Robert Fripp, Haken, Caravan, Fairport Convention, Kansas, Caligula’s Horse, Glass Hammer and more
PROG 110
INTRO
IF IT’S OUT THERE, IT’S IN HERE
STEVE HOWE EXPLAINS THE MEANING OF LOVE ON NEW CD Yes icon tried to avoid writing songs for new solo album Love Is – and half-succeeded. It took Steve Howe several years to work out how his song Love Is A River needed to work – and once he’d done that, his new solo album, Love Is, quickly took shape around it. The 10-track follow-up to 2011’s Time (not counting two more records in his Homebrew series of demos and rearrangements) contains five instrumentals and five songs, and features Yes bandmate Jon Davison on backing vocals and bass, plus son Dylan Howe on drums. “It covers a reflective three or four years where a lot of things happened – a lot of highs and a few lows,” Howe Senior says. “I let it mature like a good cheese; I wanted it to reflect some strength, some colour and some experience. I’m very happy to spend many years developing a song, although I’m not working on it all the time. I redesign it, leave it, come back to it until: ‘Now I know what this is!’” Once he’d realised Love Is A River was the “essential track” he’d been looking for, he arranged the other pieces around it and named the album after it. “I daren’t start with it,” he says, explaining why
Mystery Man: Steve Howe believes songs lose their power if they have no mystique.
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“It’s not about blowing people’s socks off, it’s about luring them into the soundscape.”
progmagazine.com
This month, Intro was compiled by
STEVE ROTHERY GETS SPACED OUT
Marillion guitarist to launch crowdfunder for new solo album, Revontulet.
Space man: Rothery collaborated with astronaut Neil Armstrong’s son on Revontulet.
Marillion guitarist Steve Rothery is inviting fans to take part in another crowdfunding campaign for the release of his second solo album Revontulet. He says lead track La Silla, which was launched in April, is a “good picture” of the space themed album as a whole, which he describes as “a little bit cinematic – it’s got a bit of Vangelis, a bit of Pink Floyd.” The roots of the LP go back a few years to when he visited astronomical observatories in Chile. He’s always had a love of space – “I suppose I’m a Trekkie,” he says – and has also collaborated with Rick Armstrong, astronaut Neil’s son, who plays bass. The aim is to release Revontulet in 2021 on InsideOut, but Rothery admits the schedule is up in the air as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.“My plan for the launch is to have playbacks at different planetariums around Europe,” he says. “I’ve got a launch event set for the Hamburg planetarium, whenever it’s going to happen.” In the meantime, he’ll continue to record the LP in his home studio – something which has given him a focus as the UK went into lockdown in March. “When I’m not working on the new Marillion album I’m in my studio working on this,” he says. “I don’t want to release anything until it’s ready. But it’s turning into something very special.” The crowdfunding campaign for Revontulet will launch on September 28 via www.steverothery.com. CC WILL IRELAND/FUTURE OWNS
he chose instrumental Fulcrum instead: “I wanted to introduce the concepts – It’s not about blowing people’s socks off, it’s about luring them into the soundscape.” Howe had actually tried to stop writing lyrics, he admits: “I like tunes. Sometimes I’ve told myself, ‘Don’t write any more songs – I can write much more music if I stop writing songs…’ And then they come, and I think, ‘I kinda like that,’ and then I’m off!” But you won’t hear the vocals pushed out in front of the other parts, as you would in many other artists’ output. “There’s various placements,” he reflects. “Freddie Mercury didn’t always put his vocals up. Frank Sinatra, and even John Wetton in Asia, his voice is really out there. That’s not how bands mix, so much… I think you do lose something with that. The voice is another instrument and it’s a very crucial thing how much you protrude, or don’t protrude. In the way my voice is used as an instrument, my guitars are used as voices.” Howe harks back to his first decade as a member of Yes, commenting: “We had a great 10 years and it educated me not only about how to perform songs, but about why you write music, why you aspire to put lyrics down. There’s ways of using art to, not disguise, but to rephrase something, so it’s not blatantly obvious what it is. A song without a level of mystique isn’t really a song. “You think about Wichita Lineman by Jimmy Webb – it’s not perfectly obvious what’s going on but it’s interesting. I like those kinds of songs more than in-your-face songs. Take one of my songs. You’ll say, ‘What’s this about?’ Well, it’s a love song, in a way, but it’s also a song reflecting the sense of life that I get.” The one thing Howe hopes does come across clearly is that he’s “a guy with a deep love for music.” Yes rescheduled their 2020 tour dates for next year amid the coronavirus pandemic, and Howe laughs when asked what he’s planning to do in the meantime. “We’ve all been going through moments when we wonder, ‘Am I alright?’ Not only, ‘Is the one I love alright?,’ But, ‘Am I alright?’ And it’s a doomladen question because nobody’s alright!” He tells fans to expect to see him online, spreading the word about Love Is – “once I find ways to avoid being totally predictable!” Love Is will be released on July 31 via BMG. Go to www.stevehowe.com for more details. MK
Lin Bensley Chris Cope Jerry Ewing Eleanor Goodman Rob Hughes Martin Kielty Rhodri Marsden Emily MacNevin Alison Reijman Natasha Scharf Nick Shilton Francesca Tyer Phil Weller
PRESS/ANNE-MARIE FORKER
Prog news updated daily online!
