MATTHEW PARMENTER

I guess the bottom line is that this album isn't catching on with me.And when i say that i mean musically because when it comes to Matthew's lyrics there are few who are as talented.I actually enjoy just reading his words more than listening to the music which is probably a first for me.He would make his musical hero Peter Hammill proud with the way he writes a song that's for sure.And that is the biggest compliment i could possibly give him.Matthew does it all here except play bass which he employed his former DISCIPLINE band mate Mathew Kennedy for.Rather dark music here without a lot of dynamics.Mostly vocals and piano, and we get mellotron on 4 of the 7 tracks. "Now" opens with vocals and piano.It gets fuller then settles.These contrasts continue.Sax 2 1/2 minutes in.Mellotron 5 1/2 minutes in and really the last 4 1/2 minutes of this song are the best on the album for me.Organ after 7 1/2 minutes.Great lyrics on this one. "Distracted" is led by drums and vocals and is mid-paced.Mellotron 4 1/2 minutes in.It settles late. "Dirty Mind" is fairly mellow with vocals,piano and drums standing out.It's fuller 1 1/2 minutes in but that changes.Again excellent lyrics here. "Another Vision" features laid back guitar and vocals.Organ 4 1/2 minutes in when the vocals stop.The lyrics are so well done. "Some Fear Growing Old" is really the first catchy tune although it's fairly slow paced.Strummed guitar and the violin comes and goes. "Between Me And The End" is a little too depressing really.My least favourite track.Sombre with piano and reserved vocals for the most part. "Modern Times" is the over 21 minute closer. This sounds better right away as we get a full sound with mellotron.It settles a minute in with almost spoken vocals and piano.It picks up some and we get some guitar before 5 1/2 minutes.It turns aggressive.Mellotron before 7 minutes.It settles after 8 minutes then picks up again after 11 minutes.These contrasts continue. I wish Matthew's vocals were a little stronger.Good release that impresses lyrically but not so much musically.

The first time I heard this I though mr. Parmenter had unearthed a long lost gem from Peter Hammill's golden era. Usually such a blind devotion and tribute to one artist makes me turn away quite quickly but this one has won me over in no time.

Main reason is the very consistent quality and artistic vision on this album. Parmenter proves himself not only a songmaster but also a master in execution and instrumentation. The basis is laid by his dramatic and sensitive piano playing. No great gestures but strongly contained emotion that bursts out in gulps but only at the exact moment when they're needed.

Parmenter does really well in mimicking Hammils vocals style. His voice is a bit more gentle, a bit smoother and less exuberant as Hammill's. But not lacking in expressivity and tunefulness.

For his second solo album, Horror Express, Mathew Parmenter has in his own words produced "a collection of musical nightmares masquerading as a horror film". He plays all the instruments with the exception of some of the drumming. Being the vocalist/keyboard player with USA Proggers Discipline it's no surprise that Horror Express is a heavily keyboard driven album with much use being made of acoustic piano.

The music fits the album title perfectly, the notes and chord structures having a melancholy and gloomy feel throughout the album with some suitably dramatic vocal work, Parmenter coming across sounding like Peter Hamill at times, most notably on album opener In The Dark, 9 minutes of suitably atmospheric and gothic piano driven music.

The music in general is not overly complex with simple drum work, in part no doubt down to the fact that Parmenter does some of the drumming himself but it's totally in keeping with the overall vibe of the album, much of it at a slow tempo conjuring up a funeral march feel.

It's not all acoustic piano based though as on the synth driven and slightly more upbeat Escape Into The Future though it turns out to be one of the least satisfying pieces on the album. Kaiju, an instrumental makes good use of haunting Violin and Cello to add to the feel of doom and gloom. Not an album to cheer you up then but the music does have a haunting beauty much of the time, none more so than on Golden Child which has a bit of a Radiohead vibe about it in their more melancholy moments.

