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Monkey Jockey Man opens with the 16-minute "Christ Excavations". Disorienting, reversed music immediately puts the listener on their back foot, but the verse that emerges is jazzy, fun, and surprisingly catchy. Subtle, weird flourishes are woven in artfully. This sprawling piece incorporates jumpy moments of math rock and post-punk that enhance the tension and gel naturally with warmer jazzy moments. The band toys around with other contrasts, too. Slow, minimal passages suddenly jump into high gear, and rock instrumentation will give way to staticky musique concrète.

The mid-track sound experiments eventually bloom into ascendant vocal harmonies backed with looping synths. Despite this incredible diversity, the band holds things together. Vocal lines act as leitmotifs as the band shifts from gentle ambiance to wiry, Yes-inspired riffage. The sheer scope and ambition of this song is one of the best examples I've heard in recent years of what progressive rock can aspire to be. There's genuine adventurousness and a forward-thinking spirit that many modern prog bands lack. This is rock music?a genre at a nadir of cultural influence?being truly progressive.

Following that impressive opener is "Acoustic Encryption". Nasty, gnarly, knotted guitar lines pour forth before withdrawing and allowing something gentler and jazzier to take the lead. The song builds across its runtime, and I really like the vocal performance a lot. It ends on a more subdued note, however, and it's a nice bit of contrast.

"Ugly Cane Day" sounds like an oddball new wave song at first. It oscillates between quiet, restrained moments; bits of mellow jazz; and bristling, edgy rock with an avant-garde slant. This piece is followed by "Tick Sugar", my least-favorite song on the album. It's a harsh, five-minute collage of noisy, squealing, processed guitar, and distant, clattering percussion. I'm not just going to listen to this song on its own, but in the context of the album as a whole, it's not awful.

Things fade in and build up on "A Wreath of Virtuous Infinite (The)". The opening passage of this 10-minute piece is a fun, Latin-flavored jazzy guitar jam. The rhythm is  jumpy and angular, but the soloing is melodic and skillful. Things slow down for the verse, and the slight folkiness of the backing ensemble reminds me of some of Genesis's early work. Compared to some of the other cuts on this album, this song has a relatively linear song structure. There are plenty of surprising twists and general avant-weirdness, but there's nothing like the detours found in "Christ Excavation" or "Ugly Cane Day".

The album's final song is "Miserable Circuit". It's a little two-and-a-half-minute piece of lush synth ambiance, and it's a nice, relaxing way to end what is often an anxious record.

Monkey Jockey Man and the Safari Tick Sugar is a big, ambitious release. Perfect does an incredible job melding jazz, avant-garde, and progressive rock influences, alongside other surprising inclusions.

Review originally published here: theeliteextremophile.com/2024/06/10/album-review-perfect-monkey-jockey-man-and-the-safari-tick-sugar/

Kicking off any recording with a 10-minute long epic, is perhaps commercially risque but it certainly sets the cinematic mood with a wide variety of sonic and vocal effects that infuse a definitely visionary impression of archeological voyage and ultimate discovery. "The Princess of Tisul" is a sonic travelogue in the vast Central Siberian steppes and going back to the dawn of time. A sabre-tooth tiger eyeing a wholly mammoth near the Mongolian border, while in the distance, tribesmen travel to a solemn burial ground. Stark but intense.

The concussive "Butcher Shop" is a tortuous affair with an incendiary cleaver guitar chopping away at a rhythmic carcass, with mechanical drum slices carving the meat from the bone. Its somehow pleasantly messy, never really macabre, and undoubtedly out there. Rick's piano twinkling eases the previous oppressive atmosphere and reverts the arrangement into a more palatable realm, fit for sale and proper consumption.

Sounding like a modern version of a late 60s hippie lament, "The Waves" hints at a beachside Hotel California, smooth and sunbaked, Pacific Coast highway in the distance, a surfboard stuck upright in the sand. Foster's guitar stings and twangs like a Mojito with fresh lime and some coconut slivers to chew on. Cool breeze.