NICK D’VIRGILIO REVEALS HIS INVISIBLE CONCEPT
His album features many musical flavours and guests. Drummer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Nick D’Virgilio releases Invisible, his second solo album, via English Electric on June 26. The storyline came about when D’Virgilio (Big Big Train, Spock’s Beard, Genesis, Tears for Fears) worked for Cirque du Soleil. “I was feeling invisible when I started, but that didn’t last long,” he explained. “It turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me – but at the beginning, that’s where my brain was at.” Special guests include Jordan Rudess, Paul Gilbert, Tony Levin, Jonas Reingold and Jem Godfrey. Recording was split between D’Virgilio’s hometown of Fort Wayne, Indiana, and London’s Abbey Road Studios – “another dream come true.” He adds: “It has its proggy moments, but I think it is more of a straight rock record. I’m really curious to see how everyone reacts to it.” Circus was an. Go to www.nickdvirgilio.com for more info and ay with the Running aw inspiration for D’Virgilio read the Prog review on page 99. AR
After several piano releases and notwithstanding the coronavirus, Rick Wakeman dives headlong back into prog with forthcoming all-instrumental album The Red Planet. Words: Nick Shilton Portaits: Lee Wilkinson
C
oronavirus has generally proved a great leveller. But there are exceptions to every rule, as evidenced by music mogul David Geffen tweeting injudiciously from his Rising Sun superyacht in the Grenadines, while Richard Branson shamelessly
“Lee [Pomeroy] said to me that he can hear Yes in some of The Red Planet. Well I was part of the band, so there’s always things I’ll do that will sound like Yes. And I’m not worried about that one iota.” 28 progmagazine.com
Locked Down But Not Out sought a British government bailout for Virgin Airlines from his Necker Island tax haven in the Caribbean. However, Rick Wakeman has been subject to coronaviral levelling. Not only was an April launch at the National Space Centre in Leicester for his forthcoming all-instrumental album The Red Planet kiboshed, but a house
The master at work.
move has also been delayed. Hence his pithy verdict on the impact of Covid-19: “It’s been a nightmare artistically and work-wise.” Wakeman has been confined to his current barracks, save for grocery shopping for himself, his wife Rachel and his mother-in-law. However the keyboardist hasn’t been using Skype, FaceTime, Zoom etc. “My phone is so old that nothing works on it. The automatic spellcheck is a nightmare. It turns ‘pianos’ into ‘penis’. So I’ve had a few strange texts go out that maybe shouldn’t have gone out. Especially to the vicar…” Perhaps surprisingly given the array of keyboards that surround him onstage, beyond the proficiency of using Sibelius music notation software, Wakeman doesn’t regard himself as technically minded. His sometime
English Chamber Choir collaborator Guy Protheroe instructed him swiftly on the rudiments of Sibelius. “Guy came over and said, ‘Forget the book’, and it’s been great. I just use the book for reference occasionally. I’m not very good at reading instructions. Do you know any cook who’s [got] good looking at cookery books?” he asks rhetorically. “As to how keyboards work, not a clue!” he laughs. “I have a wonderful technician and engineer. When we get something new, Erik Jordan comes over and doesn’t even look at the books. He spends half an hour and then shows me. If I’m shown how something works, it’s much better than me trying to read it in a book.” Having recently celebrated his 71st birthday, Wakeman has seen plenty of significant world events and disasters but is clear where the Covid19 crisis ranks in terms of impact.
