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Albums of 2015: The Year So Far

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We’re halfway through the year so I thought I would do a quick run-down of the music that has caught my attention up to this point.  There are not a lot of albums on the list; for a variety of reasons I have not been knocking myself out seeking new music.  But finding it is never a problem – there is far more great music out there than anyone could ever listen to, and many of my friends have reasonably decent taste.  🙂

It might be a short list, and not everything on there is going to make it across the finish line, but the quality of the releases has been outstanding. Let me put it this way: if this year’s no-hopers had appeared in 2014, my year-end tally would have looked quite different.  Last year it was tough to come up with ten albums without padding the list; this year it is going to be hard to leave things off.  If the quality of the upcoming releases is as high as what has already appeared, I may simply make a Top 15.

This is a year that demonstrates beyond all doubt that the best, most engaging, most sheerly awesome sounds are being made by people no-one has ever heard of, or who have been forgotten—folks who have nothing to lose and in the overall scheme of things (especially in the current musical economic reality) little to gain; when the icons seem to have become mired in hype and self-referential twaddle, and when genres have become meaningless (not that they ever were really meaningful, mind you).

So without further ado, here are the best (so far) of the maybe 16 albums I considered, in roughly reverse order.  Needless to say this is subject to change at any time, and is pretty much bound to change as the new crop of upcoming releases hits.

Continue reading Albums of 2015: The Year So Far →

Rapid Eye Movement

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Released: September 2007 (Europe); October 2007 (North America)

(The band lineup has remained stable since Voices in My Head; if anything changes, relevant reviews will note it)

Tracklist:

  1. Beyond the Eyelids
  2. Rainbow Box
  3. 02 Panic Room
  4. Schizophrenic Prayer
  5. Parasomnia
  6. Through the Other Side
  7. Embryonic
  8. Cybernetic Pillow
  9. Ultimate Trip

Bonus Disc Tracklist:

  1. Behind the Eyelids
  2. Lucid Dream IV
  3. 02 Panic Room (remix)
  4. Back to the River
  5. Rapid Eye Movement

And then there were three.

The release of Rapid Eye Movement (REM) wound up the Reality Dream Trilogy, the first three albums united by their ambitious and lushly intricate musicality, and their common lyric arc of self-exploration and change.  As it turned out, REM also marked the end of the first phase in the band’s ongoing quest to explore new musical directions and keep themselves sounding fresh, but this wouldn’t become clear until album number 4.

I find this a difficult album to review.  I like it, of course, I like all the Riverside albums, and I would rather play REM than many other albums in my collection, but I rarely feel the urge to play it in its entirety.  It is an album that seems “stuck between”, as it were, in a kind of limbo between potential and success, as if something intangible is missing.  In other words, it is not immediately obvious why REM should not be a well-played album.  I don’t have an easy explanation for why it niggles at me.

At any rate, I suspect that if anyone is going to bother to disagree with any of my Riverside reviews, it will be with REM. I know a lot of people connect with it, but I seem unable to do so. I think my issues with the album boil down to this: the largely hit-and-miss nature of both the songs and the lyrics.

The lyrics of REM appear to be themed around psychological aspects of duality and opposition: sides of our personalities that often are in conflict.  Sleeping, dreaming, and the liminal state between sleep and wakefulness are some key metaphors that drive this theme.  And I have to confess that these ideas are cleverly handled: hooky imagery abounds, sly cultural references, and plenty of deft turns of phrase—and yet, there is just something missing.

Continue reading Rapid Eye Movement →

Eschar — Nova

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Released: April 2015

Lineup:

  • Rory Gilhespy: Drums
  • George Linacre: Bass
  • Rob O’Murphy: Guitars
  • Sam Beattie: Guitars

Tracklist:

  1. Aphotic
  2. Monolith
  3. Nova
  4. Echoes and Reflections
  5. Discovery One
  6. Falling Faintly Through the Universe
  7. This is Not for You
  8. Turn Skyward
  9. Contact Light

There are a handful of bands out there that I feel kind of proprietary about.  I regard them as “my” bands, and I’m happy to share them with the rest of you.  Some are unknown DIY work-out-of-the-basement outfits, and others relatively well-known, and of course they existed before I found them (in some cases for a considerable time before), but that’s not the point.  They are still “mine”.