Tropical industrial effects, mixed with operatic effects and moaning orgasms, "The People vs Celia Valdez" is a montage of dueling psychedelia powered by various keyboard ruminations, both soothing and somewhat ominous. The fractured guitar shards induce a whirlwind of odd impressions, unsure if they are pleasant or uncomfortable, certainly not pretty and accessible! Crowd noises and tumultuous applause.

"Dead Man Trolling" is both jazzy and laid back due to the saxophone and the swooning vocal whilst still emitting a sense of untimely gloom with a dejected piano reciting the last rites. More sax on the ripping "There Walks a Man" with Foster 'fripping'out on his fretboard, an adventurous soundscape for a pedestrian (excuse the pun) stroll deep into the urban decay.

The final three tracks are clearly reworkings of a previous era, "Mean Old World/Big Sky Drifter" comes across as way more melodic and symphonic, a favorite number here. The guitar still colouring the arrangements with liquid notes whilst the sonics are keyboard generated, at times quite energetically bombastic and pervasive. The dense phantomized electronics are creepy, the spectral voices in delirious pain, the mood succinctly sombre.

There are days for pastoral reverie (Slow Dance by Ant Phillips is a regular Sunday ritual), other times, one looks for comfort zones within symphonic or its younger cousin Neo, then dive into the more sombre realms of electronic rock. On occasion when the need of being challenged becomes an overpowering urge, a virtual sonic leap into the unknown can be most refreshing, like plunging into an icy lake after a hot sauna. Bakullama will do just fine.

4 Walla-Walla insomniacs

They decided to be a four piece here, and I'm almost in shock that the lead guitarist is playing bass here. What!? And they brought in a young guitarist for this. The keyboardist, like Geddy, was both the keys and bass man, so they shifted things around for this tour. I'm not sure how inspired they were here, it doesn't feel like they were. Maybe that is why they decided to retire the band, and they were serious. Yes they would come back, but they wouldn't release another studio album for over 20 years after their last studio record.

I'm maybe being hard on this one but I don't think so. The fact the band didn't even release this hour and a half, double album at the time speaks volumes. Yes in 2007 they would finally unveil it but clearly they weren't happy with it. You can imagine the hard core fans waiting for this, or even the fact that the band could make a few bucks from this release but no. I mean it pales big time when compared to the "Karlstadt Live" or "Hofors" both from 1975, and both would peel the paint off your walls. I can't believe how jammy this is. The first disc especially, while the second disc has some variety but it's inconsistent to my ears.

I'd probably pick the song "Rot" the closer from disc one as my favourite. Yes they jam but there's some energy here at times. Thankfully this wasn't really the final concert, as it would have been a disappointing way to end it all. These guys have released over 40 live records as the archival stuff continues to be released.

Daniel Cupps, the singular force behind Good NightOwl, seems to have this same thirst. Not to be insulting, but the low amount of following behind Cupps suggests that he loves what he is doing so much that he does not care who is listening. He must be doing this with pure intrinsic passion, which I respect with high degree. With this in mind, it is completely baffling Cupps doesnt have at least SOMEWHAT of a larger following. But the production quality admittedly suggests a lack of budget. Nothing thusfar has sounded "radio friendly" (not that it's hugley important in the current era of internet music) but Cupps does not hide from this. An exchange with Cupps in Instagram DMs suggests he is living a starving artists life:

"Sun 1:11 PM

You sent Yes. but who is mixing it? Surely at least someone else is helping, no? I see on your bandcamp that the Good NightOwl project is meant to "see an artist grow over time with barely any budget. Some of it is meant to be funny, some it is meant to be serious, but if you think its all funny then it was all meant to be funny" but then I also see you're a collaborator of Tim Heidecker on occasion, so I wonder what is real and what is fake with you, as he has been known to be loose with reality in the past for giggles lol.

