OCTOBERON

After the relatively mainstream but immensely enjoyable "Time Honoured Ghosts", BJH decided to get ambitious again with their eighth album, the aptly named "Octoberon".With only seven tracks three of which exceed the seven minute mark and one over six minutes long things look promising from a Prog fan's viewpoint- the possibility of musical development, epic solos etc. The problem is that with the exception of one song- more of that later, the songs are simply long.The opening track "The World Goes On Forever" is really just a fairly slight song stretched to nearly six and a half minutes and to make matters worse the band have decided to use an orchestra again which makes the song even more bloated.The following track "Mayday" actually starts off well with an engaging "Dear Prudence"type guitar riff but again seems to drag on and ends with a rather jarring choir or should that be several choirs all singing different tunes over each other. OK, it's experimental but not particularly enjoyable.The closing track "Suicide?" is another ambitious song which is very melodic with some grim humour ("Don't jump. Let me move my car"!) but again just seems too long.":Rock N' Roll Star" is a straightforward rock song and actually quite catching. The main highlight for me though isthe seven minute plus "Ra" by Wolstenholme. It really is a prog rock masterpiece with a particularly engaging and dramatic intro and outro. Overall though I find the album while ambitious and experimental does not really succeed.

My rating 3 stars

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