One of these bands is Eschar, a post-metal foursome from Surrey, UK.  I was lucky enough to see them live a while back, on a bill with three other superb independent post-rock outfits (a lineup that might rank as the best multi-band gig I have ever seen in terms of band-to-band quality). At the time they had a 5-track EP (Elements) that they had released a few years earlier, which showed great promise, and I was thrilled to be able to see them.  They in turn were blown away by the fact that someone in North America had even heard of them, let alone had come to a gig.  So…proprietary.   🙂

Nova is Eschar’s first full-length album, and it has more than fulfilled the promise of the EP.  There has been a great leap in song writing chops and confidence since Elements, and some real maturity and sophistication is on display; these guys haven’t been sitting around, that is clear.  At first the album didn’t completely grab me; it was heavy and musical but the tracks came across as a bit samey – which alas is one of the downsides of the post-rock genre as a whole.  However, there was something about the album; something that kept drawing me back to try again. I’m glad I did, because at last, it clicked, and it has become one of my favourite releases of the year so far.

Continue reading Eschar — Nova →

Second Life Syndrome

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Released October 31, 2005

Personnel:

  • Mariusz Duda: bass, vocals, lyrics
  • Piotr Grudziński: guitar
  • Michał Łapaj: keyboards
  • Piotr Kozieradzki: drums

Tracklist

  1. After
  2. Volte Face
  3. Conceiving You
  4. Second Life Syndrome
  5. Artificial Smile
  6. I Turned You Down
  7. Reality Dream III
  8. Dance With the Shadows
  9. Before

This is probably the first Riverside album I heard all the way through.  I do know that the very first song I ever heard by them came from this album, and quite by accident.  I think we all pile up those free cds that come with each issue of Prog Mag, and (confession time) I pretty much never get around to playing them.  This time though the cd was a “history of prog ” compilation, so I gave it a shot.

Insert cd…<stuff plays> Yeah this old stuff is good…what about this new prog? <listens> Meh; okay; meh; meh; meh…<”Conceiving You”>  Oh wow who the hell are these  guys?  <jawdrop> And who the fuck is that singer???

I sure found out, because my immediate and subsequent digging around on Youtube for Riverside inevitably turned up Lunatic Soul, and that was the music…but anyway, that’s a different set of reviews. As it was (and I discovered them late: they were a year away from releasing their fifth album) I spent the next six months listening to almost nothing else but the Riverside and Lunatic Soul back catalogues.

Second Life Syndrome is the album where Riverside became complete, as it were, and its release must have quelled the apprehension of many fans eagerly awaiting the follow-up to Out of Myself: were these guys really going to be able to fulfill the enormous promise of that first album?

Continue reading Second Life Syndrome →

Voices in My Head

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Welcome to the second in my Riverside reviews series.

Voices in My Head (EP)

Released March 2005

Personnel

  • Mariusz Duda: bass, vocals, acoustic guitar, lyrics
  • Piotr Grudziński: electric guitar
  • Piotr Kozieradzki: drums
  • Michał Łapaj: keyboards

Tracklist

  1. Us
  2. Acronym Love
  3. Dna Ts. Rednum Or F. Raf
  4. The Time I Was Daydreaming
  5. Stuck Between
  6. I Believe (live)
  7. Loose Heart (live)
  8. Out of Myself (live)

The second Riverside release, Voices in My Head, was offered as a sort of placeholder for the fans, after the excitement of the first album and while they waited for the next. It is brief, as befits an EP, presenting five new tracks and three live performances of songs from Out of Myself.  It showcases the gentle, acoustic side of the band, and is notable for being the first studio appearance of their new keyboard player Michał Łapaj, who had taken over from Jacek Melnicki.

The new tracks on Voices in My Head are all ballads save one (which is exceptional in more than this), essentially acoustic and electric guitar, keyboards, and Duda’s lovely voice.  The three live tracks were taken from a show played in Warsaw in 2004, and maybe can be regarded as a road-test to see how well Łapaj was going to fit in.