Tue 11:18 AM Dan Cupps Thaaaank youuuuu for your message. Good NightOwl is where I get out my experimental musical interests with some good old fashioned "genre play" I don't put a crazy amount of work into the costly plug-in subscription things because I'm super super poor, and I have intense ADHD. Of which a huge feature is me basically on a strange quest for stimuli that gives me dopamine 24/7. So if you're zeroing in on the less-than-pro-mix then you've just noticed that haven't looked up tutorials on how to do anything right cause im just pushing forward with creativity and a lustful zest for life lol. If you like what you hear its your problem. Sorry lol I'm sort of kidding. But not really."

AND THEN HE NEVER SAID ANYTHING ELSE and I really wasn't sure what to say, he seemed a bit too eccentric for my comfort levels haha. One day I will message him for a full interview once he has another album coming tho, to focus the convo more.

This album "Capital" has all the elements I want from composition: catchyness, activeness, odd time signatures that aren't so nauseatingly random, melodic sensibiity that has fusion elements but not so jazzy it sounds like elevator music, and good vocals that arent trying too hard to go outside the needs of the song. Even one track (Royal Fortunes) has a fun proggy Symphony X vibe (with some sort of shameless nod to the Home Alone soundtrack melody) This to me is a good encapsulation of just how wacky this album is. The extreme right wing guys will think this is anti-capitalism, but I see it as more of an exploration of "capital" as a concept. Nonetheless my take that I wanted to use this review as an excuse to get out is that this Good NightOwl album is like basically if Ween made an album that explored modern prog metal and mathrock from the perspective of a youtube-era indy bedroom popstar. What more can I say? Five starts for this masterpiece!

All lyrics were written by vocalist Totti Kaarle. His strong voice has a bit of Greg Lake and John Wetton while he says to be strongly influenced by Peter Hammill for his acrobatic approach. Often his vocals make me think of the Irish band Fruupp, too. The keys & reeds player Taavi Heikkil' -- who also plays in another fine, retro-oriented prog band Malady -- composed the opening piece 'The Strangest Song (Ja simbilam malibmis aJ)' full of fast-paced, Zappa-like intensity and the heavily repeated chorus featuring that odd subtitle. The arrangement flirts with big band ingredients and Gentle Giant -like funky twists.

Instrumental track 'Ah! Per l'Ultima Volta' is a gorgeous prog rock arrangement of a piece from Giacomo Puccini's opera Turandot, giving the melodic lead role to a Morricone-reminding trumpet. Due to the organ I also sense a VdGG vibe here. Totti Kaarle's soul-influenced and dynamic composition 'Bastard's Fugue' sounds good at first, but towards the end there's an unbearably distorted, noisy and chaotic segment, which fortunately stops at last and is followed by a pretty coda for piano. I have a similarly ambivalent relationship with bassist Kalle Korkeam'ki's composition 'Demanded Recognition'. Without its manically repeated frenziest (Crimsonesquely Schizoid!) moments it would be a great eclectic prog piece. Thus the vinyl's A side leaves me somewhat exhausted and perplexed.

The B side is by far more rewarding to my ears. Korkeam'ki's three pieces form a loose continuation in which the two-part 'In Their Rendering' is divided by instrumental 'Life is but a Dream, an Illusion''. This is a lovely, serene, folky ballad in the vein of 'I Talk to the Wind' without vocals. Guitarist Lauripekka Muurinen plays also flute in this melodic piece, and leaves me craving for more of the mellowness amidst the more intensive complexity on the course of the album. The 'Rendering' tracks are also very good, the instrumental second part circulating the first part's motifs in a jazz-rock way and slightly reminding of King Crimson circa 1973.

The 9-minute title track composed by Kaarle is an impressive highlight showcasing his Hammill influences as a vocalist. The moody melodies are full of emotion and the diverse arrangement has great spots for trumpet, sax, flute, etc., containing even some Mellotron sounds ' which, in addition to the flute, I would have loved to hear more.

