PURE REASON REVOLUTION
As reasons for reforming go, Chloë Alper’s assertion that “we couldn’t think of any good reasons why we weren’t doing it” is convincing in its disarming simplicity. There’s certainly a lot to be said for creative ennui as a motivation, and while the desire to explore other artistic avenues evidently drove Pure Reason Revolution’s amicable split in 2011, you’re inclined to believe them when they say “the one aim was just to have fun, and create again… it was like it was sitting in that university room in 2001.”
The fact that since they parted professional company, their reputation has spread considerably among prog fans, is doubtless pretty encouraging, and they’ll have felt heartened by the rapturous reception they received on returning to the live stage at Night Of The Prog last summer.
And yet the first emotion evoked from the opening strains this album is not fun as such, but a strangely detached, uneasy sadness.
As an ominous low keyboard wash spreads from the speakers there’s a distant ringing phone and the slow, rhythmic bleep of a hospital heart monitor before slow, deliberate drums and a dolefully plucked minor-chord guitar take centre stage. Courtney and Alper’s vocal blend sounds similarly saddened as they offer the distinctly uncharitable sentiments: ‘You bent your mould a little to the side, and you speak to me like shit, I don’t mind.’ Or at least, it sounds as though that’s what they’re singing. As we’ll discuss later, it’s not entirely clear.
Also less than immediate, but no less intriguing, are their slowly insidious top-line melodies. On initial listens, it’s a little difficult to find entry points, as in several cases motifs and riffs are repeated in small sections but then evolve beyond recognition, with the result that there are few of the comforting riff-verse-chorus round trips a conventional pop song takes you on. Instead we’re taken round the houses and then they don’t bother dropping us back home.
Eupnea
INSIDEOUT MUSIC
“What makes Eupnea such an intriguing listen? Its unpredictability.”
The opening three and a half minutes of Silent Genesis could represent a highly enticing self-contained instrumental piece – a floating slice of instrumental melancholia graced by a gorgeously recurring piano figure, before a crashing power riff arrives cloaked in Wakeman-esque synth lines. But then the vocals come in and the story takes a one-way detour into more epic power-prog territory, with pummelling crescendos of bass-heavy electro rock culminating in something resembling Muse sampling All About Eve.
That reflects the quality that makes Eupnea such an intriguing listen: its unpredictability. While at times the Courtney-Alper vocal blend can also evoke the sweeping melodrama of symphonic metal (on Maelstrom) there are echoes of Prefab Sprout’s cerebral soft-pop.
Working out an abiding theme or concept is more of a challenge. It may be to do with the soft, slightly shoegaze-informed gauze of harmony often enveloping them, but we sometimes end up hearing some apparently quite curious snippets. Is that really ‘bladder wires and napalm fires’ that Courtney refers to in a curiously Billy Corgan-like voice on the arrestingly angst-ridden Ghosts And Typhoons? Does he really sing, ‘I want to hand you my lungs’ on the title track? Prog could have asked for a lyric sheet but it would surely spoil the fun. Jill Doherty’s sleeve artwork hardly clarifies things: a man seems to be standing on the edge of a blood-stained ice floe with a white lion’s head, looking as if he’s preparing to vomit into the sea due to the claw part of a hammer being inserted into his mouth, ready to trigger a gag reflex.
Nice work, and suffice to say it piques your fascination, as does the music within, culminating in the 13-minute title track whose title refers to the natural action of breathing within mammals. Sumptuous harmonies and a rich synth swell back the duo meditating softly, ‘your mother can’t hide her love’. Ears are pricked by sparing synth patterns and divebombing guitar before Alper’s breathy mezzo-soprano once more lulls us into a false sense of security. But the peaks and troughs continue to follow one another, first with a spiky, shred-laced passage in which Alper protests ‘I can barely breathe.’ Then around the nine-minute mark, the clouds part and she exhales, ‘breeeeathe… you made it to here,’ swathed in multi-track vocal harmonies. But the tempo gradually cranks up and we’re back into a booming, pulse-racing power metal climax to the song. But this time it’s life-affirming and redemptive, and it ends with Courtney exhaling sharply.
We know how he feels: that was quite some rollercoaster ride. And the only way to make sense of this thrilling-then-soothing, familiar-then-disorientating, cryptic-then-comforting experience? Better go round again.
MS AMY BIRKS
All That I Am & All That I Was MAB RECORDS
Timeless-sounding debut from soaring chanteuse.
Already a Prog poll-winning favourite through her previous work fronting classical-flavoured chamber-pop trio The Beatrix Players, Amy Birks now sallies forth as a solo artist. All that she was has not been deleted, for this album doesn’t forsake the timbre and tone of her sombre neo-gothic past. All that she is, however, does embrace different colours and seasons. With lashings of windswept romance and a warm, welcome aversion to the 21st century, it’s an often beautiful record wherein one senses a breaking of shackles and a voice (we’ll come back to that voice) comfortably expressing itself.
“A beautiful record and a breaking of shackles.”
One would love to avoid Kate Bush comparisons for once, but the very English, rural, feel here makes that impossible: the music exists in the same mood-world as Lionheart. That’s not easy to achieve, and it fills the room with melancholy, yearning and all those other good things you want from songs which, although released in spring, have an eternal burnt gold Keatsian autumn coursing through the veins of their leaves.
Her rising star has drawn in some prog-weathered guests, most notably Steve Hackett, who plays flamenco guitar on I Wish, the lyrics of which are based on – naturally – some of Christina Rosetti’s writings. John Hackett and cellist Caroline Lavelle also feature on an album where the only drawback is its lack of another gear: after a while you wish it would kick on and, you know, rock a little. But then the spell of the overall atmosphere might break so, swings and roundabouts. It’s a lush, lilting experience.
Jamaica Inn sweeps us away first, its melody and chorus addictive in the manner of Michel Legrand’s I Will Wait For You. With All That I Am has a stately elegance, while Not Every Night plucks at the stars. All The Fault Of The Lady Anne abandons any residual concession to modern metropolitan life: indeed there’s an unapologetic deployment of “doth”, as in ‘the moon doth shine’. If The Beatrix Players went big on Pre-Raphaelites and Ophelia, Ms Birks is doubling down. Is such escapism commendable? Let’s take a glance at today’s news. Oh God. It’s commendable. Plus, on closer inspection, Say Something contributes controlled rage to the #MeToo zeitgeist.
Keeps You Guessing, which closes, is another highlight. Pianos and strings tingling, it’s typically intriguing. That graceful voice glides. It’s almost too pure and pristine at times, suggesting a vocal coach rather than a character inhabiting the music. But then one recalls this is a debut, and its deeply impressive delights leave you hugely optimistic about all that she will be.
CHRIS ROBERTS
ALLEN/OLZON
Worlds Apart FRONTIERS MUSIC
Grand, theatrical belting it out from Russ ’n’ Anette.
Worlds Apart brings together the talents of producer and multi-instrumentalist Magnus Karlsson, and vocalists Russell Allen, from Symphony X and Adrenaline Mob, and Anette Olzon, from The Dark Element and ex-Nightwish. Stylistically, it’s firmly located in the realms of symphonic metal, which is familiar ground for Olzon but
