the zurna but they trade up some more.

"Anoxia" is a heavier sounding piece with some cool sounding guitar melodies that are replaced by the vocals. Nice bass and beats as usual. Lots of intricate microtonal sounds. "Doom City" opens with distortion and echoes before this motorik groove takes over. Krautrock 101 then the vocals come in fast paced. Sounds like a deranged harmonica after 2 minutes. "Nuclear Fusion" is my final top three but man every track is great. Deep processed vocals replace the drums then bass before we get that awesome sounding groove with vocals. Too catchy man. Swaying and swaying. Love the keys before 1 1/2 minutes and later before 2 minutes as it comes and goes. Again not fair how melodic this band is within high end compositions and sounds. This is my music. "Flying Microtonal Banana" ends it in a very exotic way with the zurna all over it but also ethnic strings and sounds. An instrumental to end it all.

My first 5 star GIZZARD album and so it's no surprise that it's their Krautrock record that hit that level first. The fireworks have been relentless here tonight on Canada Day I must say. Music is blasting outside but not over mine(haha).

In parallel with his work in Porcupine Tree, Steven Wilson spent the 2000s putting out a series of solo singles in the Cover Version series, each covering a different artist's song on side A and then providing an original Wilson song on side B. Cover Version is a compilation which brings all of this material together into a sort of "lost album".

The exact running order depends on which edition you get - some versions put all the cover versions together and all the original material together, while others mingle them, but either way what you get is a subdued art rock treatment of the material here - Steven doesn't go full prog simply because many of the songs he's tackling don't lend themselves to that, but he does add a distinctive aesthetic touch. (Never have ABBA sounded so sombre, for instance.)

As far as the original material goes, it sounds like Wilson was using the series to provide an outlet for the sort of material which had been part of the Porcupine Tree sound back when it was basically a solo project of his own, but which fell by the wayside as it shifted into being more of a band - The Unquiet Grave, in particular, sounds like something which might conceivably have appeared on Up the Downstair, whilst Well You're Wrong is a slice of the sort of whimsical psychedelic pop that the earliest Porcupine Tree releases dipped into.

Don't expect anything too much like either Wilson's previous or subsequent solo albums or, for that matter, his other musical projects - this is another body in the same sonic universe, with some aesthetic features in common with other musical worlds of Wilson's construction but its own particular way of doing things.

A marked step down from previous efforts, although not exactly a sellout: even though the band followed the tradition of their American fusion contemporaries by moving towards a more commerciably viable funk-influenced sound, it's not exactly radio-friendly material and even the three relatively accessible vocal numbers ("Arterio", "D'Essay" and the title track) all have a solid foundation in traditional mid-70s jazz fusion. This doesn't change the fact however that these three particular songs are the weakest points on the album by a distance: not only do they all kinda sound the same anyway, but they also all share the misfortune of being "graced" by guest singer Rudi Passuello's raspy voice that sounds very out of place and quickly gets on one's nerves.

The instrumentals are better, but betray a band gradually running out of steam and out of ideas, starting with the captivating, energetic "Vicolo" (proving that funkiness does not nullify a menacing quality to fusion, in case you really needed proof of that) but ending with a lifeless and uninspired jam ("Arti") and finally with a brass-driven conclusion which I think tries to go for a celestial atmosphere but just falls flat and peters out. Four years having passed since one's last album and only being able to stretch out a disappointing middle-of-the-road effort like this to just over 30 minutes is not the sign of a healthy career.

