Tag: prog-rock

Wormwood; Cracked Machine’s New Album

A third instalment of space rock swirls and cosmic heavy duty guitar riffs was unleashed in January from our homegrown purveyors of psychedelia, Cracked Machine. Plug in and prepare for takeoff, Wormwood continues on their already stunning discography of celestial shenanigans….

Pretty much where we left off with the Gates of Keras, Wormwood offers that prog-rock gorgeousness, as beefy as Bovril on the boil, heavy-laden guitar riffs beguiling the stoner or non-stoner alike; you need not skin up to be immersed in this. Pink Floyd’s moments of drifting ambience, meets contemporary likes of the Ozric Tentacles here, it’s a trip more than an album, flowing from track to track and taking you along for a ride of euphoria and headbanging moments, in equal measure. Someone, pass me a lava lamp, pronto.

All instrumental, and mentally metal, gorge yourself stupid, encased in its epic journeys. By its very flowing nature, it makes it tricky to say much more as a way of review, I found the summit track, Eigenstate particularly ‘aving it, and when it falls into eight minutes of Return to Anatres, you’re drifting back through clouds of guitar riffs as solid as tungsten. Yet, if space-rock as a subgenre has welded into the likes of Spiritized or Spaceman 3, Cracked Machine are more likeable to Hawkwind, which in my most humblest of opinions is no bad thing. Wormwood doesn’t go on whim of experimentation or try to slide anything unexpected into it, it just ripples along a course like a stream. Although intros like that of Desert Haze can cause you to assume things are going to get all trancy-techno, it doesn’t stop at that riverbank.

You may have caught them down the Gate for their album release show, I was gutted to have had to miss it. You may have seen them before, such as the year Vinyl Realm hosted a stage at Devizes Street Festival and all took flight from the Market Place to erect deckchairs at St John’s and lie in mega bliss. Such is the accomplished Cracked Machine, forging space-rock into a new era, yet not forgetting its rich history. Put this on and be submerged. 

Here’s their LinkTree, fill your boots, open your third eye…..

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Dulcet Tones Rock Back to Bassett!

You’re a teenage Tom Cruise, at least you wish you were, but stay with me on this! Your parents are away, you’re home alone…

Richard Wileman on the Forked Road

Fashionably late for the party, apologies, the fellow I’m not sure if he minds me calling “the Mike Oldfield of Swindon,” though it’s meant as a high compliment, Richard Wileman, released his fourth solo album, yesterday (Friday 12th Jan,) The Forked Road. I’ve been lost in its gorgeous blend of prog-rock experimentation and acoustic folk goodness for a while now, perhaps too much to get around to telling you about it!

It is more usual for Wileman to separate his two defining subgenres into composing under the pseudonym Karda Estra, for the experimentally ambient prog-rock, those lush Pink Flyodesque vibes of deep instrumental, and using his own name for the more acoustic folk moments. Yet since Led Zeppelin’s debut in 1969, the two have been married, and here, Richard combines them to great effect. Indeed, it is the former style which draws you deep undercover as a way of a dawning, The Last Book of English Magic is four minutes of lush and gentle instrumental introduction, easing you into this album, the most diverse I’ve heard of Richard’s, playing it out with a reprise, the First Book of….

He takes vocals on the second airbourne tune, Butterflies, a floaty beauty you’d know already if you had just bought our compilation album for Julia’s House, as it was contributed to that project. Wileman describes the album as a “prog-folk horror concept album, rooted in his home county and charting the encounter of a comet with Earth, resulting in the undead rising and converging on The Ridgeway, all bookended by the last and first books of English magic.” If author Philip Carr-Gomm transports us across England’s vast scholaric of occult arts and explores its history of magical lore and practice, Wileman captures this in music as wonderfully as Zeppelin did with the fictional magic of Tolkien; only this Shire is Wiltshire.

The title track again find us on the experimental instrumental path again, and it’s enchantingly cobblestone, teetering with whimsical harps, from Chantelle Smith, like sorcery evaporating into mist, only to be followed by the summit of this adventure, The Children of the Sun, a duet with Amy Fry, which is blissfully sublime; dreamy is the benchmark here.

