FOR ALL WE SHARED

"For All We Shared" is the debut studio album of Mostly Autumn and was released in 1999. With this album the band created a great debut with Pink Floyd and Celtic influences, although both influences are quite well separated here.

"For All We Shared" is the only Mostly Autumn album to feature Allan Scott on drums and Kev Gibbons on whistles. So, the line up on the album is Bryan Josh (lead and backing vocals, lead, rhythm, acoustic and 12 string guitars and E-Bow), Heather Findlay (lead and backing vocals, acoustic guitars and tambourine) who had replaced the founding band's member Heidi Widdop, Iain Jennings (backing vocals and keyboards), Liam Davison (backing vocals and rhythm, acoustic and 12 string guitars), Bob Faulds (violins), Kev Gibbons (high and low whistles), Stuart Carver (bass guitars) and Allan Scott (drums). It has also the participation of Angela Goldthorpe (flutes) and Chè (djembe), as guests.

"For All We Shared" has ten tracks. The first track "Nowhere To Hide (Close My Eyes)" written by Josh and Findley is a nice and beautiful song with a very catchy chorus that works perfectly as a great opener to the album. It's a very good song with an excellent composition a nice guitar work and great vocal harmonies. The second track "Porcupine Rain" written by Josh, Findlay and Jennings follows perfectly and smoothly the same vein and mood of the first track. It's another excellent and very strong track with great emotional singing. This is a song with great melody and very strong harmonies that flows wonderfully all over the song. The third track "The Last Climb" written by Josh is clearly the first Floydian's track created by Mostly Autumn. Once more we are in presence of a great track with a very good tune and a great feeling. It's a very melancholic song with a long instrumental introduction that features great violin work and a great guitar solo in the Gilmour's vein. This is clearly a song that shows perfectly the musical influence of Pink Floyd in Mostly Autumn. The fourth track "Heroes Never Die" written by Josh and Rayson is simply the best song on the album and represents one of their best compositions. It's clearly the great epic track on the album and is a song with the same similar musical structure as the previous song. This is a tremendous track with a great and sumptuous finale especially provided by the great finale guitar solo of Josh. The fifth track "Folklore" is a traditional song arranged by Faulds, Josh and Jennings. It's the first truly folk track on the album and represents a nice and good musical moment on it. We may say that the song has two different musical influences, the Celtic influence and the symphonic prog influence. The sixth track "Boundeless Ocean" written by Josh and Jennings is a very nice and quiet piece of music magnificently sung by Josh and Findlay. It represents another side of the band, the side of the ballads. It isn't as good as the rest of the album, until now, but represents a competent and relaxing musical moment on the album. The seventh track "Shenanigans" written by Faulds is another track with a folk instrumental tune. It's another nice and beautiful song, very well played and totally instrumental and with a very strong traditional Celtic sound with a driving rhythm and a happy mood. The eighth track "Steal Away" written by Josh is another nice and beautiful track. However, if the other tracks on the album were dominated by a male voice, this time we have the particularity of being totally sung by the beautiful voice of Findlay. This is a song with an excellent melody that represents the second mellow musical moment on the album. The ninth track "Out Of The Inn" written by Josh is a song that opens with a dialogue part followed by a woodwind solo with the percussion and acoustic guitar on the back. It's another excellent track that begins with a very traditional music style but where the music continues changing and progressively flows to a great rock tune with a truly stunning electric guitar work, really. The tenth track "The Night Sky" written by Josh is the lengthiest track on the album and represents another epic piece. Once more the presence of Pink Floyd is particularly noted. It's a very powerful song that is also at the same time very calm and beautiful. The song starts with a mellow part with nice vocal parts that flows nicely and gracefully to a great and dense musical ambience. This is a fantastic way to close this excellent and interesting album.

Conclusion: Mostly Autumn is a very interesting band, really. Their music is a mix of Pink Floyd and Celtic music with some very nice harmonies. They can combine perfectly well the rich Celtic traditional music with the grandeur of the classic symphonic prog of the 70's, with a strong Pink Floyd's influence. This became perfectly clear since this debut studio album. "For All We Shared" is, in my humble opinion, an excellent and surprising debut studio album. It's one of the most beautiful albums I've ever heard, especially the lengthiest tracks "The Last Climb", "Heroes Never Die", "Out Of The Inn" and "The Night Sky". That made of Mostly Autumn one of my favourite progressive rock bands in our days. The purity and simplicity of their music made that "For All We Shared" became as one of my favourite albums from the band, with "The Spirit Of Autumn Past", "Heart Full Of Sky" and particularly "The Last Bright Light". This is not to lose.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)

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