(58:56; Jack Dupon) Track list: 1. Toucan 8:18 2. Zombie 10:17 3. Nouvelle Tete 8:06 4. Garagiste 9:59 5. Mute 9:16 6. Pyjama 13:00 Line-up: Thomas Larsen - drums, vocals Arnaud M'Doihoma - bass, vocals Gregory Pozzoli - guitars, vocals with: Fil Prebet - vocals Prolusion. French band Jack Dupon have been a going concern for two decades and a bit at this point, releasing studio albums at a regular pace as well as finding space and room for a couple of live albums to boot. This year they released their eight studio production, "Toucan", a self-released album. This is also the first album with the band as a trio rather than a quartet. Analysis. Jack Dupon have been among those bands that thrive exploring the more challenging landscapes of the progressive rock universe from the onset, and twenty odd years on they are still creating their material in a manner that demands attentive listening. Avantgarde and experimental are words that fit the bill very well indeed, also on th...

(48:10; Aether) Track list: 1. Sidus (Prelude) 1:12 2. Neptune 6:13 3. Magrathea 5:46 4. Saturn 4:26 5. Ephemeris 7:18 6. Pale Blue Dot 4:58 7. Amalthea 5:21 8. Sidus 12:56 Line-up: Andrea Serino - piano, keyboards Andrea Ferrari - guitars Andrea Grumelli - bass Teo Ravelli - drums, electronics Prolusion. Italian band Aether started out back in 2021, initially to help out bassist Andrea Grumelli with a project but following this the musicians decided to continue as a band unit. They released their debut album "Aether" last year, and just a year or so later the quartet is back with their second studio production. This second album is called "Trans-Neptunian Objects", and was self released by the band in the fall of 2024. Analysis. Many years ago I came across a song called 'Cosmic Jazz' by legendary UK band Wishbone Ash, and while Aether isn't a band that will ever be comparable to those legends the title of that song pretty much summarize the impressions...

(43:04; Alberto Nemo / Claudio Milano / Niccolo Clemente) Track list: 1. Frattura Iniziale 6:53 2. Comparsa 13:18 3. Dissolvenza 18:53     4. Frattura Finale 4:00 Line-up: Niccolo Clemente - piano, electronics, vocals Claudio Milano - vocals Alberto Nemo - piano, vocals with: Borda - electronics      Prolusion. Italian composer and vocalist Claudio Milano have been quite the productive artist over the last couple o decades, with a number of solo albums, band projects and collaborations to his name during those years. Many of which I have been fortunate enough to get the chance to write about. 2024 is among his more productive years it would appear, where he has been a major part of three full length productions so far this year. The self-released production "Frattura Comparsa Dissolvenza" is the most recent of these, a collaboration between Milano and fellow Italian artists Nemo and Clemente which was released in the fall of 2024. Analysis. Whatever venture...

(39:38; Melodic Revolution Records) Track list: 1. Eva Prima Pandora 4:48 2. The Three Fates 3:44 3. Where Did Evil Come From 4:32 4. My Name Is Pandora 3:30 5. The Pipes of Pan 2:43 6. To Pandora 4:38 7. Origin Story 4:02 8. Do You Believe 3:43 9. Mythos 1:53 10. Lucky Day 2:55 11. Of Gods and Men 3:10 Line-up: Steve Bonino - vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, programming with: Shimmer Johnson - vocals Erik Johnson - guitars C.C. White - vocals (via plug-in) Prolusion. US artist Steve Bonino has been an active player in the US music scene since the 1990s or thereabouts, with tenures in a number of bands and projects from what I understand. He ventured out as a solo artist back in 2012, and have seven studio albums to his name as of 2024. "Pandora" is the most recent of those albums, and was released through US label Melodic Revolution Records in the summer of 2022. Analysis. While it is abundantly clear that Bonino does know his way around quite a few parts of the progressive...

(57:08; Melodic Revolution Records) I often think the music business is a cruel place, and how it discards those who should be feted and reveres those who are not creative at all. That is the case with Martin Springett, whose debut album, ‘The Gardening Club’ in 1983 never received anything like the acclaim it should have done at the time, and it wasn’t until the reissue in 2017 that many people (including me) became aware that Martin had a musical interest alongside his artistic one, with just two albums more since the first one. The reviews he achieved in 2017 lit a fire under Martin, and this is the sixth album since then. He has also developed two different sets of musicians to work with, one on the east coast of Canada and one on the west, and this album again finds Martin working with both on different songs. The vast majority of those involved have appeared on other albums with him, but a special mention should be made of new member Danie Friesen who provides both “normal” vocal...

(41:15; Melodic Revolution Records) In 2022, the Captain released his fourth album, the absolutely amazing ‘Hidden Gems Chapter 3 - Mysterium Tremendum’ which I gave maximum marks to and declared it to be a “review killer” in that once it hit my player, I was unable to listen to anything else, greatly reducing my output for a time. It has taken longer than expected for Shaun to come back with his next album, because he and his family were the innocent victims of a road traffic accident where someone fleeing police drove into their car. It has taken eighteen very long months for everyone to work through the physical and mental injuries, which also had a huge impact on them in other ways as Shaun is a working musician as opposed to someone doing this as a hobby. Through these terrible times, the Captain still had the need to create music,  albeit in a very slow, laboured, and somewhat sedate ‘late-night fashion’. Musically this is a very different release to what we have come to expe...

