10 January 2023: Fruupp; dEUS; The Great Old Ones

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From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website
Psychedelic Paul      5 stars 

With a bizarre name like FRUUPP, you might imagine this five-piece band are some obscure Krautrock outfit from deep in the heart of Germany, but no, they're some obscure Belfast-based outfit from deep in the heart of Northern Ireland. They have four albums to their credit with this album "Future Legends" (1972) being their first. Later albums were "Seven Secrets" (1974), "The Prince of Heaven's Eyes" (1974), and "Modern Masquerades" (1975). A fifth album was planned for 1976, but due to poor record sales and the emerging Punk/New Wave movement, Fruupp were consigned to the prog history books when they broke up at the end of the year. Progressive Rock has triumphed over the shortlived Punk-Rock era in the long run though, because Fruupp have gone on to become "Future Legends" in their time, with their marvellous brand of mellifluous melodic prog experiencing a well-deserved resurgence of interest on the Internet. The 2009 CD remaster of "Future Legends" includes the bonus track, "On a Clear Day", which classical buffs may recognise as being a proggy reworking of "Jupiter" from Gustav Holst's "Planets Suite"


"Future Legends" opens with the title track, a short classical piece of music which acts as a prelude to "Decision", a lively and rumbunctious number that gallups along nicely with a pounding rhythm and builds up to an impressively rousing finale. An awesome opening to the album. "As Day Breaks with Dawn" follows next, with a melodic classically-inspired opening, which breaks out into a powerful thrumming Genesis-like number with the singer sounding remarkably like Peter Gabriel. Yes, we're definitely in Genesis territory here, with a somewhat heavier sound, and very good it is too. Onwards now to Track 4 and "Graveyard Epistle", a song which begins as a melodic ballad before breaking out into some very proggy, heavy and intense riffing. In true prog fashion, there are constant changes of tempo, staccato breaks and a few key changes thrown in too, to keep the listener entertained and enthralled. We're halfway through the album now and this is sounding very good indeed!


Side Two opens with "Lord of the Incubus". It's a grand-sounding title and the music is impressively grand too, Again, it sounds like a song Genesis could have recorded in their classic prog years. There's a thumping rhythm section and the guitarist is really in his element here as he demonstrates his virtuosity with some masterly soloing. Track 6 "Olde Tyme Future" has a more sedate pace, with some beautifully melodic keyboard motifs. The cryptic lyrics are shrouded in mystery but with music this good, who cares about the lyrics anyway!? And now we come to the penultimate and longest song on the album, "Song for a Thought". It's a seven and a half minute long magnum opus which opens in fine rollicking style and then transposes into a laid-back mellow and melodic groove in the middle section. before the resounding and reverberant grand finale, which might just blow your socks off. It's melodic, it's dramatic, and it'll leave you feeling euphoric. The final song is a brief and gentle vocal reprise of the classical title track which opened the album. It's a perfect ending to a magical album full of proggy tales of mystery and imagination.


This is a very impressive debut album from this Northern Irish band that's likely to appeal to fans of the classic Peter Gabriel years of Genesis. It's hard to pick out a highlight of the album, because "Future Legends" is full to the brim with great songs. If you're looking for a band with the musical talent and melodic finesse of Genesis with a somewhat heavier edge, then you'll be in prog heaven with this superb album. This prog masterpiece is such a delight to listen to that you may be inspired to give Fruupp's following three albums a spin too. A must-have album for any discerning collector of classic British prog.

Psychedelic Paul | 5/5 | 2019-12-3

      

Keep You Close is the sixth studio album by Belgian rock band Deus. It was released in Belgium on 17 September 2011, in mainland Europe on 19 September and in the United Kingdom on 3 October. On its first day of release, the album was certified gold in Belgium for sales of 10,000 copies.[9] It was eventually certified platinum on 7 October 2011, denoting sales in excess of 20,000 copies                                                                                Keep You Close Review

                                                                by Jon O'Brien

More cinematic, melodic, and mellow than their usual experimental indie pop output, Keep You Close is the sixth studio album from one of Belgium's biggest musical exports, dEUS. Compared to the likes of Elbow, Tindersticks, and Broadcast, the follow-up to 2008's Vantage Point features the single "Constant Now" and two tracks featuring guest vocals from former Afghan Whigs frontman Greg Dulli ("Twice [We Survive]," "Dark Sets In"). 