Overall the EP is pleasant, the tracks short, beautiful, acoustic guitar and piano; but too many ballads in a row leads one to perhaps forget that this is (theoretically) a Riverside release and not a Mariusz Duda solo effort with guests.  Still, these songs arrow straight for the heart, taking full advantage of the delicately intimate side of Duda’s voice and lyrics, silky and yearning. “The Time I was Daydreaming” and “Acronym Love” (which would re-emerge a decade later as a somewhat re-worked live showstopper) are the best songs along that line.

And then…the remarkable “Dna Ts. Rednum Or F. Raf”, with its too-clever-by-half backward title, charges headlong into the middle of this otherwise rather sedate set: a rocking, chugging track with a rumbling bassline and compelling hypnotic rhythm (no live drums, but drum machine), it thunders along powerful and unique, and remains one of the outstanding tracks in the entire Riverside canon.  I don’t know if it ever got played live, but it might be worth seeing—this track at full bore has roof-raising potential.

Overall, Voices in My Head lacks the stylistic variety and signature sound associated with Riverside as a band; it seems more a Duda/Łapaj effort, with some Grudziński thrown in.  I tend to sample this EP rather than listen to it through:  “Dna Ts. Rednum Or F. Raf” has become a staple, and a couple of other tracks get play depending on mood.  I think what we have is what it was intended to be:  a collection of extra tracks assembled to help fans endure the wait between albums.  It certainly does not have the status or quality of the band’s other EP, but more on that one later.

Out of Myself

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Welcome to my series of reviews of the Riverside catalogue.   You can read my intro and initial rankings here.

I hope you find them interesting, and I would be pleased if you’d leave a comment or two…even if you disagree.  Hell, especially if you disagree, because hearing your opinion is more interesting than just having an echo chamber.

Besides…if too many people agree with me, I’ll suspect I’m doing something wrong.

Out of Myself

Released: Poland 2003 with original cover/2004 rest of world, cover by Travis Smith

 Personnel:

  • Mariusz Duda: vocals, bass guitar, acoustic guitar, lyrics
  • Piotr Grudziński: guitars
  • Piotr Kozieradzki: drums
  • Jacek Melnicki: keyboards

Tracklist:

  1. The Same River
  2. Out of Myself
  3. I Believe
  4. Reality Dream
  5. Loose Heart
  6. Reality Dream II
  7. In Two Minds
  8. The Curtain Falls
  9. ok

Out of Myself  is the album that introduced Riverside to the world…and for a first album, this is as grand an entrance as can be imagined.  Imbued with an astonishing sophistication of sound and vision, it is confident and forward-looking; call it what you will — prog rock, prog metal — this album married the various band-member influences (and inevitable comparisons to Certain Other Bands) into one glorious progressive bundle.  Influences aside, Riverside marched into progressive consciousness as an entity unto itself, and the band has managed to maintain its unique sound throughout its subsequent stylistic incarnations.

As it turns out, an early version of their music, raw and unrefined, exists on a 7-track “demo”.*  A couple of the tracks from this made it onto Out of Myself more or less intact (just cleaned up), but others are very differently conceived (such as “The Curtain Falls”), one has completely disappeared into oblivion (never rerecorded as anything that I have found), and one reappeared much later as a track on the “Conceiving You” single.  This bit of history provides a fascinating glimpse of the wobbly first steps of what would eventually become one of the most polished and professional musical outfits around.

Out of Myself pulls no punches: it kicks off with “The Same River”, a 12-minute prog opus, and from there manages to encompass an impressive range of styles: delicate acoustic ballads, pure face-stomping instrumental metal, screams and growls, the willingness to wander off in different musical directions and back again.  We discover Mariusz Duda’s intimate, introspective lyric style, and his lovely distinctive voice.  And behind it all what would become Riverside’s hallmark sound: Piotr Grudziński’s great winding guitar themes and melodies and Duda’s intricate bass playing, anchored by solid drumming and the vast soundscape wash of the keyboards.  It would take another album and a new keyboard player for all these elements to coalesce, but this first album is remarkable for how thoroughly it introduces us to the essence of Riverside.

Continue reading Out of Myself →

Blowing the Dust Off: Tumbleweed Connection by Elton John

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Welcome to the first post in a new occasional project: revisiting music that has sat, unplayed, in my vinyl collection for so long I don’t remember what it sounds like. Often these are albums from artists whose other work I like, or that I bought because a song or two caught my attention, or that thought I “should” have for whatever reason. I think we all have managed to accumulate a few of these albums.