After six albums and four years of silence, Daal is back, formed as always by the duo Alfio Costa-Davide Guidoni (the first on keyboards, the second on percussion). "Daedalus" partly takes up the type of compositional philosophy of Decalogue of Darkness and is made up of 6 medium and long duration songs. The intent was to address issues relating to the history of Icarus, the desires and fears most hidden in human nature, culminating in the famous flight that proved fatal for Icarus. The cover portrays a double Icaro (or perhaps Icaro in the company of his father) while electric tension flows in the veins is beautiful! Overall "Daedalus" moves on the typical tracks of the group, a real trademark, assisted as always by the guitarist Ettore Salati and the bassist Bobo Aiolfi, engaged in the interpenetration of an album that begins with great pomp with the 15 minutes of "Journey trought the spiral mind part. I". An icy effect creeps into a repetitive goblin-style piano round that includes a second part with Ettore Salati's guitar in evidence, a dark and melancholy melody that opens a vortex towards the dark. The last 5 minutes are a compendium of the best Pink Floyd (those of A Saucerful of Secret to be clear). Huge track !!! "Icarus Dream" instead is characterized by a strong and powerful rhythm, open to variations that could even appear in a metal record. There are setbacks that recall the foggy atmospheres of the last King Crimson. In this context, Ettore Salati's distorted comments on the six strings fit very well. "In My Time of Shadow" "is a melancholy ballad, in its way also quite intense, accompanied by an amazing video clip, "Labyrinth66" is the apex of the disc!!! a long piece divided into two parts completely opposite to each other, the first very infernal and experimental, the second of excellent progressive workmanship, as a vole means travel and escape from the famous labyrinth of Knossos. In the 13 minutes of duration there is the whole Daal world that we have come to know over the years. The second part of "Journey trought the spiral mind" closes the work (oh yes ..... it's a 20-minute suite divided into two tracks !!!) Which clearly recalls the great endings of their previous albums (Dodecahedron part XII, Decalogue of Darkness part x) Magniloquent and solemn.

Winning formula does not change; Daal wanted to exploit elements familiar to them, manipulating the sound material with great mastery and professionalism! If Daedalus had been released a few decades ago on vinyl, lovers of certain sounds would have done everything to grab it even at quite high figures.

DAAL is the Italian duo formed in 2008 by Davide GUIDONI and Alfio COSTA offering a singular multi-layered music based on metal, soaring, stoner and dreamlike; group instrumentally describing dreamlike, contemplative and melancholy atmospheres on the state of the composer, also exploded. Concept album, the 7th, on the myth of Icarus wanting to overcome his limits, here the endless symphonic, melancholy, dark, complex and tormented experimentation. Ettore and Bobo assist them in this intropection

'Journey Through The Spiral Mind Part 1' with an overlooping musical journey to torture your mind with minimalist synth layers, avant-garde chamber music with a dark and ethereal atmosphere; electric tonic break to amplify this feeling then hovering atmosphere à la 'Saucerful Of Secrets' by PINK FLOYD where piano and synths offer a languorous air finalized by a cello spleen. 'Icarus Dreams' takes off on a rhythmic tune with a powerful metallic groove accompanied by tribal percussion for a time before returning to this heady tune; melodic symphonic break and 'Painting Wings' for the most spleen piece with a sound reminding me of the flights of the twilight KING CRIMSON; ceremonious air amplified by this sound of musical saw reminiscent of the delusions of the film 'Delicatessen' for a very good moment, the dreamlike, dark and introspective finale with a sound of end of flight.

'Labyrinth 66 Part 1 & 2' starts with a dark and repetitive electro-spatial universe, on a slow crescendo; bordering on improvisation and austere climate just with this flute; the 2nd part refers to Frippian notes, on ZAPPA for the reading of the tormented guitar, on a crystalline and symphonic musical cascade. 'In My Time Of Shadow' follows for the dreamlike track with proven spleen; an admirable melancholic progressive ballad, a contemplative vintage tune with two beautiful guitar and synth solos in a Genesis version. 'Journey Through The Spiral Mind Part 2' gets back into the Crimsonian vibe with just that Mellotron keyboard; nervous then spleen to move without words, pompous and majestic like a hymn on the flight of man.

The deluxe version offers 'Minotaur' with a trying intro, looking for the sound of the creation of the monster, SCHULZE comes to mind. 'Sunrise' on the same vein with an evolution of the air bringing more clarity and solemnity while remaining dreamlike with the languorous guitar. 'Moonrise' drives the point home with a tormented air like the setting sun letting the moon light up the world, contrasting our life in duality.

DAAL plunges us into a universe filled with pleasurable melancholy, vintage reminiscences, ranging from KING CRIMSON to GENESIS via Elton JOHN for the intimate piano solos. It's beautiful, complex because it's instrumental but it's very moving, so inclined to meditative listening. DAAL is almost indecipherable, DAAL is to be listened to religiously.

