THE CLOCKWORK MAN

This is original to say the least! The new and fourth album from THIS WINTER MACHINE is inspired by a "comic" by Andrew RICHMOND, writer, illustrator and designer (among others) whose illustrations you will find in the album booklet; musically it is a single fifty minute piece divided into eight parts, so concept once again, the main subject is human cloning from egg to adult at accelerated speed where the female does not exist and where the clones are only present for low and dangerous tasks, fueled as they are by pills which only aim to keep them docile and without any ambition, an existential program of relative complexity that I can be discovered when reading the comic strip.

All that remains with Al WINTER is the rhythm section from the previous disc, the two soloists are therefore newcomers, a "bad" habit of the omnipotent leader of changing musical companions at every moment...like Ian JONES of KARNATAKA who comes out with tangible skills and we'll see that further, the same goes for Al on this album.

The least pleasant portion of a record which is overall "Change" may be because it is sung with two voices, the chorus by Al WINTER and the verses by a guest André SAINT, regular vocalist of the melodic rock formation with progressive connotations GRACE AND FIRE (very popular by the way), it's like a hair in the soup, we were on a song/music module with beautiful continuity and then, suddenly we branch off towards five minutes forty-one which breaks the atmosphere...destabilizing!

On the rest of the album, the complementarity of the musicians is significant. The new six string players John COOK stands out particularly on the introductory "The River" (the cavalcade on the neck is remarkable and noticed) on " Nothing Lasts Forever" (the album's ballad of incredible melancholy) and the terminal "Hole in the Sky" where he literally supports the piece with an incisive guitar, nervous and disheveled but which knows how to remain melodic, the final solo is to be included in the heritage of progressive music.

Keyboardist Leigh PERKINS is brilliant on "The Light" (on piano), on the introductory "The River" where he positively supports his fellow guitarist with keyboard motifs that are always in place although quite discreet, a pretty sarabande pianistic at 6:40 softens the piece (energetic until then), concretely a little-known instrumentalist but of real effectiveness.

"The Clockwork Man" is certainly a neo progressive record but a modern neo progressive driven by a real story (complex I grant you), created and performed by surprising and talented musicians, which places it among the notable works of the genre to through the decades, nothing less, the equal of THIS WINTER MACHINE's first disc, emblematic for the future.