 

Cthulhu is the priest or leader of the Old Ones, a species that came to Earth from the stars before human life arose. The Old Ones went dormant, and their city slipped under Earth’s crust beneath the Pacific Ocean. They communicated with humans by telepathy, and, in hidden corners of the world, uncivilized people remembered and worshipped Cthulhu in rites described as loathsome. These groups had statues of Cthulhu that seemed to be made of materials not found on Earth and chanted the phrase “Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn” (“In his house at R’lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming”). When conditions are right, the city will rise, and, with the help of the eternal Cthulhu cult, Cthulhu will awaken and again rule the world.


These Great Old Ones, Castro continued, were not composed altogether of flesh and blood. They had shape—for did not this star-fashioned image prove it? — but that shape was not made of matter. When the stars were right, They could plunge from world to world through the sky; but when the stars were wrong, They could not live. But although They no longer lived, They would never really die. They all lay in stone houses in Their great city of R’lyeh, preserved by the spells of mighty Cthulhu for a glorious resurrection when the stars and the earth might once more be ready for Them. But at that time some force from outside must serve to liberate Their bodies. The spells that preserved Them intact likewise prevented Them from making an initial move, and They could only lie awake in the dark and think whilst uncounted millions of years rolled by. They knew all that was occurring in the universe, but Their mode of speech was transmitted thought. Even now They talked in Their tombs. When, after infinities of chaos, the first men came, the Great Old Ones spoke to the sensitive among them by moulding their dreams; for only thus could Their language reach the fleshly minds of mammals.

H.P. Lovecraft: "The Call of Cthulhu"
 

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FreeForm Radio thanks Raffaele for providing us with a copy of this excellent release.

Special thanks for the collaboration to Mario Lino Stancati (voice and electric guitar), Alexandros Magkos, a.k.a. Grim Machine (percussion, electronics, voice).

Mastered by Raffaele Pezzella (Sonologyst)
Artwork by MrZarono
deviantart.com/mrzarono/gallery
© 2023. All rights reserved
ambient dark ambient dark chamber drone industrial noise Italy

03 January 2023: The Aaron Clift Experiment;

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FreeForm is please to open the new year with the exciting new release from The Aaron Clift Experiment.  This is an outstanding album for opening the new year, prog-style!

 Austin, Texas One of the most eagerly awaited prog albums of 2023 will be released on January 6 by The Aaron Clift Experiment. Titled “The Age of Misinformation, the band’s 4th album is a conceptual work about the destructive power of lies and the search for truth in the face of overwhelming odds.

 
Band founder, Aaron Clift, explains: "During the COVID lockdown of 2020 - 2021, my friends, colleagues, and country went through an incredibly challenging time, and I knew that I had to say something about it. ‘The Age of Misinformation’ is The Aaron Clift Experiment’s document of that era.”

 
In addition to its lyrical ambition and emotional resonance, the album marks a high point for the band’s creativity - featuring everything from explosive, hard rocking songs, to gorgeous ballads, to multi-layered vocal writing that would make Queen blush!  Two songs explore symphonic music with a guest string quartet, and the album’s lead single, “Bet on Zero,” is an epic big band jazz/blues fusion collaboration with 7-piece Austin horn ensemble, Big Wy’s Brass Band.

 
Aaron notes: “For ‘The Age of Misinformation,’ we wanted to do more of everything: record music that was more intricate, more melodic, and more diverse than anything we had done before. I’m really happy with how we pulled it off, but above all, I love how the album explores a concept that reflects the events of our current world. There are songs
all about frustration with the crazy state of politics, but there's also a renewed sense of optimism in other songs - knowing that there's always a light at the end of the cave."
 

Formed in 2012, The Aaron Clift Experiment is a multi-faceted band that blends influences from classic rock (Rush, Pink Floyd, King Crimson),modern rock (Porcupine Tree, Opeth), jazz, and classical - all anchored by a dedication to high-quality songwriting and musicianship. Progradar has described the group as "one of the most impressive progressive acts currently on the scene.

 
www.aaronclift.com
www.facebook.com/aaroncliftmusic
www.youtube.com/aaroncliftmusic
www.instagram.com/aaroncliftmusic

 

The Aaron Clift Experiment:
Aaron Clift: vocals, keyboards
Anthony Basini: guitar, backing vocals
Clif Warren: bass
Pablo Ranlett-López: drums, percussion

  FreeForm thanks Aaron Clift for provididng us with a copy of this release.