The worst of the catalog? really? lol This is the best and is not even close... and I love the Vol 1 & 2. Still have to listen 4,5,6 though

I was reading some of the reviews here before getting into this album since in the first place I do already have all the official albums released by Frank and ZFT, so before getting into this saga called You Can't.... I thought that all the material was a compilation of what had been released up to this date and I didn't want to spend redundant time if already had the material somewhere else which I have listened hundreds of times ?06.2022. Well, while few material is indeed in some posthumous albums like Halloween 77' and 81, I'd say that at very least the 70% of the content here is not, and that is great to start off; ie most of the material is brand new versions of already beloved songs or actually unreleased material. Also, you have to know that my music background is hard rock , heavy metal, and classic rock (before entering into the Art Rock/Experimental world, aka "progressive" music), plus, I specially love guitar virtuoso music, so this volume of the series fits just right with my musical taste because most of it is actually that; hard rock and guitar virtuoso music performed by the cream of the cream of the industry by the time and led by the best musician of all-time in my book; so... what else do you want? lol

Having said that as an introduction, this album is not for people who is entering into Frank Zappa universe IMO, since in order to really appreciate it 100%, you should have digested everything else of the catalog including the ZFT releases, ie the vault material?over 120 albums and 2500+ songs lol; I mean, out there are dozens of Dickie's Such an Asshole, Zoot Allures, Sharleena, etc. versions and yes, every single version is different, and that my friend, is what makes FZ unique and a genius among other million things. So these particular versions presented here are literally home runs by Frank, and now I get why he selected this particular performances and mixes. They are magnificent, and hey! Sharleena, Dickie's such an Asshole, Honey, Don't You Want a Man Like Me?, etc were oks in my book before listening to this, but here my friend, they shine like masterpieces; really!

Also, El Maestro here once again proves his genius mind. Did you ever imagine listen in a song like Zoot Allures which is already a master piece in its studio version, being performed by say:

musicians 1976: FZ?guitar Napoleon Murphy Brock?sax André Lewis?keyboards Roy Estrada?bass Terry Bozzio?drums

musicians 1982: FZ?lead guitar Ray White?rhythm guitar Steve Vai?stunt guitar Tommy Mars?keyboards Bobby Martin?keyboards Ed Mann?percussion Scott Thunes?bass Chad Wackerman?drums

Well, Frank made it possible here mixing the tune which sounds terrific. Speaking for myself I always wanted to listen for example Bozzio and Vai in a single tune; here the dream came true. Some other tunes as well like King Kong were mixed this way. Seriously, you will be surprised how beautiful they sound.

Do not take me wrong all newbies in the FZ universe, you will love it as well since after all this is still great music, but hardcore FZ fans might understand what I'm talking about ?or not lol

Anyways, this is a masterpiece all the way man. It's only 5 stars just because out there are not 10.

Apparently this album has been cooking slowly since 2019 (remember pre-pandemic era?), so, what we have here is the mature product of a band who really took their time to round it.

The bright side of this music lies in a set of neat pop melodies delivered with great sensibility by a vocalist graced with a wide range and a very likable tonal color. The not-so-bright side comes to evidence when the minutes pass and the arrangements keep showing no notable variation or inventiveness: they are primarily based on minimalistic displacement of the rhythmic accent and frequently (more than desirable) underlined by a seemingly synthetized brass section.

As a personal favorite, I can mention track 4, Ring 5 - Middle Class. It's a delicious melody I suppose one could have found sounding in any mid-class kitchen during the mid-seventies. Think something like "Bachara meets XTC's psychedelia". Nevertheless, don't expect any highly skilful solo (guitar or whatever), nor a classic drums sound, because the dishes are nowhere to be found.

All in all, it's a good album crafted for not exceedingly high prog expectatives. This record can seat comfortably in your pop shelf (in case you have one), among the likes of XTC, Tears For Fears or Field Music.

This is Stanley Clark's first album, he chose to surround himself with some of the best in the business including the singer DEEDEE BRIDGEWATER whose performance I had the pleasure to see a few years ago.

The giant PAT MARTINO holds the electric & 12-string guitars and LENNY WHITE, who held a preponderant place in the development of jazz fusion is behind the drums.

To create his first work, Stanley Clark was determined to surround himself with the bests. But in practice, what does it give?

On the whole, the album is a fine execution of the standard, pure jazz style. we have some striking examples of this "ordinary" and basic type of jazz in Children of forever or Butterfly dreams.

Some moments are rather grandiloquent (especially the first piece) and sometimes reigns the softness and sensuality thanks to the sublime voice of DeeDee Bridgewater (Unexpected Days).