Monsters From The ID turns out to a favourite of mine, starting out as more slow tempo piano based gothic horror before picking up for an organ driven mid song section.

Polly New has a fuller sound with a lot more going on musically than on most tracks with a greater array of instrumentation. It's also one of the more dynamic pieces and the 10 minute length is made use of for some interesting changes. Van Der Graaf Generator particularly spring to mind here in places.

Another particularly haunting melody is All Done (Horror Express), starting off with piano and vocals only, it builds dramatically with some fittingly over the top screeching vocals towards the end.

Overall Horror Express is a very good album though the prevailing mood starts to wear a bit thin towards the end but then it is in keeping with the concept of the album so in that sense works very well. Fans of Discipline will no doubt want to check it out and also recommended to fans of Van Der Graaf Generator. 3 ½ stars.

I was taken back a little when i heard Matthew''s vocals on the first track,i thought he had Peter Hammill guesting on it.It''s not just Hammill''s voice he''s channeling here though it''s the lyrics .Simply put they are brilliant,especially on the song Polly New,but throughout this record.I really like the album cover as well.Matthew thanks a lot of people individually and alphabetically in the liner notes.So he thanks each member of ANEKDOTEN as well as TILES'' Jeff Whittle for letting him use his bass guitars.He thanks the father and son team of PRESENT and many others.Yes this is dark as all Parmenter related projects (DISCIPLINE) tend to be.Piano and vocals dominate. In The Dark is the over 9 minute opener where you would think Hammill is singing.The piano is dark and the sound is reserved although it does get fuller. O Cesare features piano and theatrical vocals.Violin after a minute and some mellotron too.Drums and vocal melodies create a great sound 3 minutes in. Escape Into The Future could be a PHIDEAUX song.Oh he does thank Xavier in the liner notes as well.The focus is on the vocals on this mid paced catchy track. Kaiju is dark and almost spacey.Violin before 2 1/2 minutes. Snug Bottom Flute And Starveling is fairly uptempo at the beginning and the ending.In between it''s calm with piano. Golden Child features reserved vocals,bass,piano and light drums.Guitar after 2 minutes.Great sound. Monsters from The Id opens with the sound of a monster.Reserved vocals and piano follow.It''s dark.Tempo picks up after 4 1/2 minutes with organ.Vocals are back 6 minutes in as it settles right down.The organ is back. Polly New has such thoughtful lyrics.I just like to read them.Mellotron and full sound hit us right off the hop.A piano/drum interlude comes in after 3 1/2 minutes.Vocals are back a minute later.The ending is dark and intense. All Done (Horror Express) opens with piano and reserved vocals.Drums after 4 minutes and a full sound follows.It settles again. The Cutting Room has some theremin in it,yes those spacey Lost in Space sounds.This one has a really VDGG feel to it other then the threremin. Tough not to give this 4 stars but i''m just not really into it yet so i''m going to continue to listen.This happened with the latest BELIEVE cd which i originally rated 3 stars, but have since given it 4 stars since it won me over big time.

Four years passed between Astray and Horror Express release. In this new album, Matthew Parmenter execute, compose and interpret all the instruments, except the drums.

In the dark, the opening track, immediately remember us the Peter Hammill´s voice and his penetrating style. Accompanied of the piano, he delight us with an extensive sung section, which gradually becomes more dramatic. This is promoted thanks to the drums and a secundary electric guitar. In O Cesare, definitively we discover that Parmenter voice is one of the album´s principal instruments, whereas bass, piano, drums and keyboards create a dark, dramatic and clean basis of no complex, but very emotional textures, which get closer the album to art rock. "Escape into the Future" is a song with a pop structure, where the synthetizers create a cold and artificial ambient. Kaiju starts with a sentimental violin, and a drums rythm helps to create a very melancholic ambient. The cello, a shy guitar and some electronic arrangements complete the gestalt. A beatiful composition, one of my favourites. "Snug Bottom Flute and Starveling" is another instrumental cut more strong, extrovert, with some private piano moments, which mutate to very interesting rythm changes. Drums and guitar merge in a very smart manner. Next, "Golden Child" brings back the Parmenter´s voice in a tetric ambient of progressive power. This track gave to me memorables and heartbreaking moments, a very nice piece.