In the last few years, the band has carved out a significant worldwidefollowing. The Aaron Clift Experiment’s last album, 2018’s “If All Goes Wrong,” was a critically-acclaimed progressive rock achievement, landing on several year-end best album lists. In 2017, the band had a star-making performance at RosFest, one of the largest progressive rock festivals in the world, and followed it up with an impressive outing at 2018 at Chicago’s Progtoberfest, and in 2019 with a hometown concert that was recorded for the band’s second live EP, “Live at One-2-One Bar.”

 
Here's what the press has raved about The Aaron Clift Experiment:

 
“There’s much to admire about The Aaron Clift Experiment . . . They can convincingly range from pure power to more delicate inferences in the same song.” | Prog Magazine
“Prog smarts and pop appeal combined nicely . . . furnished sleek, urgently uptempo tunes, brainy-heading-toward-quirky lyrics, and a taut, controlled sound.” | Proglodytes
“The music of The Aaron Clift Experiment is melodic, hard, and spellbinding.” | Music from the Other Side of the Room

 

 

King Buffalo is the trio of vocalist/guitarist Sean McVay, bassist Dan Reynolds, and drummer Scott Donaldson. Since forming in 2013, the self-proclaimed "heavy psych" band has made its name via 4 EPs, 4 Full-lengths, and tours with the likes of Clutch, All Them Witches, Uncle Acid & the deadbeats, The Sword and Elder.

Rochester, New York-based trio King Buffalo will issue their fifth full-length, Regenerator, on Sept. 2, 2022, as a self-release in North America and through Stickman Records in Europe. Preorders will be available on June 10th via http://kingbuffalo.bigcartel.com.

Written and recorded by the band with mixing and engineering by guitarist/vocalist Sean McVay and mastering by Bernie Matthews, the seven-song outing is the third in King Buffalo’s stated ‘pandemic trilogy,’ following Two of 2021’s Best Albums in The Burden of Restlessness and Acheron.

Both of those albums – like 2018’s Longing to Be the Mountain, 2016’s debut, Orion, and the various EPs and other offerings they’ve made over the last eight years – made bold declarations about who King Buffalo are as a band, and Regenerator is no different. As McVay, bassist/synthesist Dan Reynolds and drummer Scott Donaldson continue to explore the outer reaches of modern psychedelic songcraft, melding progressive rhythms, drifting atmospheres and accompanying surges of electricity, the new collection only further establishes them as one of the brightest lights shining in underground rock today.

As the third of three, Regenerator seems inherently to tie together the two LPs most immediately before it, and as King Buffalo unfold the leadoff title-track across nine and half minutes, it becomes clear just how truly they have marked out their own sonic presence. The later melodic highlight “Mammoth” – with McVay’s most confident vocal yet – shimmers with hope that somehow doesn’t come across as desperate, and as “Hours” engages classic space rock and the closing “Firmament” summarizes the first, second and third series installments, the final chapter of this trilogy becomes the essential cornerstone of King Buffalo’s work to-date.

The band returned to live activity late last year, touring alongside Clutch and more recently a full North American spring tour with Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats. By the time Regenerator arrives, they will have completed a UK and European headlining tour with festival appearances in Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Portugal, Belgium and Denmark.

Tags

rock desert rock doom heavy heavy psych heavy rock kraut krautrock psychedelic psychedelic rock stoner stoner metal stoner rock Rochester

 


"a farewell to arms" is the debut album by Michael Valentine West on the Reverse Alignment label. It is already known that mvw is a very talented musician, but in the long piece that gives the title to the album, the artist is capable of passing from initial intimate electro-acoustic music to expanses of pure sound plasma that bring to mind Ligeti's flocks of sound; and then to then pass through the energy of the percussion immersed in electronic gusts, finally returning to the calm of the dusty ambient music. A work of rare beauty.

Michael Valentine West is a composer/decomposer utilising lessons learnt from various musical disciplines such as minimal, ambient, glitch, hip hop, jazz and sound design. He has recorded, produced and remixed using aliases such as Twiggy And The K-Mesons, K-Meson 4, Suck Susan, Lower Third, Anal Teens and of course MVW. He has also scored music and contributed songs to soundtracks for several independent films.

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released December 28, 2022

Conceived and completed by Michael Valentine West between May 2022 and November 2022.
Images/artwork by Matt Hyde Photography
Mastered by Mikimo Sosumi
Post Production by Raffaele Pezzella

Published by Reverse Alignment (a label of Unexplained Sounds)
© 2022. All rights reserved
ambient dark dark ambient drone ambient industrial post-industrial Gothenburg