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PROG… WITH A CAPITAL
P
That’s how Rick Wakeman describes his new studio album, The Red Planet. He’s now released more than 90 solo records, which cover a wide variety of musical styles. We went through his back catalogue and picked out the ones that put the ‘P’ into prog. Words: Paul Elliott, Jerry Ewing, Jo Kendall, Dave Ling, Dom Lawson, Grant Moon, Chris Roberts, Henry Yates Portrait: Kevin Nixon
unashamedly pompous. And in May 2009 came a final, fitting postscript, when Wakeman performed the whole album – plus, fittingly, Defender Of The Faith – at Hampton Court Palace to mark the 500th anniversary of Henry’s accession to the throne. A knighthood surely beckons. PE
THE SIX WIVES OF HENRY VIII (A&M, 1973)
Wakeman’s second solo release (his first being 1971’s disowned Piano Vibrations). His record company A&M initially dismissed it as ‘unsellable’. The reviews, as Wakeman recalled, were ‘stinking’. And yet The Six Wives Of Henry VIII – a grandiose instrumental concept album fusing progressive rock, classical and jazz, and based on English royal history – would become a multi-million-selling hit. And over time, it has come to be regarded by fans, and by Wakeman himself, as one of his defining works. An extraordinary piece – dazzling in its breadth and complexity, rich in melodic finesse, audacious and 34 progmagazine.com
JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH (A&M, 1974)
People often cite the explosive run of releases from both Yes and ELP in the early 70s as prime examples of the mesmerising talent on display within progressive rock at the time. Prog would be tempted at add Wakeman (who of course also features on Yes’ spectacular run of Fragile, Close To The
Edge and Tales From Topographic Oceans), whose own run from Six Wives… to Myths And Legends… is equally groundbreaking. Sandwiched in between is what many consider to be the jewel in Wakeman’s crown. Inspired by being taken to see Prokofiev’s Peter And The Wolf as a child, work on Jules Verne’s 1864 novel actually pre-dates Six Wives…, but money for such an audaciously lavish production was always going to be an issue. “I had to mortgage and sell nearly everything I owned in order to make this album as I only had £4,000 from A&M to pay towards it,” Wakeman says. “In fact that is one of the reasons it was recorded live as I just couldn’t afford to record it in the studio.” Despite the financial hassle, the fact there are audible errors and even a wrong section of The Battle is sung at one point and A&M in the UK refused to release it (the US arm of the label came to Wakeman’s rescue), Wakeman had the last laugh, getting his only solo UK No.1 album (it was also A&M’s first ever No.1), selling millions of records and receiving an Ivor Novello and Grammy for his efforts. Wakeman returned to the album in 2012, rerecording it and adding back in the 18 minutes lost to original time constraints. A classic without a doubt. JE
“The Six Wives Of Henry VIII is an extraordinary piece of work – dazzling in its breadth and complexity, rich in melodic finesse, audacious and unashamedly pompous.”
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The Cockroach King made them, now they’re breaking him. Prog catches up with Haken to learn all about their ambitious new album, which concludes the prog metal titans’ definitive decade. Words: Phil Weller Images: Max Taylor Grant
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mbition has never been something that Haken have lacked. Ever since 2010’s Aquarius introduced the British progressive metal act to the world, they’ve striven for each new step to be bigger, bolder and braver than the last. Those selfperpetuating designs have put them at the pinnacle of the contemporary progressive metal scene, where they
Haken: ’roach killers.