(43:00; Phil Mercy) I was in contact with Phil Mercy recently, and I was asking what was happening with the wonderful Thieves’ Kitchen. Sadly, the band has been put on hold mostly due to Brexit and COVID – not easy to play together when the band is in Sweden and there is no longer any freedom of movement. Phil has been keeping busy by working on a new project, Blind Convergence, which is a combination of ambient electronica and improvised guitar. So far, he has released one album, with another recorded, and he asked if I would like to have a listen so here it is. The album is available in two versions, either as a continuous piece of music or with it broken down into individual tracks, but given it was recorded live and in one take it made more sense for me to play the continuous version. It was recorded on 22nd December 2022 and there are no overdubs, with minimal post-processing of the files. There are a few samples, all of which are credited, and the overall result is something whic...

(63:10; Grand Tour Music) Here we have the third album from Long Earth, a band who piqued the curiosity of many old-time proggers given it contained three musicians from the early Scottish scene, but I notice that since the last release the old Abel Ganz rhythm section has departed with neither Gordon Mackie nor Ken Weir still involved. David McLachlan (bass) and Alex Smith (drums, triangle) have been brought into the fill those gaps, with the rest of the line-up still Martin Haggarty (lead & backing vocals), Renaldo McKim (electric, acoustic & ambient guitars) and Mike Baxter (piano, synthesizers, Hammond C3). It never ceases to amaze me that different progheads can listen to the same album and come up with quite different ideas on what it sounds like, but I have been following my own path for more than three decades so am not going to change how I write now. This is quite a basic neo prog album, which is okay but is never more than that, and there are large parts where I find...

(46:18; Greydisc) For his next album,  Kevin restricted himself to just playing 36-string Double Contraguitar and this time was joined by trumpeter Phil Grenadier. This is the first time he has worked with Phil, a well-known band leader and collaborator who is also on faculty at Berklee College of Music. Most of Kevin’s albums comprise a series of pieces, yet this album contains just two, one which is more than 30 minutes in length and one which is more than fifteen. Also, the trumpet is a powerful instrument, and one which will generally take the lead when being played with an acoustic guitar and that is exactly what we have here so Phil can often be found providing the melody while Kevin concentrates on accompaniment and nuances. This album sounds far less improvised and much more like modern classical music, and Kevin even describes it as “symphonic compositional scale” and that it marks a new direction for both musicians. The reverb on both instruments means that space is a ver...

(32:43; Greydisc) I have long been a fan of Kevin Kastning and his incredible mastery of massively stringed guitars (here he plays 36-string Double Contraguitar, 16-string Subcontraguitar, 24-string Subcontraguitar, and 28-string Contraguitar), but also what makes his music so interesting is the way he continues to find different musicians to improvise with. Here we have his first work (although it will not be the last) with double bassist Bruno Råberg, a Swedish musician who has been living in the States for more than 40 years and is a teacher at both the Berklee Global Jazz Institute and at Berklee College of Music. He has also recorded 12 albums as band leader and another 30 as a sideman, so he has quite a reputation, and deservedly so. Bruno has a wonderful tone, and there are times (such as “Memory Present Echo”) where Kevin sits back and waits for the right moment to come in and add his nuances. There are times when so many strings sound less like a guitar and more like a harpsic...

(47:18; Glassville Records) Hasse Fröberg first came to prominence in Swedish hard rock band Spellbound during the Eighties, but it will be for the last two decades he has spent with The Flower Kings which must progheads will know him for. He came up with the idea of forming a band in 2008, with Hasse Fröberg & Musical Companion starting to play the following year, and this is the sixth album since then. There has been a minor line-up change since 2021’s ‘We Are The Truth’, with the band now being Hasse Fröberg (vocals, electric & acoustic guitars), Sampo Axelsson (bass guitar), Kjell Haraldsson (keyboards, piano, organs), Anton Lindsjö (guitars) and Ola Strandberg (drums, backing vocals). I have only heard the last two albums, and I do find it strange that they are the only reviews for those on PA so they must have slipped under the radar, and while I enjoyed them, I must admit I felt they could have done with some judicious editing as they were both over an hour in length and...

(57:57; Lynx Music) Following on from the two new albums, Ryszard was somewhat surprised to be asked if he would be reissuing the 1998 debut, ‘Etermedia’. This was not something he had considered, especially as he had included a lot of the material on the 1998 TRK Project album ‘Sounds from the Past’. However, he was never truly happy with that, so took those session tracks and recorded his own vocals as well as new guitar and keyboards, while Marcin Kruczek added some new guitar to his originals, Krzysztof Wyrwa added bass and fretless bass while the drums are again by Grzegorz Fieber. It was then mixed by Kamil Konieczniak (Moonrise) with new translations of the lyrics by Zdzisław Zabierzewski. I have never heard ‘Etermedia’, and it is a long time since I last played ‘Sounds From The Past’, and I deliberately have not gone back to that as the best way to treat this is as a brand-new album, just with its roots more than 25 years ago. A lot of the work for this was undertaken during th...