Just like the Horses of the Gods album, We Wish You Health, if you’re not whisked into a timeless magical realm within the mystics of your own county by now, seek medical attention! Avenue & Circle is more harp and melodica driftiness, like wandering into the crystal shop in Avebury. Finally, the scene is set, and Richard brings back Amy Fry to vocalise the diegesis unfolding. Comet Vs the Earth is Wileman’s Forever Autumn, if Justin Hayward was Jeff Wayne’s scene setter in his musical version of War of the Worlds, and what can be more of a Wiltshire related comparison than that?!

Harpist Chantelle Smith duets with Richard on the next tune, Old Bones, delicately resurrecting, never does this venture into anything horrifically jumpy, rather flows gently throughout, even if things are becoming spooky in the next instrumental piece, Spectres of the Ridgeway, which in its very name suggests the narrative of the concept.   

Alongside guest vocalist, Amy Fry, who also adds saxophone, and harpist Chantelle, and his daughter Sienna, who captured sound recordings of Avebury, Richard’s multi-instrumental skills are at the forefront, taking on guitars, vocals, bass, keyboards, percussion bouzouki, Appalachian dulcimer, accordion, melodica, and finalises his projects with artwork.

We’re nine tracks into this storyline, concluding with a dramatic ambient piece. Wileman’s faint lamentation leaves you wondering if the Inevitable Beast is metaphoric and you’ve missed a reality within the plot, and it’s followed by the aforementioned reprise. Combined this album is awash with the timelessness of prog-rock concept albums, of Bowie, and The Who, yet dreamy as Pink Floyd, all this I expected, but in listening to the past two sections, of Richard’s acoustic solo work largely with Amy Fry, and the more experimental angle of   Karda Estra, I’ve longed for the two to embrace, and here it is, and it’s all rather lovely, wrapped in mystical narrative; top marks!

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Rowdefest 26 Lineup Reveal!

Drizzly Sunday…again. I’ve just finished designing the poster, so allow me to reveal the lineup for Rowdefest this coming May, might cheer us up a…

REVIEW – James Hollingsworth @ The Southgate, Devizes – Friday 17th November 2023

Andy Fawthrop

Wish You Were Here  

Apparently I’ve not reviewed a gig at The Southgate for a while, despite attending plenty of them over the last few months, including the wonderful Courting Ghosts last Saturday night…..

And, apparently, Debbie broke through the 400-gig barrier in early October, a major milestone which we allowed to pass without sufficient fanfare.  And (apparently) there are plenty of gigs already booked for 2024.  We don’t know how lucky we are in this town!

And, finally, apparently March 2023 marked the 50th anniversary of the release of Pink Floyd’s seminal album “Dark Side Of The Moon”.  No – I didn’t know that either, but there you go.

Let’s try and put some of those omissions to rights.  

So here’s the obvious warning – younger readers should probably look away now. We might mention stuff from 50 years ago.  Don’t be frightened – some of the music was actually quite good!-

I’ve known Frome-based singer/ song-writer James and his work for a few years now, and I’m well aware of the two different sides to his musical repertoire – there’s the acoustic folky/ blues/ prog/ whimsical stuff, and then there’s barely-concealed Pink Floyd set.  We were treated to the former earlier this year at the Gate, but now it was time to wheel out the big guns of prog rock.  James, a huge Floyd fan, wasn’t about to let this anniversary pass without a major dusting-down of the whole album, and he’s been presenting this set throughout the year.  Tonight was special though – this was the Gate, this was Friday night. The controls were set for the heart of the sun, and the interstellar overdrive was fully engaged.

The pub was absolutely rammed, which is a great compliment to the quality of the music on offer on a wet Friday night.  And soon there were strange looping sounds coming from the stage as James set off on his journey.  The first half contained lots of non-DSOTM numbers – Shine on You Crazy Diamond, Wish You Were Here, and Comfortably Numb, the latter evoking just the first singalong of the night.  Playing with few breaks, James clocked up 70 minutes of material in his opening salvo.