Then, "Monsters from the Id" begins in a decadent way, awakening our more bizarre archetypes. Parmenter and his piano are the stars, and sometimes a shy flute pops in the dark. The guitar accelerate the rythm, and with some electronic arrangements and keyboards build a very impressive interlude. Finally, unexpectedly, Parmenter and his piano rend the fog with a warm ray of light. Polly New, a 10 minutes track, make us levitate with a strange style on gray, black and white tonalities. Here we found a more complex musical structure (but no too much), with drums and piano creating memorables in crescendos, with the accustomed private and dramatic moments of Parmenter and his piano. In this track I like the guitar very much. "All Done (Horror Express)" is a prelude to end ("I finished the job."). The Parmenter´s voice is the basis and the absolut protagonist, with the piano, and to them gradually some instruments become attached. Finally, The Cutting Room starts with an absolute perversity, and in its briefs 6 minutes give to us memorable and versatile moments. One of the album´s highlights, a nightmare turned to music, an exquisit, dramatic and shocking composition, with phantasmagoric keyboards. A big end of this original and very recommended album. With some similarities with Anglagard, Gnidrolog and VDGG, this is one of the great releases of this year, not due it complexity. I like it because its aesthetics and concept.

4.25 Stars!

"Horror Express" is yet another manifestation of Matthew Parmenter's art-rock genius, and mostly, a particular highlight in the world of prog rock for this year 2008. The album's title is not misleading at all, and neither is the album cover, with that disturbing picture of a giant alien emerging in the darkness of night among skyscrapers massively on fire: this repertoire seems to have been created, arranged and performed to explore humankind's deepest fears as they materialize in the real world. There is definitely some relatedness with the darkest side of Discipline (especially the brilliant sophomore album "Unfolded Like Staircase"), but it is also clear that Parmenter didn't intend to see himself as some substitute of the band in itself. The album is heavily dominated by piano, also featuring plenty of vintage synth sounds (Moog, Theremin) and mellotron: these are the most recurrent sonic sources in the instrumentation, but never getting tiresome. The 9+ minute long opener 'In the Dark' sets the mood quite right, an indication of the overall motivation stated by the repertoire as a whole: uneasy darkness, sense of mystery, abundance of textures, clever use of monotony. The first lines are somehow humorous with those handclaps and playful backing vocals, but the song is genuinely creepy. There is a lyrical moment that states a mixture of early solo Hammill and late 60s Procol Harum - a great opener, indeed. 'O Cesare' sounds like a leftover from an Art Bears album retraced with a set of Landberk-inspired arrangements, and engineered by the producer of Hammill's "The Silent Corner". Parmenter really shines in his softly demented vocal deliveries (including flowing falsettos), as well as the sinister violin phrases. It is as long as 3 ¾ minutes, but more than enough to leave a mark in the listener's mind. 'Escape Into the Future' bears a lighter mood, bringing a more explicitly articulated scheme that is somehow related to the avant side of Brit-pop: the use of unusual rhythmic patterns in some passages and the eerie use of synths keep this track from inconveniently getting too poppy. 'Kaiju' brings back the darkness, even enhancing the density inherent to terror: there is a sad mood to it, like a moment of nostalgic evocation in a creepy environment. Univers Zero-style violin and cello dominate the instrumental framework, which also includes some guitar ornaments that partially emulate the Frippertronics. 'Snug Bottom Flute and Starveling' is another instrumental excursion, this time more extroverted while not devoid of tension: it is a progressive feast as a sort of Birdsongs of the Mesozoic-meets- Univers Zero. 'Golden Child' (almost totally instrumental) sounds like a "Vandergraffized" Radiohead. 'Monsters from the Id' pursues the continuity of stylized horror initiated with 'Kaiju', bringing familiar airs of 72-74 Hammill, unmistakable really. The 10 minute long 'Polly New' is the longest track in the album. This track keeps loyal to the general environment of terror and mystery, but definitely the allusions to psychedelic-era Beatles in the rhythm pace and piano chords helps to light up the mood a bit. Still, the possibility for disturbance is never denied, and so the mellotron emulations of string ensemble and choir get in through some specific passages. When things speed up, the variations state a momentary increase of the dramatic potential before settling in for a slower pacer: from there onwards, a sense of introspective desolation prevails in a very Hammillesque fashion. 'All Done (Horror Express)' almost sounds like a continuation of the preceding track, even reinforcing the aura of solitude. The lyrics are menacing (referring to a job done) but the mood seems more connected to the protagonist's inner self than to the aforesaid job. The mood makes an explosive shift to a sustained crescendo whose climax is transformed into an intensified retake of the sung portion. 'The Cutting Room' closes down the album with a sense of splendorous bleakness: closer to Univers Zero and Present than to VdGG or Peter Hammill, this is actually the liveliest piece in the album, as if it claimed a grand finale for this excursion of progressive terror. The slightly space-infected Anglagard-type finale brings a mechaneic feel to the eerie creepiness that goes on flowing like a recurring nightmare. Matthew Parmenter's genius has found a definitive expression in this amazing album.

