This just in from the fine folks over at Inside Out Music:
FROST* – announce release of “Others – EP” on June 5, 2020
With FROST*’s latest album, “Falling Satellites”, dating back to 2016, it was about time mastermind Jem Godfrey teamed up with Nathan King and John Mitchell to continue forging daring and dynamic progressive music.
Completed already back in 2019, FROST* now announce the release of the stunning 32 minutes long “Others – EP”. Jem Godfrey states: “Others” is a 6 track EP containing 6 songs that were written at the time of the “Falling Satellites” album. Initially the idea was that “Falling Satellites” would be a double album, but it felt more focused and concise as a single album by the time we’d finished making it, so these half completed songs were put to one side. Now finished and mixed, they are ready to see the light of day!”
The EP will be released digitally on June 5, 2020 and will be released as part of the limited “13 Winters” anthology-artbook physically later this year.
A first track from the “Others – EP” will be released on May 22!
The track-list is below:
1. Fathers
2. Clouda
3. Exhibit A
4. Fathom
5. Eat
6. Drown
Furthermore, FROST* are putting finishing touches to their highly anticipated new studio album which is tentatively scheduled for a September release through InsideOutMusic.
ME: How did the collaboration with Alex Lifeson of Rush come into fruition?
We’ve been pals for decades so all I did was call him. The title track ETERNITY NOW was heavily influenced by my love of Rush so it seemed like the time to make the call. I figured if he was involved I wouldn’t have to explain myself later. I asked him to play a guitar solo (he agreed) but he also sent a number of overdubs that made the song even Rush-y-er(?) He’s a total sweetheart and a mentor. We love Lerxst!
AC: I put the record on the other day and I thought I made a mistake. It sounded like I’d grabbed a Rush record from 1988.
GJ: [Laughs] Make no mistake, my friend. That was not an accident! [Rush guitarist] Alex Lifeson is on the title track. He’s on the title track of my life and career trajectory. He was one of the first supporters of Big Sugar and one of the greatest mentors that I’ve had. And he’s such a down-to-earth chill guy. He saw us coming up, liked our music, and would do things like “Hey, man, here’s a double-neck guitar. Why don’t you take the Xanadu guitar and use it for a while?” Like, who does that?
So I texted him and I had to explain myself because it’s such a Rush knock-off. I got the Taurus Moog pedals in there and gave it the full Moving Pictures treatment. But he not only sent me a wicked guitar solo but a bunch of overdubs–acoustic guitars and banjos and all kinds of other production to put in the track. It got way Rushier. And I’m good with it.
The Opium Cartel returns with their new CD Valor, released on June 5, seven years after the release of their last CD Ardor. As a refresher course, The Opium Cartel is songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Jacob Holm-Lupo’s ‘vehicle for songs that capture a mix of sophisti-pop, dream pop, art-rock and synth pop’. Holm-Lupo is mainly known as the leader of White Willow, one of Scandanavia’s foremost progressive rock bands. On their third album The Opium Cartel lists influences that include a variety of predominantly 1980s sources, from The Blue Nile and Shriekback, via late Roxy Music to the prog-pop of 80s Alan Parsons Project and Camel. From the promo sheet provided ‘the period feel is amplified by use of exclusively hardware synthesizers iconic to the era, like the Oberheim Matrix-6 and Yamaha DX7’.
Holm-Lupo describes The Opium Cartel’s 3rd album as a record ‘about naïve but brave dreams, songs about the hubris and optimism of childhood and youth… and also about that bittersweet moment when you start to realize that things may be a little different than you imagined’.
The music is a bit bipolar in that the two long instrumental standout tracks, A Question of Re-Entry and A Maelstrom of Stars,
with Airbag’s Bjørn Riis on guitar, capture a very proggy, Parsons/Camel spaciness. The remainder of the tracks effectively capture the feel of the 80’s more reminiscent of Thomas Dolby, Dream Academy Cocteau Twins and The Thompson Twins with the heavy synth bass, electronic drums and ethereal vocals. Unlike much of that period’s music, melody is not sacrificed over texture. Featuring a variety of singers poses some risks but the songs blend together nicely, especially with the reverb and 80’s dream pop mix. The outstanding production and attention to detail shows that creating Valor was obviously a labor of love by Holm-Lupo. Ultimately it all comes together as a lovely tribute to a time long passed.