Chick Corea is not outdone, and we hear his touch throughout the album (in particular on the dynamic Bass Folk Song)

Only the last track is for me really interesting and goes out of the beaten tracks, one feels that it is more adventurous, more daring, it goes into space, DeeDee Bridgewater even makes a more original rendition.

I give 2.5/5 to this album because it is still really too academic, too stern, I know that each of these artists did better, they are here still at their beginnings and seek their way, let us be indulgent.

Review Nº 547

At the turn of the 60's, two English students of Cambridge, Fred Frith and Tim Hodgkinson formed the core of Henry Cow, a band who over the course of ten years pretty much bucked every stale tradition of rock, creating their own way, a Baroque inflected free jazz soaked cacophony which they refined to a method dubbed Rock In Opposition (RIO), by way of several communal traipses across Europa. The general idea was to create an independent network of like minded performers that would not be dependent on the largesse of the major record companies for their own survival.

So, in the 70's, the collaborative spirit seemed to have swept through the British progressive art rock scene. Countless performers commingled on each other's albums and, in a variety of configurations, they explored similar sonic territory. This spirit of creative collaboration was most highly concentrated around the virtually unclassifiable music of one of the most iconic bands, Henry Cow. Serving as the nexus of a wildly experimental scene and seeing a virtual who's who of the avant-garde wing of the British art rock, Henry Cow's influence and ideals spread quickly during the decade in which they existed, each member popping up here and there on other artists' albums before striking out on their own.

During the ten years of existence, 1968-78, Henry Cow released four studio albums. During the recording of their final album "Western Culture", the band split down the middle, with Hodgkinson wanting to continue down the increasingly oblique path their music had been careening down, and Frith wanting to perform more "song-oriented" fare. In a fashion unusually amicable and diplomatic, Frith split off with the percussionist Chris Cutler, to finish recording the material they had prepared for "Western Culture" but which didn't make part of the final version. Cutler wrote lyrics, and their recently bandless acquaintance Dagmar Krause, who already worked with them, stepped up to work with both.

So, the drummer Chris Cutler and the guitarist Fred Frith were core members of Henry Cow, who had collaborated with German singer Dagmar Krause's band, Slapp Happy, on a pair of albums in the mid of the 70's. Krause brought a highly distinctive vocal presence to the band, one both wildly idiosyncratic, witness her various shrieks, growls and unclassifiable utterances throughout the Art Bears catalog, and schooled in traditional European art songs, particularly those of Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht. With her voice and phrasing, she managed to single handedly unify lengthy works that might have otherwise lapsed into typically arch, classically structured Henry Cow pieces. When Krause joined the band on a permanent basis, it was natural that they should gravitate towards something more like "songs".

The musicians who would become Art Bears began recording their first album, "Hopes And Fears", before the band even formally existed. In 1978, Cutler, Frith, Krause, Georgie Born, Lindsay Cooper and Tim Hodgkinson went to Switzerland with the intent to cut the fifth Henry Cow album at Etienne Conod's Sunrise Studio. However, when it became apparent that Cutler's shorter songs, along with Krause's vocals, weren't going to result in anything resembling a Henry Cow album, Cutler, Frith and Krause decided to rename themselves Art Bears, and with the others, agreed to record different, instrumental pieces for what would become Henry Cow's final album, "Western Culture".

The duo wrote 13 succinct, arguably more tuneful songs all based loosely on carvings which adorn the walls of the Amiens cathedral in France. This is really a very dense, challenging and tough album to crack. It's supposed to be. But with repeated listenings, its brilliance will begin to take shape, an angular swan which slowly carves itself out of the ice of initial distaste. Brilliance and genius, all too apparent in Frith's shapeshifting guitars and stark arrangements and the panoply of diverse percurssions and noises of Cutler and his oblique, preternatural lyrics, delivered supernaturally by the voice of Dagmar Krause. It's the confounding voice of crestfallen strength, desperate and seemingly tuneless, yet never missing a note. It's stark in the greatest German tradition, but unlike much less talented and yet far more namedropped "anti-singers" like Nico, this is a voice strained and cold via too much emotion, rather than devoid of it.