Four years in making, 'Horror Express' differs a lot from ANY Prog album of today. Prog-Metal/Modern- Prog tendencies? None. Retro-Prog filled with cliches and filler in order to reach 79 min of playing time? Wrong again. Best DISCIPLINE traditions combined with singer-songwriter attitude? You've hit it!!!

Starting from 'In the Dark', album carries you into Darkness just like that express mentioned in the title. 'In the Dark' is easily the best song on the whole record, just like 'Now' was on 'Astray' - dark, sincere, dramatic and epic. Then shorter songs follow, from utterly dark 'O Cesare' to unusually poppish 'Escape into the Future', with 3 instrumentals following each other, different in moods and tempo, sounding just like sections of a certain trilogy. 'Monsters from the Id', piano-driven killer, changes to 'Polly New', disturbing and sinister epic. 'All Done' is a future classic, another track that can be compared with best DISCIPLINE pieces, is a pre-last one. 'The Cutting Room', nervous and biting instrumental, ends this close-to-masterpiece album.

Matthew has grown in terms of songwriting; I mean, this is the closest thing to singer-songwriter stuff I heard from him. Some Dark Folk thrown in instead of Psychedelic/Blues influences that were on 'Astray', but I don't think Matthew cares for tags to pigeonhole his music. One of the best Prog releases from this year so far, 'Horror Express' is dark and moody. Don't dare to miss it! Highly recommended

OK, 'Horror express'! What is this going to be??!! Well, Matthew had stated that the next CD would be slightly different to the 'Astray' album and he was not wrong! This new set of songs is a lot more varied in style than anything he has done by himself or with Discipline. Not to say that is a bad thing of course, but it was strange hearing such a different direction in a few numbers. Of course there are still the clear prog songs, such as 'Polly new', 'In the dark' and 'The cutting room'. Even then those songs are not traditional in our sense. 'In the dark' is a genuinely complex 9:22 of music that opens the album, once again Matthew's unique voice and angular composition work very well here. 'Escape into the future' is quite perhaps the oddest song on offer, being almost 80's poppy when it starts, it does actually work into a strong song, however. I am fully aware that Matthew's work does have somewhat of a 'Hammill' influence and his clear 'eclectic' nature (similar to Hammill's) really shines through on this album. The piano is the center of most of the pieces here and he really does play well, not fast or manic but with a great amount of 'feel'. This is most evident on the tracks 'Monsters from the id' and 'All done (horror express)', where the piano is almost the only musical instrument. With a couple of very Parmenter/Discipline sounding short instrumentals thrown in, the album as a whole works well. It may not be as easily accessible as 'Astray' but with repeated listens it has become apparent that this is another solid release from Matthew.