have remained for the last 10 years. Visions quickly followed in late 2011 and The Mountain, released two years later, married their technical virtuosity with raw, emotional lyrics, that showed a vulnerability making their complex music hugely relatable. It was the record that sent a fast-rising act skyrocketing. They haven’t let up since, producing two more critically acclaimed records in synth-loving
Affinity and 2018’s forceful Vector. Now, as their first decade together draws to a close, the band are unleashing their most ambitiously grandiose statement yet. Their sixth full-length release, Virus, marks the completion of an arcing narrative that first began to unravel seven years ago and one that has consumed the band, creatively, for the past three years. Staying true to
Haken’s multicoloured plumage, the album pushes their versatile vitality further than ever before. “Virus is a continuation of our last album, Vector,” reveals guitarist and chief songwriter Richard Henshall. “The narrative comes from one of the tracks on The Mountain called Cockroach King, which is a song that our fans seem to really like. We wanted to provide a back story to the protagonist we
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THE MOST INFLUENTIAL
ALBUMS
IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF
PROGRESSIVE
ROCK 64 progmagazine.com
Over the last six decades, progressive rock has undergone a great evolution. It’s not only changed sound but also its form and appearance. But which albums have been the most important in its progression? Prog has gone through its music collection to discover the albums that helped develop prog’s sound. Words: Jerry Ewing
B
efore we start, a word about what this list of albums is, and what it probably isn’t. It’s not a list of the best prog albums of all time. Although many of these records would sit quite happily in such a list. Rather it is a list of albums that we here at Prog, along with musicians as diverse as Steven Wilson, Pete Trewavas, Carl Palmer, Mike Portnoy, Magenta’s Robert Reed, Mastodon, Tim Bowness, Ihsahn, Alan Reed and more have debated and see as being pivotal in the ongoing development of progressive music. So albums that probably inspired the originators of progressive music. Many of the high points of the early classic era of the genre. But also, as progressive music has developed over the years, other albums force themselves into the equation, which we think at least makes the whole list an even more intriguing proposition. Not simply great records, but those that have acted as a signpost to where the music would inevitably head. Of course, how you react to the list depends on what you think progressive music is. Some might say it’s easier to discuss what progressive rock is not, but
“What we do have in common with those bands is the freedom to do what we want, musically.” Colin Greenwood, Radiohead
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Caravan In The Land Of Grey And Pink In September 1970 Caravan went into the studio to begin recording their third album. In December they emerged with what would be not only the greatest album of their career, but also a progressive rock classic. In an article that originally appeared in Prog issue 8, the band reveal the story behind the making of In The Land Of Grey And Pink. Words: Paul Henderson
T
he feelgood British summer of 1970 may have been one of hot, sunny days, with Mungo Jerry’s ubiquitous In The Summertime the defining song of its soundtrack, but it was also a year in which, along with the good vibes and warm zephyrs, some particularly chill winds blew through the rock music scene. More than half a million revellers had smoked, toked, tripped and generally let it all hang out at the sunkissed Isle of Wight Festival with a stellar line-up that featured The Doors, Free, The Who and Jimi Hendrix. But no matter how strong the IoW’s Yang, it was crushed by the Yin of events that included The Beatles breaking up and, on September 18, the bombshell that was Hendrix’s death. On the upside in 1970, the 747 airplane had its first commercial flight, the soar-away Sun introduced the Page 3 Girl… and Caravan recorded their third album. A four-piece from the sleepy cathedral city of Canterbury, decidedly English progressive rock band Caravan were major players in what came to be known as the Canterbury Scene. With three strong songwriters and two contrasting lead vocalists, Caravan had released two albums of highly original, inventive, accomplished and engaging music, yet outside the coterie of Canterbury Scene fans they remained largely unknown, their records acclaimed but not selling in numbers that would enable them to swap the out-of-date shelf at Tesco for the food hall at Harrods.
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Canterbury Scene touchstone, In The Land Of Grey And Pink.
“I was in a club called the Beehive and I’d had a little smoke. They put the album on very loud and I thought, ‘Wow! This sounds really good!’” Dave Sinclair Caravan were arguably at a crossroads in late 1970. They may have been talented, but they were also skint. In fact their finances had improved little since two years earlier when, with not much more than fluff in their pockets, they’d spent the summer living in tents, happy campers until autumn’s falling temperatures forced them to seek shelter crashing with friends. It was a difficult time for the Canterbury Scene’s de facto leaders.