So I’ve decided that this blog is a perfect excuse to haul them out, dust them off, give them a spin, and write up short reviews to tell you about them. With luck, I will discover some forgotten treasures. On the other hand it may inspire me to get rid of stuff and open up some much-needed (Much. Needed.) space for albums I might actually want to own.

Tumbleweed Connection by Elton John

Released 1970

Tracklist:

  1. Ballad of a Well-known Gun
  2. Come Down in Time
  3. Country Comfort
  4. Son of Your Father
  5. My Father’s Gun
  6. Where to Now St. Peter?
  7. Love Song
  8. Amoreena
  9. Talking Old Soldiers
  10. Burn Down the Mission

Tumbleweed Connection is Elton John’s 3rd album, a follow-up to his self-titled second that provided him with his first major hit (“Your Song”). It did well in the charts, reaching No. 2 in the UK Albums Charts and No. 5 in the American Billboard chart. As with most of his albums, John wrote and composed the music and Bernie Taupin wrote the lyrics.

I was never much of an Elton John fan, he was far too pop and mainstream for my taste. But for some reason this album struck a chord—or more accurately, one track from this album dug itself in deep, even if I never much listened to the rest of the album. The beautiful, poignant ballad “Where to Now St. Peter?” resonates with me in a way that few songs do; whenever I work up a list of my favourite songs of all time, it always manages to find its way there. That must mean something.

 

Tumbleweed Connection is vaguely a concept album, wherein John and Taupin try to capture the Gestalt of some sort of mythic American West. Lyrically it is replete with the themes and tropes of “America”: home and hearth, the old west, The Gunfighter…. I can’t really comment on how well they managed to accomplish that, but musically there is a real western flavour and tang to these tracks, country-rock and bluesy ballads, lovely gospelly vocal harmonies, harmonica and steel guitar and honky-tonk piano…they have pulled off an album of nicely evocative, gentle, country-style songs.

I’m happy to say that this is an album well worth listening to, and I plan to hang on to it. Maybe “Old Soldiers Talking” borders on maudlin, and the piano theme for “Amoreena” is essentially a major-key version of the theme for “Where to Now…” but overall this is an album of fine country rockers, lovely ballads, and very pleasant soft rock time-fillers. And the packaging is vintage ‘70s album-cover: a well-designed gatefold where the album opening is inside at the fold, and a large format book with lyrics and photos. And they manage to put all that quality on a plain-bread 120 gram pressing in a sleeve that doesn’t occupy a half-inch of shelf space the way the modern crazy-thick vinyl covers do (this is a bit of a pet peeve of mine…).

Note: The track “Country Comfort” was written for Rod Stewart, which appeared on his second solo album Gasoline Alley, also in 1970.

Hand. Cannot. Erase. The new Steven Wilson is here.

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Take a cut of the heavier, proggier end of Steven Wilson and season it with a judicious pinch of jazz fusion, simmer with a touch of Blackfield and Grace for Drowning, and serve over a bed of Porcupine Tree. Present on a silver platter of fan-hype and accolades and Voila! Hand. Cannot. Erase., the new Steven Wilson solo album.

I’ve been playing this more or less regularly since the iTunes download arrived (read: at least once a day) in order to get a feel for it. I’m not sure yet where it fits in the Wilson solo canon, but my overall impression is of an album of pleasant tedium interrupted by moments of sheer beauty. And alas I find that there are not nearly enough moments of sheer beauty, or any sort of other exceptional moments. It is all very competently done (as is ever the case with Wilson): well composed, well sung, well played, but overall it tastes rather…not so much bland, as restrained.

On the plus side: HCE is poppier, proggier, and more purely face-melting heavy than anything Steven Wilson has done solo for a long time, and this is not a bad thing. These are skills that are not lacking in the Wilson musical recipe book, and his prog-pop (pop-prog?) work is nicely concise and to the point. The long instrumental passages and jazzy solo stretches of the last two albums are (mostly) gone. There are instrumental breaks, of course, but they move the song along and one doesn’t get the feeling they were stuck in there as a showcase for somebody’s chops. This is a clear improvement. The introduction and careful use of the female vocalist has worked out better than a lot of people expected: Ninet Tayeb has a wonderful voice and her parts are perfectly placed.