For the highly uncomfortable moments on the latter half of the A side, I initially thought my rating would be rounded down to three stars. But Facade is so impressive and original as a genuine eclectic prog debut that it's definitely worth four stars. It's interesting to wait and see how the band will craft their skills for the follow-up. Hope there'll be one!

P.S. The cover art is by Lauripekka Muurinen. The first look at the mosaic of buildings made me think of Radiohead's Hail to the Thief but on closer look there's no notable similarity. Especially for the colours the design suits well to the album.

How much can you do with a duo? Well plenty I suppose but this record is not an example of that. There is one track that stood out though called "Ego Sum Pauper" at 3 1/2 minutes. The drums and electric piano had my attention right away, the synths will lead around 2 minutes in. There's a lot of synths on here along with jazzy piano. I would rather recommend checking out his "Drones" album from 1980 where he gets a lot of help from his former WEIDORJE mates but also from Klaus Blasquiz, Didier Batard and Francois Auger.

A good album but the best was yet to come.

The instrumental opener 'Kohti tuntematonta' (= Towards the unknown) rocks with bubbling energy, and so does 'Hyperkuutio' (= Hyper cube). How to describe the sound? It's somewhere between Steve Hillage and The Police at their most energetic. 'Lasisilmä' (= Glass eye) is the first track with vocals. Musically it continues in the same uptempo direction with a faint early 80's Rush vibe to my ears, except for the male vocals and harmonies that come closer to, say, Fish On Friday.

The instrumental 'Yläkannella' (= On the upper deck) has a charming late 70's disco influence and a fusion groove combined with psychedelic space rock. This is a lovely piece in its sunny happiness. The title track has acoustic guitar and many kinds of vocal attributions, and being in a slower tempo it has a powerful, slightly dystopic atmosphere. This direction is taken further in 'Palava aurinko' (= Burning sun) which is a gorgeously emotional prog-pop song with good vocals.

The next pop-sensible vocal song 'Ohikulkija' (= Passer-by) returns to the Signals era Rush reminding energy. If the 80's Genesis were one of the inspirations as the band mentions, they really used that influence in a good way. I also came to think of some late 70's Camel songs such as 'Wing and a Prayer' mainly for the vocals, but this song is more interesting. The final song 'Universum' sounds immediately great. Slowish tempo, moody guitar chords and a very nice female vocal guest appearance from Heli Valkama, joined by a male voice.

This is a pleasant album of partly instrumental pop-prog alternating between happy uptempo energy and the more emotionally oriented songwriting with intriguing lyrics in Finnish. It's remarkable how a band can do two completely different albums and artistically succeed in both of them. Alkusoitto may more easily find its international target audience, but personally in the end I'm perhaps more charmed by this poppier album featuring vocals.

A bit of context here, I am a staunch Abacab defender. I may not have grown up with Genesis in the 70's, as I was born in 1986, but even still, I can appreciate all eras of Genesis. My favorite Genesis albums are from the 70's, when Steve Hackett was with the band. So when I see comments like "Steve never sold out," or "we don't talk about 80's Hackett," I will. Highly Strung is by no means a terrible album. It's just that in the time I spent listening to it, I couldn't help but feel there's a great idea here, but something is missing. What could possibly be missing that could elevate this? Let's find out.

The first song off the album is Camino Royale, the only song off this album that has stuck around in Steve's setlist. I can see why he likes to keep this one around. Steve has found a way to make the 80's work in his favor on this one, and I'll admit, that hook gets stuck in your head. So what's missing here? Well, honestly a stronger guitar solo is missing. If Steve had just added a few more minutes during the instrumental break, this would have been fantastic. During the live shows, and when this song appears on Revisited, it seems Steve has gone back and extended the break with a guitar solo, as well as a sax, giving the song more of a finished feel. Honestly, I feel like this should have been a single. It could have charted, but we're not off to a bad start though.