Then, almost before you could get another pint in, we were off on the main adventure – the whole of Dark Side Of The Moon *** (see below for the factual stuff).  Got all of that?  And here was James – just one bloke in a crowded Devizes pub.  And that’s where the pedals and loops came in.  Appearing to play only acoustic guitar and harmonica, James built up the songs through many layers, adding the vocals as the songs swept past.  Each song was greeted with a cheer, and there were a good few singalongs.  I’m not going to claim that Messers Gilmour, Mason, Waters and Wright “could have been in the room”, but he made a bloody good fist of it, simulating drums, keyboards, synthesisers, bells, clocks, and even making a passable attempt at Clare Torry’s amazing vocal sequence on “The Great Gig In The Sky”.  

It was a tour de force, a stunning effort of both musical versatility, but also of concentration.  How he had the time to smile and raise himself for some inter-song chat was amazing.  He must have been exhausted, but he looked nothing but happy.  It’s the music he loves, and it really showed.

As the final track died away, James was rewarded with a well-deserved cheer and huge round of applause.  And he still had enough gas in the tank to give us an encore.  What a performer.  He did Devizes proud, and I think Devizes responded with full enthusiasm.

Great night, great gig.

*** A bit of background info.  “The Dark Side of the Moon” was Floyd’s eighth studio album and was developed during live performances before recording began. It was conceived as a “concept album”

that would focus on the pressures faced by the band during their arduous lifestyle, and also deal with the mental health problems of former band member Syd Barrett, who departed the group in 1968. The record builds on ideas explored in Pink Floyd’s earlier recordings and performances, while omitting the extended instrumentals that characterised the band’s earlier work. The group employed multitrack recording, tape loops, and analogue synthesisers. Engineer Alan Parsons was responsible for many of the sonic aspects of the recording, and for the recruitment of session singer Clare Torry, who appears on “The Great Gig in the Sky”.

The album centres on the idea of madness, exploring themes such as conflict, greed, time, death, and mental illness.  Snippets from interviews with the band’s road crew and others are featured alongside philosophical quotations. It’s among the most critically acclaimed albums of all time and brought the group international fame, wealth and plaudits.  As THE blockbuster release of the vinyl album era, it also propelled record sales throughout the music industry. It’s certified 14 times platinum in the UK, and topped the US Billboard for 984 consecutive weeks. It’s claimed to have sold over 45 million copies worldwide, making it the band’s best-selling release, the best-selling album of the 1970s, and the fourth-best-selling album in history.

Future gigs at The Southgate:

Saturday 18th November Junkyard Dogs

Saturday 25th November Worried Men

Sunday 26th November  James Oliver

Saturday 2nd December  Lunabarge

Sunday 3rd December  Jon Amor Trio + special guest Dale Hambridge

Friday 8th December   Strange Folk

Saturday 9th December   Black Nasty

REVIEW – Skinny Molly @ LSBC, Devizes – Saturday 20th August 2022

What A Sell Out

Andy Fawthrop

Seems ages since we were last turning up at the Con Club for Long Street Blues, but last night the new Autumn/ Winter season began, and there we all were again.  And what a way to start, with a cracking US band and a ticket sell-out….

The place was, therefore, obviously packed out. Whilst it might suit the music – hot & sweaty –I think it’s time that the Con Club looked into installing some air-con.  Just like the The Homing’s gig back in June, as part of the Devizes Arts Festival, the room was really stifling and airless.

Nevertheless we had some great entertainment to distract the huge crowd.  First up were Koerie & Andy, a duo new to me, introduced by host Ian Hopkins as recently discovered busking.  As might be expected with such a heritage, they were a little raw and rough around the edges, but very effective and entertaining for all that.  Using guitar, vocals and harmonica, they delivered a string of covers, including “Wild Thing” and “Should I Stay Or Should I Go?”  The crowd gave them a good listen and a good welcome, and hopefully we’ll see them again.

But that was as nothing to the roar that went up went Skinny Molly finally hit the stage to start their 75-minute one-set performance.

This band, hailing mostly from Tennessee, is a major force on the US Southern Rock scene.  They were formed by guitarist/vocalist Mike Estes (formerly of Lynyrd Skynyrd and Blackfoot), original Molly Hatchet guitarist Dave Hlubek (who has since left the band) and drummer Kurt Pietro (who also played drums for Blackfoot).  By 2008, the line-up was solidified with the addition of Blackfoot guitarist/vocalist Jay Johnson and  Grand Ole Opry stalwart bassist Luke Bradshaw.  And this was the line-up featured last night.