Wilson does have a gift for the beautiful melody, and on an album as pop-flavoured as this one, he really shines. The title track is catchy, infectious, upbeat, and surprisingly heavy at times; I’ve heard people say that it might be a bit too Blackfield-ish, but you know, he does this sort of thing so well. The man has such a vast repertoire; I see no problem with his pulling influences from wherever he needs to get them. Likewise the intense heavy moments are reminiscent of the metal-ish days of Porcupine Tree – which suits me fine because those were my favourite PT albums. It’s nice to hear them again.

I wish there were more tracks as completely immersive as “Hand Cannot Erase” but unfortunately the other stunning moments are kind of scattershot, popping up in the midst of pleasant but otherwise unremarkable tracks: the last third of “Routine”, the first bit of “First Regret/3 Years Older” for example.

And on the downside: HCE has more heart and soul than The Raven that Refused to Sing possessed, and much less (thank god) sheer wankery than was on Grace for Drowning, but despite the beautifully heartbreaking moments and joyful metal heaviness, I find it lacks a fundamental sense of adventure or daring. It is just so polite and restrained. The most applicable description is “nice”, with all the innate blandness implied in the word, and the great moments are not enough to overcome that final sense of dissatisfaction at the end of the album. It could have been so much more.

I will wind up on a more positive note because the album does end well: “Ancestral” (at least the last two thirds of it) is a mighty, mighty song. It. Kicks. Ass. in the way Deadwing kicked ass, and there are sections that could have come directly from Deadwing.

And “Happy Returns/Ascendant Here on…” is my favourite song on the album by far, heartbreaking and transcendently beautiful.

Alas, there just are not enough of these moments on this album. It is a tasty stew, but it is not Cordon Bleu.

7.5 /10

And Just Who is this Riverside Outfit Anyway? 2023 Update.

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I am glad you asked.  My answer: the best band in the world.  But you probably saw that one coming.

I have given this post a heavy edit; I first wrote it in 2015, when the discography consisted of five albums and two EPs, and one live album. I added new notes with each release up to Wasteland, but it became a mess, and the sequence hard to follow. So to hell with that. I will condense it into a list of official release dates.

 The other thing though, is that I find I must revise my rankings. After a decade of listening and careful thought, I realize that there simply are albums I love way less than I want to. I mean, I don’t want to not love (I won’t say ‘dislike’ because it is not that) any of the albums, but I have to be honest enough to admit when they don’t work for me, and sometimes I wasn’t. However, I am not going to touch the actual reviews that I link to. For the most part, they say what I want them to say.

 Riverside Release Dates:

  • Out of Myself: 2003 Poland/2004 Rest of World
  • Voices in My Head (EP): 2005
  • Second Life Syndrome: 2005
  • Rapid Eye Movement: 2007
  • Anno Domini High Definition: 2009
  • Memories in My Head (EP): 2011
  • Shrine of New Generation Slaves: 2013
  • Love, Fear and the Time Machine: 2015
  • Eye of the Soundscape: 2016
  • Wasteland: 2018
  • ID.Entity: 2023

Note:  Eye of the Soundscape has been reviewed  here.  I have not included it in the rankings below for reasons explained in that review.

But to get started…since I am reviewing the albums, I guess I am also rating them, one against the other, a task that is no trivial matter. And as with all such lists, it is mostly a reflection of my own personal taste and inclination and less a judgement call on the objective quality of the music. The band’s output varies so greatly in style and approach that it is impossible to actually pin down a genre beyond the broadest notion of “progressive”, and it should come as no surprise that some of their explorations resonated with me more than others.

Anyway, let’s begin with a rough ranking, from least favourite to most beloved, with a little capsule explanation for why they are in this order.

Voices in My Head (EP): made up of brief ballads and one great song, and a couple of very good ones. Only half the tracks are new, the other half are live versions of songs from the first album.  See review here

Love, Fear and the Time Machine: This is the album that shifted its position the most: it was fifth, but alas, over the years I have come to like it less and less. It is an oddball.  LFatTM is a rather more delicate and personal album — personal to Mariusz Duda that is — than any of the others, and with the exception of two great tracks, it just doesn’t work for me. See review here.

