Prog

Launched in 1987, The Laser’s Edge Group is still an extremely active mail order specialist in progressive music. Beginning in 1990, we developed four in-house labels with a specific focus: The Laser’s Edge (progressive rock), Sensory (progressive me

Send your letters to us at: Prog, Future Publishing, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London, W2 6JR, or email prog@futurenet.com. Letters may be edited for length. We regret that we cannot reply to phone calls. For more comment and prog news and views, f

Jethro Tull’s classic Thick As A Brick was released 50 years ago, on March 3, 1972. To commemorate this anniversary, Warner Music is reissuing the album on vinyl, complete with the original St Cleve Chronicle & Linwell Advertiser newspaper packaging

Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s singles output will feature in a new deluxe, coloured vinyl box set out this summer. Released through BMG Records on August 26, Singles is the first ever boxed collection of the trio’s singles, and includes remastered, two-si

Italian prog veterans Banco Del Mutuo Soccorso will release their new album, Orlando: Le Forme dell’Amore (‘Orlando: The Form Of Love’), on September 23 via InsideOut. The LP comes three years after their long-awaited comeback album Nudo, and it’s th

Virgil and Steve Howe’s first album together as a duo was Nexus, which came out in November 2017. Sadly Virgil didn’t live to read the many plaudits that followed. The talented, respected drummer and keyboardist died unexpectedly that September, aged

UK prog rockers Threshold are back with their a new studio album – their 12th – which is out later this year. Dividing Lines will be released by the Nuclear Blast label on November 18. It’s their first album since 2017’s Legends Of The Shires, which

A critics’ favourite since 2009’s Mercury Prize-nominated LP Twice Born Men, English band Sweet Billy Pilgrim remain a hard act to categorise. The press release for Somapolis – their sixth album, due on November 4 through Republic Of Media – bills th

Legendary British prog group Gentle Giant have announced a new vinyl box set focusing on their live work and featuring previously unreleased material. Front Row Center: US Dates 1976-1980 will be issued on September 23 through Madfish, the label resp

“When I was 15, I was at the convent school in Kidderminster and my friend Neville Farmer was at the boys’ school around the corner. We’d meet up at lunchtime, go for coffee, talk about music and swap albums. I was listening to a lot of Gong – I thou

WHEN IANAI FIRST emerged into the world, the “band’s” members’ identities were secret. The enchanting, multi-instrumental, folky world music project was shrouded in mystery, led by an enigmatic figure named Trevenial, who was said to have come from “

“We’re at the point where we can’t sign any more bands,” says Apollon Records co-founder Robin Mortensen, with a slightly nervous laugh. “We have so many now, and they’re all really active.” Based in Bergen, Norway, Apollon’s a dynamic, all-embracing

THE OLD ADAGE goes that if you love someone, set them free and if they come back to you, it was meant to be. And as far as Maraton are concerned, it’s a saying that holds weight. In 2014, the Norwegian alt-proggers had just finished recording their d

SUPERFICIALLY AT LEAST, Ghost Of The Machine would appear to be born from adversity. Five of the band were the musicians behind This Winter Machine – an act who were garnering both attention and substantial momentum. Back in 2020, the quintet departe

What got us all grooving this month… Porcupine Tree’s reunion was one of this year’s biggest surprises and the quality of music on their comeback album, Closure/Continuation, went far beyond what anyone could have imagined. You can enjoy it for yours

FROM 1999 TO 2008, Californian quartet Zero Hour were one of progressive metal’s most vital forces. But despite masterpieces such as 2001’s The Towers Of Avarice, the band led by brothers Jasun and Troy Tipton (guitarist and bassist respectively) lar

Emerging from the mid-60s homegrown R&B/soul scene, rubbing shoulders with Pink Floyd along the way, Dave Terry (aka Elmer Gantry) and his Velvet Opera embraced the shackle-freeing ‘Summer of Love’ with both arms, transforming Willie Dixon-fixated ch

Robert Fripp is addressing a room of around 25 or so attendees at a Guitar Craft course in the summer of 1998. Held in an old educational establishment in Alfeld, Germany, the windows are open, allowing a breeze carrying birdsong to accompany his gen

Released in 1979, Exposure (right) was Robert Fripp’s first solo album. A surprisingly eclectic mix of razor-edged rock and gnarly complex instrumentals, as well as some touching, tender moments, it featured an array of guest contributions including

He may have stepped away from live performance with King Crimson for the foreseeable future, but rest assured Robert Fripp has got plenty to keep himself occupied with. On September 1, he publishes his first book via Panegyric. The Guitar Circle prov

Steven Wilson recently told John Mitchell that A Model Life – the fifth Lonely Robot record – is his favourite among all the things he’s done. “Steven asked, ‘How long did you spend doing it?’” Mitchell tells Prog with a cackle, “and when I said abou

Tim Bowness began his 40 years ago to the day when Prog catches up with him. It feels right for him to wax nostalgic. “I started singing in bands in April 1982, during the Falklands War,” he says (he would’ve been 18 at the time). “I was in the north

Veteran keyboardist Ryo Okumoto is not most readily associated with a solo career. A mainstay of Spock’s Beard, he’s renowned for both his virtuosity and irrepressible stage antics, but as a solo artist? Less so. However way back in 1980, Okumoto rel

