THRENODY FOR A DEAD QUEEN

This veteran Scottish prog band has been consistently dishing out quality releases at a steady pace since kicking off their recording career with "Disobey" in 2011. All of their previous five studio albums have met with critical favour, having a clear knack for consistently attractive progressive rock, with not only first-rate musicianship but a stellar vocalist to boot in Joe Cairney. Their line-up has also been quite anchored, only recently parting ways with bassist John Fitzgerald. So, dual guitarists Mark Spalding and Sam McCulloch, drummer Bruce Levick and keyboardist/composer Jim Johnston maintain their form, simply because they excel at their craft. In fact, they have elevated their considerable skills by having the audacity to start off this new 2023 release with two consecutive mini epics, thus putting to rest any misunderstanding (or mistake, Mr. Collins!) that they can only perform less than 5-minute neo-prog hummable ditties. The title of the album is "Threnody (Elegy) for a Dead Queen", perhaps a coincidence only with the recent passing of the British monarch.

The highly atmospheric synthesized sheen that introduces the 15 minute + "Summer Lies Beyond" slams the gavel quite emphatically on that debate, a glistening sonic evolution that provides amply amounts of subtle grandeur, gradually incorporating some deft polyrhythmic drum fills, crisscrossing guitar slashes that united with Johnston's extensive ivory arsenal. Cairney settles in on the microphone, spinning his tale. The shimmering effect in the lead guitar instills beauty and elegance to the arrangement which, like any outstanding prog piece, only serves to enhance the variations of all the intertwined themes on display here. Just like the title's significance of the spring's radiant blooming process that just keeps expanding as the sun caresses that planet with its warmth, showing the road towards summer's bliss. Beautiful is the only adjective I can think of. A stunning anthemic opener.

"The Seventh Seal" surely refers to the classic Ingmar Bergman film from 1957, where the Black Plague had devastated mostly Western medieval Europe by killing millions of people, hence challenging the notion of an all- caring divinity. Naturally, this challenging piece will require slightly more vigour in its disposition, a platform for the crusading Johnston's multitude of keyboards to battle with the story line, propelled forward by athletic drums, and a riveting and uncredited bass guitar. No mistake here Mr. Rutherford, this is definitely prog! The piano work alone shows a sense of delicate composure that proves the finesse involved in composing such impactful music. The serene vocal section is, pardon the overt pun, to die for, in battle or in sickness. Does it really matter? A half an hour in, after only 2 tracks, and I am slayed by these Tartan armoured warriors.

Emotional relief comes in the form of three shorter songs, just to confuse the enemy even more with subversive camouflage, beginning with the calm instrumental "We Are Such Stuff as Dreams are Made On", literally a sonic cinema open to interpretation. Vaporous and wistful, it serves only to reset the heartbeat, after all those poor departed souls, slayed by perfidious disease. How about a little ballad, that comes out of the blue? Well, "Jane" is simple elegance, a rolling bass leading the merry troubadours along a majestic ride, enhanced by a shivering guitar flicker, this could have been a classic Strawbs song, as it does incorporate some typical British folk tendencies. The aural sandwich is consummated by another brief orchestral flutter, showcased by strings galore, sultry axe phrasings, a roaming bass curvature and a steady beat. Simply celestial. This trio of pieces work like a charm.

The title track is the third epic offered, and as befits the extravagant title, it's a brooding, somewhat sorrowful yet also hopeful elegy, a musical lament for the deceased. Crystalline rivulets of Oriental sound , authoritatively fragrant and articulate, percolating with percussives, mellotron swaths and lingering on adventurously, I thought perhaps this was a Jade Warrior outtake. When one least expects it, the swerve into song happens at the very end, as a gentle electric guitar phrasing transforms the arrangement into a more conventional symphonic construct, Joe's high-pitched vocals recalling some Closeness to an Edge and massed instrumentation that give this both luxuriance and pathos. The outro guitar rage is absolutely mesmerizing.

Two shorter tracks lock the lid on this gilded coffin. "And Our Little Life is Rounded with A Sleep" has a classical/electronic keyboard slant that would astonish any unsuspecting listener by its cinematographic audacity, a modest nap before the big slumber of "Funeral Dance", a medieval adieu that has a memorial festivity to the impending voyage to Valhalla in the case of the crusading knight (Max von Sydow) in "The Seventh Seal" or perhaps the burial vessel leading to the island of Iona, the perennial Abbey cemetery for mostly Scottish, but also Irish, Norwegian and French kings.

This is an easy choice for election into the top five prog albums of 2023.

5 Regal requiems