Shrine of New Generation Slaves: This is the most variable in quality of all the albums—there are a couple of excellent tracks, and alas a couple that are downright mediocre, something I regret to have to say about any Riverside song. The brilliant “Night Sessions” bonus tracks pull this album off the bottom. See review here.

Out of Myself: There is something about this album that keeps it from moving up higher in the ranks. I like it when I play it but I don’t get the urge to play it very often. Michał Łapaj had not yet joined the band, and so the sound is not yet “signature”; also, there are fewer (maybe only one) really stunning tracks than one generally finds on a Riverside album.  See review here.

Rapid Eye Movement: The songs here range from brilliant to unmemorable, but alas it is the unmemorable that dominate. They are good songs but for some reason they simply do not stick in my memory – rarely an earworm from this album.  However, the bonus disc is a revelation: these remixes and semi-experimental long instrumentals show a side of the band perhaps less appreciated than it should be. It is different enough from REM I to be almost a separate album. See review for REM here.

Memories in My Head: (EP) This EP represent the absolutely classic Riverside sound, in the form of three long, lovely proggy songs. If only the last one had fit in better….  Review is here.

ID.Entity: This album had really captured me in the months after it came out — there are some stunningly good moments, and it really was among the best albums of 2023. I do believe it encapsulates the entire history of the band in a brilliant way, and is enormously energetic. However, years later I realize that I play it much less than I originally expected to, and some tracks just did not stand up. A couple others though, have become among my favourites. Review is here

Second Life Syndrome: This is a glorious album, not quite at the top because it is a bit variable in quality, but the monumental title track is one of the best, truly inspired long prog epics ever recorded by anyone, ever.  Review here.

Wasteland: Riverside the trio, their first album as such, and with a whole new sound and feeling…and it is a massive accomplishment, from a band that has found their footing again.  It took me a while to come to the conclusion that it does not quite reach the inspirational heights of ADHD, and it edges ahead of SLS mostly because the guys are now much more experienced craftsmen and performers.  Review is here.

Anno Domini High Definition (ADHD): Ahhh yes, kick-ass progressive metal, a side of the band that surprised people I think, loud and raunchy and hard and relentless; in my mind the guys are at the absolute top of their game on this album. It was the first album for which they took a different approach to the recording of it, and boy did it work.  Wasteland comes close, but the tight conciseness of ADHD, and the epic genius of “Left Out” was just too high a bar to get over. Review here.

See also a discussion of the Reality Dream live album/DVD here.

 

The Final Entry: The Actual Album of the Year

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Lunatic Soul:  Walking on a Flashlight Beam

It was difficult to know what to do with this album. Clearly it is the number one album of my year, but it didn’t take too many listens to realize that this was an album I could not in good conscience stick into the same list with the other, mere music offerings – it was hardly fair to them. At any rate, since it transcends just about everything else I’ve heard—not only this year but maybe for the last decade, I decided to put it into its own category.   So yes, my list goes to eleven.   😀

The actual review for this album can be found here. Please read it if you want a detailed, somewhat rational take on it.

I have to admit, I was somewhat anxious about how this album was going to fit in with the other three Lunatic Soul albums. It is difficult to describe what this music means to me–hell I wouldn’t even call it “music”…whatever it is that is at the heart and soul of Lunatic Soul: the approach and sounds, the musical philosophy and vision…it absolutely enmeshes itself into me. It is essential like blood and bone and breath. I am astonished that something like this even exists out there, and abjectly grateful to whatever fates might be at work that I was able to find it (or that it found me…there is a case to be made for that).

But enough of that.

I needn’t have worried. WoaFB is different, but only in the details. The essence of Lunatic Soul has not changed, in fact maybe even more Lunatic Soul-ish…likely because its creator was more focused and it is a true solo album, with no dilution of vision through other people (yes, there is a drummer, but clearly Mariusz Duda and Wawrzyniec Dramowicz are on the same wavelength).

However…now I worry that if ever I am stranded on that Desert Island, forty percent of my album allocation is already accounted for. I wonder if I can pretend it is a single item….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1XbtU31KbU