Cash-poor they might have been, but they were rich musically in terms of ideas and creativity. So much so that, after driving their van down to London and lugging their equipment into the creaky Decca Studios in Broadhurst Gardens, West Hampstead one warm September day in 1970, they emerged one cold December morning from the smoky, darkened cocoon of AIR studios onto Oxford Street clutching the master tapes of what would be not only the greatest album of their career, but also a touchstone album of the Canterbury Scene and a progressive rock classic: In The Land Of Grey And Pink. With their previous album, If I Could Do It All Over Again, I’d Do It All Over You, having been released earlier that year, there had been precious little time to write material for the new record. Much of the last one had been written by guitarist/vocalist Pye Hastings, which meant he now had little left in terms of fully formed songs. The only complete song he contributed to the new album was the jaunty Love To Love You, although he did, as did all of them, contribute ideas and bits and pieces for other people’s songs. Hastings having written the lion’s share of If I Could Do It All Over… (and the band’s self-titled debut in ’68) also meant the others had material in their lockers. Bassist/vocalist Richard Sinclair brought along the dreamy, exquisite Winter Wine (“probably the best song Richard has ever written,” say both Hastings and keyboard player Dave Sinclair), along with the song that became the title track, and the bouncy Group Girl, later changed to Golf Girl and chosen to open the album. The Girl in question was Richard’s soon-to-be wife Trisha, who in the finished lyric became ‘Pat, and we sat… under a tree’. “I believe we had all the music for the album before we went into the studio,” recalls Dave Sinclair now, “although I think some of the lyrics were left until the very last moment. In those days we always used to write the music first and the lyrics came later. On my Nine Feet Underground I wrote the lyrics for the Disassociation part and Richard sang that. For the second part, Love’s A Friend, I was having great trouble with the lyrics, and Pye helped me out quite considerably and he sang the song. Also, it was a higher part, and Pye had a higher voice than Richard. “With Nine Feet Underground they were individual pieces, but with continually playing them through, and because each piece was only about five minutes long or something, I found it quite interesting to join bits up. I think it evolved, really. And this idea of doing one long number, I’d completely sorted it out well before we went into the
PRESS
REASSESSING TREASURES FROM A BYGONE ERA...
At the top of their tree! Caravan, L-R: Pye Hastings, Richard Sinclair, Richard Coughlan, Dave Sinclair.
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SIMON NICOL Every month we get inside the mind of one of the biggest names in music. This issue, it’s Simon Nicol. Along with Richard Thompson, Ashley Hutchings and Shaun Frater, the guitarist formed Fairport Convention in 1967 and is now the only original member in the current line-up. The progressive folk group, who recently celebrated their 50th anniversary, have just released a new studio album, Shuffle And Go. Here Nicol talks about the band’s humble beginnings and their role as musical pioneers. Words: Paul Sexton
W
ithin weeks of enjoying the renewed communal experience of a Fairport Convention gig on their winter tour, the very idea of such a gathering seemed as steeped in time as some of the band’s influences. Folk music is, by its very name, of the people and for the people, and like many of life’s
speak, forming an early liaison with Ashley Hutchings that led to the group’s birth, with Richard Thompson and fleeting early drummer Shaun Frater, in 1967. A mere 69 years old, guitarist and vocalist Nicol now looks back on an aggregate of more than 40 years as a Fairport, in three terms with one of British music’s most noble and, it turns out, indestructible institutions. The current line-up, in which he serves with Dave Pegg, Ric Sanders, Chris Leslie and Gerry Conway, have been together since 1998. Except that Nicol doesn’t tend to look back. For all pleasures, it’s of Fairport’s undisputed rather less fun place in the vanguard of in isolation. progressive folk, they Thankfully, before the social . continue to regard their Go d an fle uf m, Sh next performance and drawbridge was The latest albu record as their most important. pulled up, there Such rigour, coupled with was still the opportunity for a collective sense of wonder about a post-tour face-to-face in what they can yet achieve, have London with one of Fairport’s resulted in a new beacon in their co-founding originals. Simon bespoke discography, the utterly Nicol was one of those who was there before the beginning, so to delightful Shuffle And Go album.
“We took the right fork in life, not to commercial success or any kind of adulation, but to a career path, which is undeniable now. I’m not looking for another job, it’s official.”
Fairport Convention in 1967, L-R, back row: Martin Lamble, Richard Thompson, Judy Dyble, Simon Nicol. Front: Ashley Hutchings, Iain Matthews.
Gazing in admiration at Fairport’s London show at Union Chapel, it felt like a measure of your pride in Shuffle And Go that the new album was so extensively showcased. The feeling on stage, and the freshness, [means] that we managed to put 10 new songs in the set. Albeit two of them have been mainstays for 18 months
PRESS/FAIRPORT CONVENTION ARCHIVE
PRESS/FAIRPORT CONVENTION ARCHIVE
After those triumphant winter dates, further opportunities to showcase the LP have inevitably been shuttered, as has their annual backyard beanfeast, Cropredy Festival. Happily, that’s been successfully transported a year down the line, with the entire bill intact, and now glows like a nightlight in next year’s calendar (August 12-14, 2021, to be precise). Meanwhile, Nicol sat down with Prog for some gentle pondering of Fairport’s past, present and future.