Up next is Cell 151, which became a minor hit in the UK. Great! Steve got some minor commercial success with this song. As I listened to the instrumental, and took a deep listen to Hackett's singing, I couldn't help but feel like this could have been a Genesis song. This song needs a stronger singer than Hackett, and honestly, I could see Phil singing this one if Steve had chosen to stick around. The song ends with a jam session, much like how Abacab ends with a jam session. Though I feel like this jam session is a bit weaker, the song in its entirety is not at all bad, it's not even mid. It's a solid song overall.

We have an instrumental break in Always Somewhere Else. One of the things I immediately took note of listening to this is that I almost thought I could hear a bit of Rush's Tom Sawyer in it. It's not one of Hackett's stronger instrumentals, but it fits the 80's sound aesthetic to a T. It's fine, and that's all it needs to be.

Next is Walking Through Walls. A song that is so 80's, it feels like Steve shouldn't be playing it. It's an upbeat dance tune where Steve counts to 4, and in the re-issue, even has a dance mix of this song. Yet I can't help but love it. This instantly dated song is so cheesy, that Hackett just owns it. It's way out of his style, in the same way Who Dunnit was for Genesis, but unlike that song, Walking Through Walls is catchy as hell for all the right reasons.

Sadly, I can't say the same for Give It Away. Give It Away, though a good song, could easily be mistaken for any song in the 80's. It's another one of those generic as hell 80's tunes you forgot existed. If I had to think of somebody to have on this song, it would be 38 Special. This sounds like a 38 Special song, right down to the chorus. Maybe if the guitar did more work than the synth, I'd have a different opinion on this one. And that's an issue I have with this album, is the synth is at times doing a little too much work. Hackett's a guitar guy, he should be trying to take his brand of style into the 80's, rather than the 80's dictating his sound entirely.

Weightless is a nice, summer breeze prog song... we can call it... yacht prog? The song doesn't have a whole lot going for it, but it's a nice tune for relaxing considering the hard hitting songs we got early on. But again, this doesn't feel like a Steve Hackett song. The synth, once again, is the backbone of this track. It almost feels like it was left on the cutting room floor of Cured. You'll also notice I haven't commented too much about Steve's singing on this album, and that's because I find it serviceable. Not great, nothing to write home about, but also not terrible. It's not like he's going to be worse on the next album. Right?

We have another instrumental in Group Therapy, the proggiest song on the whole album. And surprise, it's an instrumental. But, this one is actually fairly strong. It's the closest it comes to figuring out a way for Steve's style of prog to fit into the 80's compared to the rest of the album which feels like Steve trying to go commercial. It's fine.

Then we have India Rubber Man which I can only describe as a weird choice of song. It's a soft, melodramatic tune. Hackett's stretching his singing, trying to make something of it. To some it's a nice, touching heartfelt song, to others it's basically just album filler. I would say it did nothing for me, but I'm going to revisit this later.

And we come to an end with Hackett To Pieces, a pseudo-bookending callback to Camino Royale. It's fine. But after everything I just went through, I had to go back and process this album's lyrics. I spent a good amount of time analyzing everything, and I could not believe the conclusion I reached.

Steve Hackett just sounds absolutely miserable. I've seen what happens when artists get into creative funks, and Steve is definitely going through one with this album. The most blatant example in this is Give It Away, where Steve mentions "when you lose your self expression, it's time to change direction." Things made a lot of sense when I actually did research on this album and found that The "Famous" Charisma Label was butting heads with Steve Hackett and trying to take control of the album. The end result is a record that is completely disjointed, and also the creative meltdown of a musician who's just been told they can't do what they want. Me personally, I think it's the only 80's Hackett album worth revisiting. While it's a massive step up from Cured, primarily because Steve isn't working against a drum machine, it suffers from Hackett himself being highly strung. Maybe if Charisma didn't get in the way, this could have worked out for them. Unfortunately, they didn't want to let him cook, and this is the result.