Skinny Molly’s mantra is apparently “Never let one fan leave a show disappointed” and they set about trying to fulfil this promise right from the outset, with a string of rock-infused blues and country numbers. There was newer SM material, mixed in with some older Skynard classics, and some covers.  Free’s “Wishing Well” was perhaps a surprise, less so Steve Earle’s “Copperhead Road”, but the biggest cheer of the night of course came about an hour in when they launched in to probably their biggest hit “Sweet Home Alabama”.  But there was nothing one-dimensional about their material – we had a good old Southern gumbo of different ingredients, including southern rock, old country, blues, hard rock, and general Americana.

They built up the mood and the atmosphere, and there were soon plenty of folks rocking along and dancing. They kept the inter-song chat to a minimum, instead focusing of packing in as much music as possible, culminating in a standing ovation and well-deserved encore. I don’t think anyone went home disappointed, so I guess they did exactly what they said on the tin.

Future Long Street Blues Club gigs:

Saturday 8th October 202-   Eddie Martin’s Big Blues Band

Friday 14th October 2022  Black Sabbitch (Corn Exchange, Devizes)

Saturday 5th November 2022  Robbie McIntosh Band

Friday 11th November 2022   Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse (Corn Exchange, Devizes)

Saturday 19th November 2022   Hardwicke Circus and The Alex Voysey Trio

Friday 23rd December 2022  Gee Baby I Love You

Half a Review: James Hollingsworth @ The Southgate

It was only a whistle-stop for me at Devizes’ best pub for original live music on Saturday, but long enough to sink a cider and assess; James Hollingsworth is fantastic….

Our roving reporter Andy informed me James is a blessing on the folk circuit, but this occasion, armed with enough loop pedals to make The Southgate’s alcove resemble the Millennium Falcon, he summoned his inner “progness” to embark upon a journey beyond three chords.

A captivating solo show, where pre-recorded backing tracks were not welcome, Frome-based James worked steadily and proficiently through his own compositions, as well as some covers, with complex arrangements built via hand percussion, voice and guitar effects.

James, with additional Southgate’s regular answer to Pan’s People!

Prominsing classics from the likes of Jimi Hendrix, Yes, Genesis, Led Zeppelin, Kate Bush, The Beatles, Roy Harper, Jeff Buckley, Marillion and more. If I couldn’t stay for long, because I’m as not as omnipresent as I need to be, I picked out Hendrix’s Castles Made of Sand, and it was sublime.

So, only a quick note to say, for any music lover from folk to prog-rock, from the era of mellowed Flyod-eske goodness, James Hollingsworth works some magic. I’ll be making a bee-line next time he arrives at The Southgate, and so should you!

Baber and Wileman set to Chill

Meditatively strap yourself into a comfy recliner, as under his pseudonym Karda Estra, Swindon’s prolific experimental virtuoso Richard Wileman is in collaboration with Sanguine Hum keyboardist Matt Baber for an album taking their names as the title, Baber-Wileman. It’s released tomorrow (Monday 10th Jan 2022) on Kavus Torabi’s Believers Roast label.….

Under his own name, Richard projects acoustic folk songs, yet never without fascinating instrument experimentation, yet as Karda Estra soundscapes of surreal gothic and cosmic compositions evoke mood as a film score should.

With a pungent fusion of Zappa and Canterbury influenced instrumental compositions, Sanguine Hum was formed a decade ago from the ashes of the Joff Winks Band and the Antique Seeking Nuns. Known for complex ensemble work, reflective song-writing and distinctively striving instrumental pieces, Sanguine Hum’s defining characteristics owes much to Matt’s keys, who released his first solo album, Suite for Piano and Electronics on Bad Elephant Music in 2018.

The pair first met at RoastFest in 2011, where Sanguine Hum were performing, and soon afterwards, Matt and Richard did their first collaboration track, Mondo Profondo 1, which appeared on the Karda Estra album Mondo Profondo.

Returning to the studio together towards the end of 2020, initially intending to put a couple of tracks down, the sessions went so well, they continued co-composing through 2021 and the project evolved into this album, which is chilling me to the bone.