Check out the cover too, its quite the interesting painting!

4 stars easily

I guess I'm going to rate EVERY Parmenter-related stuff with 5 stars! This guy has talent and charisma! He's THE MOST UNDERRATED PROG COMPOSER of our time! Just listen to his works with DISCIPLINE (or here) to confirm this!

Again bearing his Hammil/Gabriel appreciation, luckily Matthew didn't copy their solo styles (sometimes quite different from both VDGG/GENESIS styles). As usual, he DOESN'T write symphonies or simple songs burdened with long and pointless instrumental spots - he just writes PROGRESSIVE SONGS. And it's worthy of 20 minutes, the songs will be 20 minutes long. And if it requires complexity and changing themes, it'll have them all. Sometimes it seems that Matthew just takes our sacred dreams of "having A Perfect Prog Album in your collection" and makes them come true! Give a listen to opening "Now" - it's the best song VDGG never did! Experience the closing epic "Modern Times" in best DISCIPLINE traditions...wait, I said "DISCIPLINE traditions"? I must be wrong - this is simply Matthew Parmenter, a man-orchestra who doesn't sound like your typical faceless one-man bands failing to keep your ear attentive...

Bravo, mr. Parmenter, you're flawless as usual. DISCIPLINE lovers, it's a Must! Progheads - it's worth of buying! Extremely recommended!

It's a shame Discipline dissolved before they were able to build a larger discography. Only two albums, with the second, 'Unfolded Like Staircase', among the best U.S. prog records ever. Discipline was largely great thanks to the talent of leader and songwriter Matthew Parmenter, and 'Astray' is a most welcome addition to the man's slowly growing songbook.

Lots of people compared Discipline's second album, and Parmenter's vocal delivery, to Van Der Graaf Generator and Peter Hammill. In terms of pure emotional bloodletting, I hear the comparison, but in terms of sound and tone, I really don't think they have much in common. But 'Astray' indeed comes close to the Hammill solo aesthetic, and at times is a great companion to the great man's most difficult '70s solo work.

Besides the bass work of Discipline's Mathew Kennedy, Parmenter lays down all instruments, in addition to his warm and confident vocals. As a drummer and a guitarist, he is adequate, but not a virtuoso. His keyboard, sax and violin work are his strong points, so you get an album that sounds quite band-like. This isn't a sparse, simplistic singer-songwriter affair.

High points are "Distracted", with an infectious foreboding sway, the lyrically interesting "Dirty Mind" (paired with music that gives the subject matter a contemplative, haunting edge), and "Now", which mirrors the deep and dark introspection of latter-day Hammill. All songs are textured and written with plenty of depth. Much of the mood is melancholic beauty incarnate (see "Between Me And The End"), and just about all of it is rewarding, unfailing in its attempts to emotionally move the intent listener. The only problem is that some of the songs seem to stray beyond their natural end, wandering for several minutes in an instrumental limbo (or a too- repetitive chorus). To be sure, Parmenter and Kennedy have enough musical talent between them, but these songs are primarily centered on Parmenter's poetry and his captivating vocal delivery and should probably stay that way. "Now", "Another Vision" (an otherwise great song) and the overlong "Modern Times" suffer from this over-long syndrome. I'm usually first in line for a 20-minute epic, and though "Modern Times" has its share of beautiful and challenging moments, it suffers from some of the superfluous wandering heard elsewhere on the album. Overall, though, the songwriting and performances are of a high standard, enough that this can be easily recommended to all fans of Discipline and Peter Hammill's best solo work. (oh yeah, big P.S. here: I do NOT see this as having anything to do with Neo-Prog, as it is categorized on this site.)