The diverse cast of musicians on Valor include Wobbler/White Willow keyboard player Lars Fredrik Frøislie on drums (!), Silje and Ole Huleboer on vocals and guitars/bass, and appearances by Bjørn Riis, Alexander Stenerud (who sang on White Wolf, the highlight of Ardor to these ears), Israeli singer Leah Marcu, and Jacob’s 13 year old daughter Ina A, who provides the beautiful lead vocal on Nightwings. The stunning cover by Glen Wexler (Van Halen, Rush) with assistance by Cirque du Soleil captures a woman jumping through a ring of fire.
On first listening I did not find Valor as engaging as Ardor, but after repeat plays I can say it has proven worthy of the effort. Beautiful songs like The Curfew Bell and Fairground Sunday provide a welcome relief from the gravity of our current world situation. The 80’s have always been a strange period musically, when even progressive bands like Genesis got caught up in the production values that are served up here on Valor. It is up to the listener to decide whether they want to revisit that musical period, but The Opium Cartel does a great job of capturing that more innocent time with outstanding musicians and excellent production. If you found any musical pleasure in that period Valor will provide you with an interesting and rewarding musical flashback.
We’ve all had the experience of mishearing song lyrics, sometimes spending years or decades with our strange, faulty interpretations. The best examples are well-known, and sometimes humorous, like Jimi Hendrix singing “‘Scuse me, while I kiss this guy”. Occasionally, the meaning of an entire song can be misconstrued; according to Bryan Adams, the title of the song “Summer of ’69” is a reference to the sexual position, information which, given the overall innocent and nostalgic vibe of the song, I choose to regard as disingenuous.
The song I’ve been most wrong about, though, also happens to be one of my all-time favorites—it earned that position even when I had a fuzzy idea (at best) of its content, and has maintained its rank even after the true nature of that content was made clear. Or at least, clearer.
One of the casualties of the digital revolution in music was a little thing called liner notes, and where a freshly pressed 1996 store-bought CD of Sing to God by the band Cardiacs might have provided song lyrics to puzzle over during those first exploratory listens, I discovered the band about 10 years later, via internet download— if I recall correctly, the album in question wasn’t even in print at the time. Listening to music mostly via iPod while walking or driving made finding a copy of the lyrics less of a priority; the thought only occurred to me in inconvenient places, and any mental note—”I really should look up these lyrics one of these days”—was promptly forgotten upon arrival at whatever destination.
Uriah Heep
• Very ‘Eavy …Very ‘Umble (1970)
• Salisbury (1971)
• Look at Yourself (1971)
• Demons and Wizards (1972)
• The Magician’s Birthday (1972)
• Sweet Freedom (1973)
• Wonderworld (1974)
Budgie
• Budgie (1971)
• Squawk (1972)
• Never Turn Your Back on a Friend (1973)
• In for the Kill! (1974)
Judas Priest
• Rocka Rolla (1974)
Scorpions
• Lonesome Crow (1972)
• Fly to the Rainbow (1974)
Flower Travellin Band
• Satori (1971)
• Made in Japan (1972)
• Make Up (1973)
Sir Lord Baltimore
• Kingdom Come (1970)
• Sir Lord Baltimore (1971)
Bang
• Bang (1972)
• Mother/Bow to the King (1972)
• Music (1973)
Alice Cooper
• School’s Out (1972)
• Billion Dollar Babies (1973)
• Muscle of Love (1973)
Blue Oyster Cult
• Blue Öyster Cult (1972)
• Tyranny and Mutation (1973)
• Secret Treaties (1974)
Granicus
• Granicus (1973)
Montrose
• Montrose (1973)
• Paper Money (1974)
Amboy Dukes (with Ted Nugent)
• Call of the Wild (recorded 1973)
• Tooth, Fang, and Claw (1974)
Aerosmith
• Aerosmith (1973)
• Get Your Wings (1974)
KISS
• KISS (1974)
Rush
• Rush (1974)
Pentagram
• First Daze Here (2001 release of 70s material)
Now, go do your homework! (Thus spake Progarchy.)
