THE SILENT CORNER AND THE EMPTY STAGE

The third album by Van Der Graaf Generator's leader, after the masterpiece "Chameleon in the shadow of the night", "The quiet corner and the empty space" reinforces the progressive component of Hammill's music, thanks to the extensive presence of Jackson, Evans and Banton.

The beginning is spectacular, with

1. Modern (7:28) Hammill produces a music that, like in the first albums, manages to combine aggression, epic, paranoia and existential anxiety, with a hybrid sound that has no equal in rock. Compared to the past, only the line-up changes, where guitars and bass are much more important. There is an orgiastic passage of fantastic instrumental sound and the voice is quite functional. It is an absolute masterpiece. Rated 9.

2. Wilhelmina (5:17) A deeply felt piano ballad, a songwriter story, it starts slowly, then it has an excellent progression between a minute and a half and two minutes, which it repeats a minute later, to reach the climax towards the end of the piece , which arrives suddenly. Excellent arrangement, refined. Rated 8+.

3. The Lie (Bernini's Saint Theresa) (5:40) Beginning at the piano worthy of classical music, with the piano played in a percussive way, comes the voice of Hammill, very at ease with the contrite, penitential, almost church-like atmosphere, then voice and piano perform in a crescendo full of pathos , with slowdowns and accelerations. Typical song by existential philosopher songwriter, with an atmosphere that is at the same time romantic and distressed. Rated 8.

4. Forsaken Gardens (6:15) Splendid rock piano ballad, with a riding progression, which returns three times inside the song and has a splendid epic emphasis and the song of heartfelt Hammill (There is so much sorrow in the world). Voto 8,5.

End of side A.

5. Red Shift (8:11) The song is more experimental than the others, with sound effects and jazz drums, saxophone in evidence, to recreate a cosmic sound that compared to the old Van der Graaf Generator albums is more rarefied and jazzed. The beginning is too much slow but then comes an instrumental piece with Jackson's sax and the very jazzy Evans' drums, until the piece stops, Hammill's voice expresses his lament and at that point the song starts up again with much more energy, with Randy California's acid guitars finally in evidence. The piece then improves in the final, and while not remaining among the best of the album, it arrives at a beautiful instrumental orgy, acid, before the final sung again by Hammill. Rated 8.

6. Rubicon (4:11) Pastoral folk piece, with voice, guitar and bass well in evidence. Hammill's voice makes the music restless, with moments of pathos, but overall it is the calmest and most unadorned song on the record, the acoustic song by a songwriter that interrupts the soundstorm heard so far. It is the weakest piece of the album but its position is strategic, it serves to make the listener breathe. Rated 7+.

The album ends with one of the absolute masterpieces of the solo Hammill, which, as in the previous album ends the disc in a crescendo of sounds worthy of the best Van Der Graaf Generator.

7. A Louse Is Not A Home (12:13). We are at very high levels, we seem to hear VdGG at their peak, and in fact we didn't feel them so full and so fit as In A Black Room. But this composition surpasses even the aforementioned, because it is more homogeneous, more linear, a single sound poem as in the days of the trilogy (The Least, From H to He, Pawn Hearts). After a melodic and epic beginning at the same time, the first instrumental variation begins, which includes the Jackson's medieval flute and soon after sound electronic anguish. The rhythmic progression and the voice of Hammill alternate with moments of stasis, comes a pause with sounds of sax that resemble those of the suite of Pawn Hearts, then the suite starts again. Hammill still manages to amaze the English scholastic prog groups with moments that are completely wild and full of violent pathos that upset the controlled feelings of English people. Hammill confirms itself to be irregular, out of the box of the same progressive due to the emotional charge that it puts us: the progressive music that it forges is disturbing, aggressive, violent, emotionally very strong, and in these its emotional earthquakes it translates into a rock completely unpredictable and composite that is categorized as progressive but in fact, unlike progressive groups, which first of all try to compose complicated music in a planned way, in the case of Hammill the progressive sound of the music is only the consequence of the swing of his emotional stages, and therefore it is a much more visceral and much less cerebral progressive. In the end the piece reaches a climax of rare emotional power. Rated 9.5.

Very inspired album. Absolute masterpiece of progressive rock.

Medium quality of the songs 8,3. Rating 9,5/10. Five stars.