Conclusion: The music on "Hopes And Fears" is strange, dark and aggressive. Sometimes reminds me of something close to Van Der Graaf Generator, but even more experimental. Firth's guitar sounds are twisted and unpredictable, and Cutler's drumming focuses on a more simplistic, but at the same time forceful side, rather than his disorienting, polyrhythmic playing in Henry Cow. On "Hopes And Fears" there are mostly regular length songs, with Krause's falsetto vocals at the center. I must admit that I'm not a huge fan of her singing, although she is a nice addition to the music on the album. The music of Art Bears sounds almost as ahead of the curve today as it did so many years ago. The sophistication and beauty of their music is far above of most other song based bands of the last few decades. Art Bears was at the pinnacle of the European songwriting. Unfortunately, they aren't simply understood by most people.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)

THE ARISTOCRATS is originally to follow up on a dirty joke, it's mostly Guthrie, Bryan and Marco, 3 musicians who dipped their names into different bands; from rock fusion to heavy prog, from blues to jazzy progressive jazz- fusion. They took from the musical spirit of RETURN TO FOREVER, MAHAVISHNU ORCHESTRA, KING CRIMSON and UK, from the great Steve VAI, Joe SATRIANI, from ZAPPA for the avant-garde fusion side. Guthrie seen with ASIA and after GPS shows all his knowledge and deserves to be recognized for his talent. Album recorded following a sight of said musicians of the orchestra in question and final desire to go further with Wojtek LEMANSKI and his 22 classic pieces. Titles from the ARISTOCRATS discography mixed, reworked, re-imagined to magnify the presence of the orchestra, but let's take a look.

2013's "Culture Clash" sets the mood by showing the symbiosis that an orchestra can bring to a rock band; more syrupy jazzy variation, highlighting the guitar and rhythmic bass juggling with the classical orchestration of the strings; we come back to the psychedelic jazz of the MAHAVISHU ORCHESTRA. The battery sawed by violins and a disconcertingly fresh title. "Stupid 7" follows on a tonic register where nervousness and breaks with the strings hit the mark, perhaps even too much because too short. "The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde" and its classic intro with killer violins is a good thing, for a meditative journey eyeing intimate blues; the story is indeed that of pigs, to be taken in the 1st or 2nd degree with the legendary bandits; grandiloquent air for that, sinister and jovial as they loved each other before they were renegades. The final fusion makes it a Dantesque musical firework. "Dance of the Aristocrats" revamped synth, electro, vitaminized like a completely crazy VAI and RETURN TO FOREVER fusion; the nervous violins responding to the bass and a guitar solo by Guthrie assassin for the end.

"Through the Flower" masterpiece hard prog bluesy highlighting the three friends with the chamber orchestra 'furnishing' and revisiting the musical score to bring more warmth; long title with a bewitching atmosphere which passes easily like on those of BUCKETHEAD in bluesy-stoner mode; it vibrates and Guthrie blasts the air in a deafening finale of re-creativity.

"All Said and Done" with a pizzicato as an appetizer, a title where PRIMUZ steals the show with its presence, the musicians seeming to step back to show themselves only by solo touches including that of Bryan then Guthrie whirling. "Jack's Back" with twirling wisps of strings, leaping violin and near-perfect osmosis with the rock instruments that come stealthily and surgically; at 5 minutes it is dark and sinister chamber music like on a bald mountain! Yes, this association makes it possible to amplify the titles (I made the effort to re-listen to them originally) and this replay increases the ARISTOCRATS sound tenfold. "Ohhhh Noooo" for the fusion of the different musicians supported by a flight of violins for a long crescendo interspersed with dithyrambic bows; at this moment it is clear that it is indeed hard Rock, prog or bluesy which takes control of the jazzy velvets. "Last Orders" to conclude with the finally progressive bucolic piece in view of this oboe, this clarinet, these violins, this baroque atmosphere of the last title of 2019. Calm, pastoral, moving title declining as a perfect sweetness and a hot break on trumpets before Guthrie's guitar puts on a show; it goes down as if this break had not taken place, am I hypnotized? The second bluesy solo brings its final touch of emotion.

THE ARISTOCRATS have therefore taken the step of falling in love for the time of an album with the association with a classical orchestra; an alchemy that passes perfectly in view of the style they offer, its merged and merging breaker of drawers. Shocking art rock that boosts THE ARISTOCRATS sound, which shows that music is universal, which allows you to review the discography of the said group before ironing this unique album made of magnified covers. Album reminiscent of a new album in fact. Album leading to meditation and daydreaming, with a frantic and alkaline rhythm, a musical paradigm in all its probity.