REGENERATION

With Martin Orford retired from music, it was left to Mike Holms to resurrect the occasional Lens project on his own. This time around, Mike attempts an interesting experiment - rather than crank out another album of old Lens material from the pre-IQ days (the best of which had already been perfectly adequately handled on A Word In Your Eye), he'd do a little thought experiment and present an album of the sort of music he thought The Lens might have ended up producing in a parallel universe where they had stayed together and kept playing to the festival circuit rather than transforming into IQ and getting involved in the nascent neo-prog scene.

His conclusion is that thanks to exposure to acts like Ozric Tentacles, Steve Hillage, and the nascent rave culture, The Lens would end up drawing much more on spacey dance music than previously. (Don't worry, it's proggy dance music - think Porcupine Tree's material on Voyage 34.) With gorgeous neo-prog guitar Holmes still in the mix, the end result is an intriguing mix of neo-prog, space rock, and spacey trance. It's a lovely parallel universe to visit - but owing to the lack of IQ, I wouldn't want to live there.