Al Di Meola and John McLaughlin both remember the first time they came across the phenomenon that was flamenco and classical guitarist, Paco De Lucia. Di Meola was on tour in Spain with Return To Forever and kept hearing the name. “I bought a few of

“We couldn’t help ourselves!” That’s the explanation Ed Wynne offers when Prog asks how he came to make an album with Dutch multi-instrumentalist Gre Vanderloo, aka Gracerooms. That might sum up the former’s approach to making music, whether as Ozric

Ozrics activity continues with the recent release of the eight-disc set, Travelling The Great Circle, and a new studio album pencilled in for sometime next year. This November sees Ed and Silas play with a full live band for the first time since 2014

“Sorry, I’m gonna yell at my cat real quick,” Cammie Beverly apologises. The vocalist of Texan progressive metal idols Oceans Of Slumber is sat in her living room in Houston, and her one-year-old feline is destroying her curtains. “She’s a rescue fro

“On my 22nd birthday – November 2, 1969 – I went to Mothers club in Birmingham with my ex-wife Christine to see Fairport Convention,” says the group’s current bassist Dave Pegg. “I had never seen them before but I knew [violinist] Dave Swarbrick from

Solo albums are often an opportunity for musicians to step away from the traditions of their main band and explore new sounds and cultures. But when that main band’s palette is as broad as Haken’s, where do you go from there? The answer, according to

In 1973, Al Stewart was a man at a creative crossroads. His fourth album, Orange, had described the end of a relationship whose happier days he had earlier documented, and he couldn’t face the idea of writing love songs anymore. A bold and fresh dire

Right from the moment they graduated from the celebrated BRIT School for Performing Arts and Technology in 2017, Londoners Black Midi have been both a divisive and acquired taste. To their detractors, the trio of singer-guitarist Geordie Greep, bassi

It might be an obvious analogy but Born, the excellent debut from San Diego’s Birth, marks a rebirth of sorts. Singer and multi-instrumentalist Conor Riley and guitarist Brian Ellis set the prog and psych scenes alight a decade ago with Astra, releas

Despite his work being familiar to millions thanks to his extraordinary contributions to classic singles including David Bowie’s Boys Keep Swinging, Talking Heads’ existential classic Once In A Lifetime and the utterly joyous Genius Of Love by Tom To

More sublime gloom from the rising Norwegian trio. Dim Gray’s stock has soared quickly. The Norwegian trio’s self-released 2020 debut, Flown, introduced their brittle soundworld where post-rock textures, chamber pop hooks and song-centred musicianshi

Veteran art-rock trio’s first studio album in 14 years. Let’s face it: long-awaited returns can often be lacklustre. A cock-up in the personal chemistry department. Blunted songwriting chops. An ill-advised new direction or the wrong producer. Deligh

Nature calls for German post-rockers. It’s not often an album with songs about sloths, rhinos and sharks appears in these pages. But German post-rockers Long Distance Calling have channelled their inner David Attenborough for their eighth studio albu

Matt Bellamy and co edge towards the strange on album nine. Muse frontman Matt Bellamy recently revealed that the Devonshire trio have an out-and-out prog album stirring deep in their souls. While ninth studio album Will Of The People isn’t that, it’

The storied songwriter and studio wizard continues his solo path. A little over three years since his last studio release, The Secret, Alan Parsons returns with a sixth solo set. From The New World adheres largely to the blueprint of its warmly recei

Their final album gets a US reissue. The advent of punk and new wave had a profound effect on progressive rock. Aside from all hair being shortened by around one to two inches and beards either trimmed or removed, it seemed that every guitar had to s

A hugely rewarding delve into the folk icons’ Chrysalis years. After the departure of Ashley Hutchings and Martin Carthy, Steeleye Span’s fourth album Below The Salt – their first for Chrysalis – was a new beginning. Carthy and Hutching were staunchl

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Prog metal pioneers’ early steps towards infinity and beyond. Voivod weren’t the first band to gene-splice prog with metal’s take-no-prisoners abrasion, but they were the most significant. The Quebec quartet possessed two things that set them apart f

Floydologist’s sumptuously illustrated record of a pivotal period. To use an appropriate farmyard metaphor, Animals is sometimes seen as the runt of Pink Floyd’s 1970s litter, partly because it’s among their least accessible sets. But as seasoned Flo

VENUE ROYAL ALBERT HALL, LONDON DATE 21/06/2022 Half a century ago Close To The Edge emerged, greeted by reviews ranging from “unmemorable meaninglessness” to “transcending the medium”. It’s endured as the Yes album most often begrudgingly admired by

VENUE THE GARAGE, LONDON DATE 17-18/06/2022 SUPPORT THE UTOPIA STRONG Magma return to the UK for the first time since 2019. Prior to a trip to Manchester they stop for a two-night residency at Highbury’s The Garage. Support comes from The Utopia Stro

VENUE ISLINGTON ASSEMBLY HALL, LONDON DATE 11/06/2022 It’s been nine months since this show – to mark the 40th anniversary of IQ’s formation in Southampton – was originally scheduled to take place. But the best things do come to those who wait. Over

VENUE DONINGTON PARK, LEICESTERSHIRE DATE 10-12/06/2022 Does progressively inclined music really work outdoors? It’s an interesting question, one often used by promoters of events such as these to explain a lack of decent prog talent on offer. Not th