Richard’s long-time vocal and clarinet player Amy Fry also guest appearances on three of the nine enchanted tracks. At times, like the finale, The Birth of Spring, this sounds like it could’ve been recorded on a light dewed grassy knoll, under a troll bridge of a Tolkienesque landscape, at others a Kling Klang type Düsseldorf studio towards the end of the seventies, but the steam of this melting pot perpetually reeks of influences further and wider.

With Matt’s clear progressive-rock influence, tracks like Passing Wave and the penultimate Day Follows Night, hold woozy psychedelic swirls of a Hawkwind free festival, yet the classical piano concertos of Claude Debussy ring through interludes like Three Audio Slow and 2009.

It’s a wonderous journey, mellowly twirling through gorgeously uplifting, sometimes haunting soundscapes, as ambient as The Orb, as methodically composed as Mike Oldfield, as peculiar as The Art of Noise, as moody electronically progressive as Tangerine Dream, and melodically unruffled as Jefferson Airplane.

The second tune, after Karda Estra-fashioned haunting intro, sounding like a spooky film score by William Orbit, Souvenir is vocally a prime example of the folk-rock influence of Jefferson Airplane, but only a slight segment of styles blended here, of which the magnum opus of the album, Emperor combines all aforementioned elements sublimely. This one is as Mike Oldfield created Primal Scream’s Higher Than the Sun from Screamadelica; yeah, it’s that beautiful, all too beautiful!

Find a Richard Wileman track on our compilation album!

Daisy’s Good Luck Songs

If I learned to take heed of Sheer Music chief promoter Kieran J Moore, when he Facebook posts about a new local discovery on a previous occasion, when I had the unexpected realisation outstanding Americana artist, Joe Edwards was virtually a neighbour, it’s paid off again.

The sounds of Daisy Chapman the subject this time, and it’s exquisite.

“How have we only just discovered each other?” Daisy responded. She may reside in Trowbridge but rarely gigs locally, concentrating on touring the continent. I listened fondly to the song he prompted, time for me to cut in on this dance.

Starter for ten, Daisy has an angelic voice of vast range. It could conjure enough emotion to make you tearful over a Chas n Dave cover, if she were to attempt it, which she probably wouldn’t, purely hypothetical!

Orchestral, at times, but dark, folk in another, if unconventional, there’s a thin line between heavenly and infernal here, as a sense of generation X sneaks in too, through conceivably progressive writing. Coupled with poignant narrative in these nine original good luck songs, a waiver away from archetype instruments and riffs of country and folk, and bold genre experimentations and crossovers, makes her third studio album, 2020’s Good Luck Songs something of a masterpiece.

It opens lone on piano, this divine voice, almost liturgical, but layers are building, a trusty cello will become a trademark throughout the album. The title track preps you for something unique, something obviously wonderful.

Into the second tune, Home Fires, and the tender euphoria continues through piano and cello combination, whisking you on its journey, of nostalgic recollections annotating seasonal change, the wordplay is sublime. Neatly layered into the existing recipe, a gothic folk element slips neatly into play by the third tune. Daisy’s voice willingly commands you, captivating you, like a child mesmerised with a campfire fable.

Then there’s Generation Next, a strictly country feel with a delicate fiddle, and brass, accompanying a tongue-in-cheek division, a tale which, despite the Americana sound, nods to gigging on a local circuit, from well-versed experts to the concept their advice is to be ignored by the younger upcoming performers. It is, quite simply, fascinatingly ingenious.

I used to own an Empire is another compellingly written emotional piece; on bonding to face a greater cause, articulated by a crusader boldness against aggrandizement. Through historic references it compares devastating impacts of political cuts, The Beeching Report, Miner’s Strike and even Custer and the Gettysburg Address to the ignorance of Icarus, as the wax of his wings melted from flying too close to the sun. An archetypal subject of leftism maybe, but you’ve never heard such expressed with such academic prose and orientation.

Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do! The subjects of Good Luck Songs are concentrated, factual and tangible, emotionally expressed and divinely produced to an exceptionally high standard. But diversity makes it tricky to pin down, there’s a moment, in the haunting ambient opening of The Decalogue, which sounds so soulful, held steady with military style drum riff, yet the following song There’s a Storm Coming has a drum loop and high-hat, akin to a contemporary RnB song, or the country-pop of Shania Twain. Feels like succumbing to commercialisation, but in this, there’s a point; Daisy’s voice is so lithe, it could flex into any given genre or style, and finish on top.