After you watch the above video, here’s a summary of the first lesson (also compiled by Gregory B. Sadler, Ph.D):
1970 – A Seminal Year For Heavy Metal
February 1970
Black Sabbath release Black Sabbath
June 1970
Deep Purple release Deep Purple In Rock
Uriah Heep release Very ‘Eavy Very ‘Umble
September 1970
Black Sabbath release Paranoid
October 1970
Led Zeppelin release Led Zeppelin III
UFO release UFO 1
September 1970
Sir Lord Baltimore release Kingdom Come
Other important developments and processes:
Jimi Hendrix dies, and Jimi Hendrix experience dissolves.
Budgie, Iron Claw, Thin Lizzy, Judas Priest, Blue Oyster Cult, Flower Travellin’ Band, Scorpions, Alice Cooper, Amboy Dukes are all playing and producing music, some of which is heavy metal.
Aerosmith, Necromandus, and Bang formed.
If you want to write a midterm exam, Progarchy invites you to reflect and then answer these two difficult questions:
Black Sabbath‘s eponymous 1970 debut might well be the ultimate Yer Metal is Olde entry. Besides being unquestionably metal, it’s also as Olde as Yer Metal can possibly get. Because, despite what a small minority of Coven and/or Blue Cheer fans might say, the release of Black Sabbath marks the birth of heavy metal itself as both a sound and a fully-formed aesthetic. (Some argue High Tide‘s 1969 debut, Sea Shanties is the actual birth of metal, and there is a wicked guitar tone on that album.) Infamously recorded in a single day, the album is more or less a live performance by a young band that was just starting to discover its own power.
If you doubt this album’s influence, just take a listen to the opening title track. That initial three-note riff — you’re hearing it in your head right now — informed everything that would follow, from Judas Priest to Metallica to the entire “doom” subgenre. Vocalist John “Ozzy” Osbourne then enters with an anguished vocal counterpoint, which completely separates this track from any blues or jazz that preceded it. The faster section of this song could be considered a precursor to NWoBHM and eventually thrash metal, although Sabbath would pioneer that more thoroughly with songs like “Symptom Of The Universe” later on. I don’t even need to mention that the song literally mentions Satan by name, decades before black metal bands were casually name-checking the big red guy.
The rest of the album, while not quite as terrifying, is still a fascinating listen. …
Back in March, something cool showed up online: an official Porcupine Tree Bandcamp page. Today, Bandcamp spilled the beans to the world by featuring Porcupine Tree on their Daily blog. (Though the snarky tone of the listicle left something to be desired — as is all too often the case. Oh well, all publicity is good publicity, right?).
So what’s on Bandcamp for your listening and downloading pleasure?
XM and XM2, recorded live in studio for satellite radio. XM, recorded in 2002, focuses on songs from the then-new In Absentia, while 2003’s XM2 delves into the back catalog.
Back on March 20, Bandcamp waived its share of all sales, in order to support artists whose livelihoods were effected by the COVID-19 pandemic (especially because of cancelled live shows and tours). The results were astonishing: $4,300,000 in sales of downloads, CDs, LPs and merch, 15 times a normal Friday’s take.
On May 1, June 5, and July 3 (the first Friday of each month), we’re waiving our revenue share for all sales on Bandcamp, from midnight to midnight PDT on each day.
(Over 150 artists and labels are offering discounts, exclusive items, merch bundles, and more this Friday.)
It may sound simple, but the best way to help artists is with your direct financial support, and we hope you’ll join us through the coming months as we work to support artists in this challenging time.
And, in case you’re wondering, there’s tons of recorded goodness available at Bandcamp from these Progarchy-favored artists:
The Opium Cartel returns with their new CD Valor, released on June 5, seven years after the release of their last CD Ardor. As a refresher course, The Opium Cartel is songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Jacob Holm-Lupo’s ‘vehicle for songs that capture a mix of sophisti-pop, dream pop, art-rock and synth pop’. Holm-Lupo is mainly known as the leader of White Willow, one of Scandanavia’s foremost progressive rock bands. On their third album The Opium Cartel lists influences that include a variety of predominantly 1980s sources, from The Blue Nile and Shriekback, via late Roxy Music to the prog-pop of 80s Alan Parsons Project and Camel. From the promo sheet provided ‘the period feel is amplified by use of exclusively hardware synthesizers iconic to the era, like the Oberheim Matrix-6 and Yamaha DX7’.
Progarchy 