Simon Nicol: “Not looking for another job.�
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Edited by Dave Everley prog.reviews@futurenet.com
New spins…
HAKEN Who says sequels are never as good as the originals? The UK prog kings pick up from where 2018’s Vector left off – and serve up a modern masterpiece in the process. Words: Philip Wilding Illustration: Mark Leary
I
t was mathematician ET Bell who said that time makes fools of us all, though history will surely judge Haken’s appositely titled sixth album as being so on the money it’s uncanny. Virus was written on their last tour and will no doubt be best enjoyed in lockdown. And while Prog doesn’t wish seclusion on anyone, it’s probably best you digest the latest Haken album while consumed by concentration; there’s a lot to take in. Never backwards in coming forwards creatively, Haken have changed lanes almost at will before coming to fruition with 2013’s dizzying The Mountain. That they chose to follow that with the playful electronica on the 80s tinged Affinity album three years later says as much about their self-confidence as it does their desire not to be boxed in. In 2018 they released Vector and redefined what Haken were again: a dense mix of classic and contemporary nods to prog’s florid history and now, with an album mostly written and recorded on tour in support of Devin Townsend across Europe and North America, they’ve rewritten their story again. Simply put: this is Haken’s best record yet. Much like their former touring partner, Haken have redefined their own musical parameters by refusing to have any. “Since releasing The Mountain,” drummer Ray Hearne says of this record, “one question has been asked of us time and time again: ‘Who is the Cockroach King?”. Which seems a curious question at best, but for those that missed it, Cockroach King was one of the standout tracks on The Mountain. Lyrical and complex, with some lovely vocal interplay, think pastoral folk prog with booster rockets and you’re close. That reference to The Mountain isn’t the only callback here. It soon becomes clear just how closely entwined Virus is with the previous Vector album. Where Vector focused on a catatonic, institutionalised patient in the 1950s, Virus moves the story along a full
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Virus INSIDEOUT
Simply put: this is Haken’s best record yet. 20 years, haunting the now empty corridors of the Mountview Institution run to wrack and ruin. There’s no describing the breadth of the storytelling on display, or the farreaching arc Virus describes. You simply need to make space when you’re making music on this scale. Opener Prosthetic, which, we’re assured, bridges the gap between this album and its predecessor, places the virus in sharp relief, detailing its crushing effects – biological, psychological, technological, and that’s just plucking three from the (infected) air – in a scintillating six minutes of sheer brute force. Don’t be fooled, Virus travels from the ridiculous (sounding) to the sublime, and touches on most of the spectrum in-between, but they open with an intensity that would make Pantera stop and stare.
Proving that the sum is greater than its parts, Virus comes in roughly two halves, five songs leading to the five-part Messiah Complex suite. The album finally rounded off by the lilting musical footnote that is Only Stars. Fans of The Mountain will faint away like a Victorian woman in a tight corset given the familiar musical tropes that record has revived for Messiah Complex, not least the glorious nod to Gentle Giant during Messiah Complex IV: The Sect, if Gentle Giant had hired Steve Vai to perform the guitar parts. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. As a great man once said, it’s the journey, not the destination and, quite simply, what a trip Virus is. This writer wishes that Tool might have managed to write a song like Invasion to lift their underwhelming Fear Inoculum album: stuttering and jagged and filled with dread, yet still soaring and full of grace. If it weren’t for the sprawling Messiah Complex, the listener would be hard pushed to find a better track on Virus than the 10-minute Carousel. It begins with a remote vocal before growing exponentially until, as was once said of TS Eliot, it floods the frame. Even as it eddies, rises and falls, it still holds on to its structure: it’s still definable as a song. That’s quite a skill when a tune covers as much terrain as this. That they manage to dwarf even this with the magical Messiah Complex is testimony to Haken’s skill and sheer bravura. Even more so when you consider this record was written and arranged in a makeshift studio on their tourbus. Trust Prog when we say you don’t often stumble across gold in a tour bus lounge, unless you consider old socks some kind of manna. And it’s a ceaseless kind of magic, a universe in which one can get lost time and time again as the story reveals itself across prog totems old and new. Rich and vivid in idea and execution, suffused with melody and filled with light and shade, all consuming, as it draws the listener in, shedding light on another unseen world.
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