TOGETHER WE'RE STRANGER

Tim and Steve are back with another stroll through the mellow side of poppy prog. This time they've allowed over half of their compositions to drift into the ten minute region, thus we have long slow development with little or no drums or percussion.

1. "Together We're Stranger" (8:31) industrial ambient soundscape. Tim enters singing from a closet in the back of the room at the end of the third minute. Way more like a Mark Hollis song than I was expecting. Some nice, emotional electtic guitar in the middle within the synthy spacescape before some breathy, treated trumpet notes take a turn just before the music turns into the next song. (17.5/20)

2. "All The Blue Changes" (7:48) spacious Mark Hollis-like piano and shakers set up the mood for Tim to perform his elegant magic. Piano, guitar, and other electronics slowy build beneath Tim's vocal. Very Steven Wilson-like harmony vocals in the final two minutes. (13.25/15)

3. "The City In A Hundred Ways" (2:23) more like a warm up of an John Zorn orchestra pit or Art Zoyd wind section. (4.5/5) 4. "Things I Want To Tell You" (9:03) taking over from the bleed over from "The City in a Hundred Ways" echoed Dominic Miller-like acoustic guitar notes and strums join in, almost incidentally, while Tim whisper/croons his almost equally incidentally deposited vocal lines. It's pleasant enough. I'm sure it might mean more if I were into the lyrics. (17/20)

5. "Photographs In Black And White" (10:03) gentle Americana acoustic guitar played while watching an immense open sky of Western expanse provided by thin Mark Isham-like synth washes. The song could almost pass for something by Rikkie Lee Jones or k.d. lang. Clarinet takes over the lead at the end of the third minute for a bit before Tim continues his breathy Paris, Texas confession. Roger Eno's harmonium begins rising up from the deep background as second acoustic guitar becomes a bit more aggressive and the clarinet returns for another solo. Over celestina and acoustic guitar weave Tim's muted voice sings and bass clarinet joins in before some deep bass thrums thunder the background every 16 seconds or so. This is the best part of the album (so far). After the thunder storm ends in the tenth minute, Tim and acoustic guitar finish out the song as it started (minus the synth backdrop).(18/20)

6. "Back When You Were Beautiful" (5:07) what, no drums?! Methinks we've heard this one before. By either No-Man or Talk Talk. Nice floating guitar and bank of Mellotron-like "ahhs" in the middle. Nice to hear Steven's banjo in the final third. (8.5/10)

7. "The Break-up For Real" (4:11) electric guitar and acoustic guitar. Tim Bowness and acoustic guitar. Definitely a Steven Wilson song. Nice AMERICA/TONY PATTERSON vocals. A nice one. (8.75/10)

This is different from but in no way as good as the duo's previous album, Returning Jesus. (primarily because they chose to not retain the services of rhythm maestro Steven Jansen)

B/four stars; a nice addition to any prog lover's music collection--especially if you're in the mood for the mellower more meditative side of prog music.