Said versatility was first noticed by UK prog-rock band Crippled Black Phoenix, and since 2009, on and off Daisy has travelled as pianist/BV with the band on tours covering every corner of Europe as well as a short trip to China. Daisy was also chosen as vocalist on their cover of AC-DC’s “Let Me Put My Love Into You.” With a penchant for prog-rock, Daisy shares lead vocals with ex CBP singer, Daniel Anghede in the group Venus Principle.

And anyway, Good Luck Songs finishes with a sublime cover of Tom Waits’ Tom Traubert’s Blues, to confirm Daisy’s dedication to acoustic rock, but as expectable, it strips out the croaking vocals of Waits and replaces it with the pure silk that is Daisy Chapman. Believe me, if you’re captivated by strong female vocals, the kind that could bring a church down, but want for intelligent lyrics, this album will hold you spellbound from start to finish.

Arcana & Idols of the Flesh: Ambience and Chamber-Prog with Swindon Composer Richard Wileman

One portion my nostalgia rarely serves, and that’s my once veneration for spacey sounds, apexed through the ambient house movement in the nineties, but not comprehensively; we always had Sgt Pepper, Pink Floyd and Hendrix’s intro to Electric Ladyland. I’ve long detached myself from adolescent experimentation of non-licit medications, lying lone in a dark bedroom chillaxing to mood music, and moved onto a full house of commotional kids; progress they call it.

Incredibly prolific, Swindon’s composer Richard Wileman might yet stir the memories, if these headphones drown out the sound of a nearby X-Box tournament. Best known for his pre-symphonic rock band Karda Estra, there is nothing vertical or frenetic about his musical approach. Idols of the Flesh is his latest offering from a discography of sixteen albums. Yet far from my preconceptions of layers of decelerated techno, as was The Orb or KLF, or psychedelic space-rock moments of my elders, which our own Cracked Machine continue the splendour of, Richard’s sounds with Karda Estra bases more orchestrally, neo-classical, as if the opening of a thriller movie. Though, so intense is this sound you need no images to provoke you.

Idols of the Flesh is dark and deeply surreal, with swirls of cosmic and gothic hauntings which drifts the listener on a voyage of bliss. Nirvana is tricky to pinpoint in my household, but with my ears suctioned to my headphones I jumped out of my skin upon a tap on the shoulder, daughter offering me some sweets! Momentarily snapped back in the room as if I’d surfaced from a hypnotist’s invocation, but aching to fall backwards into it once again.

Agreeably, this is not headbanging driving music, neither does it build like Leftfield for those anticipating beats to start rolling after a ten-minute intro, it simply drifts as a soundscape, perhaps coming to its apex at the eloquently medieval church organed Church of Flesh, one of two named tunes out of the six on offer, the others given part numbers. Then, with running water, the final part echoes a distant chant of female vocals as if a wind blowing across a sea for another eleven minutes, it’s stirring, incredibly emotive and perfected.

Along a similar, blissful ethos Richard Wileman served up Arcana in September this year, a third album this time under his own name. While maintaining a certain ambiance, it’s more conventional than his Karda Estra, more attributed to the standard model of popular music. It’s an eerie and spectral resonance, though, with occasional vocals which meander on divine folk and prog-rock; contemporary hippy vibes, rather than timeworn psychedelia. Released on Kavus Torabi’s Believers Roast label, a sprinkling of Byrds and Mamas & Papas ring through with an unmistakable likeness to a homemade Mike Oldfield. When vocals come into effect, with one guest singer Sienna Wileman, it’s astutely drafted and beguiling.

Select anything from the bulging discographies of Karda Estra or Richard Wileman and you’re onto a mood-setting journey, composed with expertise and passion. If ambient house is lost in a bygone era, this is reforming the balance of atmospheric compositions with modernism, so mesmeric it remains without the need for intoxication. Now, where did I stash my old chillum?! Probably in a dusty box in the loft with my Pete Loveday comics and some Mandelbrot fractal postcards….