The spacey music on this album is instrumental in the musical sense, but most tracks feature voice samples in Finnish (often sort of distanced, sometimes also distorted), easy to imagine being part of a sf movie about astronauts and astronomers. The voices speak mostly of cosmic theories like "What would happen if you fell into a black hole?', as the second track asks in its title, and of astronauts' dangerous tasks in space. Unfortunately the non-Finnish speakers miss that textual level, but then again it's primarily part of the atmosphere and doesn't demand to be fully understood.

The title of the album refers both to the Big Bang and to the musical term overture. The synth-oriented title track reminds me of the space themed pieces of the mid-70's Vangelis. The male voice speculates what happened in the very beginning of the universe. The mentioned black hole themed track gives bigger emphasis on the spatial and clear guitar texture. The soaring, spacey melodies remind me the early 70's Pink Floyd (Meddle, Dark Side). 'Spagetti-ilmiö' (= the spaghetti phenomen) illustrates the nightmarish imaginary situation in a more rhythmic psychedelic space rock and panicking voice samples. 'Avaruuskävely' (= space walk), despite containing the danger element of a hole in the equipment and oxygen slowly running out, sounds relatively sunny and laid-back with its bouncy guitar chords and synthesized voice doodling.

The final track 'Matematiikan ja aineen todellisuudet' (= Realities of mathematics and substance) has a continuos hypnotic pattern, and the voice talks this and that of the space. Above I said that the speeches heard throughout the album are primarily an atmospheric detail. While I appreciate the use of mother tongue instead of English for change, which surely increases the charming personality of the album, I do feel a bit sorry for the non-Finnish as they will miss the exciting and hilarious narrative level. Musically speaking, the album has a respectable open- minded variety (undoubtedly the reason the band fell into Eclectic Prog instead of e.g. Psychedelic/Space rock), spanning from the ambient, Vangelis-like synth orientation to the rockier moments. And yet the whole feels very coherent.

In a while I'll review Avaruusasema's new album Kilonova which brings new sides to their space-inspired music.

This second album is an enormous sideways leap from their debut which was still soaked in psych and blues. Where does this one sit? You know, I would struggle to say exactly. Oh it is definitely in the prog oeuvre, just a tricky blighter to pin down to one place within it.

2 vocalists are well and good but the female of the pair is much preferred ....so of course she is given a 'supporting role'. The rest of the band are competent if unspectacular but it is the big picture rather than individual flash on offer here.

So, you ask, give us a clue then? The front man Richard Joseph certainly has a touch of the Peter Hammills (Distant Thoughts...) about him and his compositions and he seems to have dipped them in a bowl of Curved Air and even Renaissance, especially when they employ Larraine Odels under used talents. She has a bit of Alice Coltrane about her (Lightshine) and can bring the chanteuse to the 'cabaret' when asked. She may well have listened to a fair bit of Julie Driscoll/Tippetts too. Although they came after, she sounds a lot like the Wilson sisters from Heart. The band flirt with a bit of jazz/rock fusion and an occasional groove, though the guitar player isn't quite able to carry off his time/s in the spot light. Depending on your range of knowledge you would say they could have slotted well onto a bill with Beggars Opera and also later period Principal Edwards....but I sometimes hear a typical late 60's/early 70's musical soundtrack...say Hair or JC Superstar and that is 'not a good thing'. To balance Songs From The 4th Era could come from Tommy. In Archway 222 the keys man pinches some No Quarter, Riders On The Storm and Canterbury bits. You have to make up your own mind if it works or is too derivative. Dream is ambitious but reminds me of post Tommy Bolin Zephyr trying to go a bit prog and funky (yup whakka whakka guitar n all!).

So to give kudos you have to say it's a bit 'different' though was never going to sell but full marks to Transatlantic (one of my favourite 70's labels) for giving it a go anyhow!

I have to give it 3 stars but it is a little better even with the flaws mentioned and tack a couple of decimal points on to that rating.