(45:42; Lynx Music) The words “alea iacta est” are credited to Julius Caesar, and means the die is cast, and is the title of the closing (and longest) song on this album which followed on just one year from the return of the name. It is the same line-up as before, except for the addition of Michał Kramarski who sings with his father on “Like Father Like Son (Part 1 Father / Part 2 Son)”, but in a rather more pleasant manner than Cat Stevens and “Father and Son” and very different indeed to Harry Chapin in “Cats In The Cradle”. There is a much stronger feeling of Seventies rock on this album than there was on ‘My World Is Ending’, with punchy guitar and the band starting to feel their way into a separate identity from TRK Project. If one ever wanted to know what inspires Ryszard then just play “My Beloved Songs” where he names songs which mean a lot to him such as “Nights in White Satin”, “Mockingbird”, “Stairway To Heaven”, “Brothers In Arms”, “Space Oddity” and so many more. This is n...

(47:35; Lynx Music) For many years one of my favourite Polish bands has been Millenium, which has always featured Ryszard Kramarski on keyboards, and who this month released their fifteenth studio album. If that wasn’t enough, in 2017 we had the debut album by The Ryszard Kramarski Project (TRK Project) where he provides keyboards and guitars, and last year they released their seventh album. Of course, even though he also owns and runs Lynx Music he felt there was still something missing, so decided to bring back the name Framauro. This was the band pre-Millenium, where Ryszard also provided lead vocals, and they released their only album, ‘Etermedia’ in 1998. Using musicians from TRK Project, this was the comeback album in 2022: joining Ryszard Kramarski (vocals, keyboards, acoustic & electric guitars) were Marcin Kruczek (guitars), Krzysztof Wyrwa (bass, fretless bass) and Grzegorz Fieber (drums). Before playing this I did have some concerns, in that I have known Ryszard for many...

(45:46; Lynx Music) This 2023 album was the second release by the trio of Małgorzata Maleszak-Kantor (vocals), Przemysław Piotrowski (bass) and Kovy Jaglinski (guitar, keyboards, drums, vocals), and I see from their website that they are soon touring through Bulgaria, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Poland so they obviously have a reputation in Europe and listening to this album I understand why. There is no doubt that Lynx Music have long been at the forefront of progressive music in Poland, and here we have another album which takes us into a new world. It is always nice to find a band’s site is available in English, even more so when there is a press pack to download (hint to all bands, make a reviewer’s life easy, we like that), and I note they describe themselves as a post-dream rock trio. I am too old to use new labels I don’t fully understand, so let’s just say the music has the melodic bass laying down the foundation, then there are a few layers of guitars, loads more synths and k...

(43:45; Metal Blade Records) Dååth began their journey in 1999, releasing four studio albums and touring with  Slayer, Nile, Cattle Decapitation, Dark Funeral, Cynic, Dragonforce, Goatwhore, Chimaira, Dying Fetus and others before going on hiatus in 2011. They have finally returned with their first album in 14 years, although  founder/guitarist Eyal Levi has overseen a complete overhaul of the lineup, with only singer Sean Zatorsky still there from the old days.  Together they have been joined by Kerim “Krimh” Lechner on drums, Jesse Zuretti on orchestration and guitar, Rafael Trujillo on lead guitar, and David Marvuglio on bass. In addition, there are numerous guests providing guitar solos including Jeff Loomis (Nevermore, Arch Enemy), Mark Holcomb (Periphery), Dean Lamb (Archspire), Per Nilsson, (Scar Symmetry, Meshuggah), Spiro Dussias (Platonist), and Dan Sugarman (Ice Nine Kills), while video game composer Mick Gordon (Doom Eternal) contributed sound design and synth...

(51:52; Inner Nova Music) It has been way too long since we last heard from Circuline, with ‘Counterpoint’ being released eight years ago, and the live ‘Circulive: New View’ coming out in 2020, but finally they are back with a new album. I am not sure why it has taken so long, but I know Andrew Colyer has been very active with both Robert Berry and The Tubes, and then on top of that we have had some line-up changes. The core of the band since 2014, Andrew (keyboards, lead & backing vocals), Darin Brannon (drums & percussion, keyboards) and Natalie Brown (lead & backing vocals) have now been joined by bassist Shelby Logan Warne (Kyros) and multi-instrumentalist  Dave Bainbridge (The Strawbs, Iona, Lifesigns) who this time around provides guitars and additional keyboards. Ex-member William "Billy" Spillane provides backing vocals, while Joe Deninzon (Kansas, Stratospheerius) plays violin on one song. The band describe their music as “modern cinematic rock” and if by...

(66:44; Dur & Doux I have always been a fan of record samplers as they are a great way of finding out about a label in a relatively inexpensive manner. I doubt there are few which will ever live up to the wonderful ‘You Can All Join In’ from 1968 where Island Records where we were treated to material from the debut albums by Jethro Tull, Free, and Spooky Tooth along with songs from the likes of  Fairport Convention, Traffic and Nirvana. The motley crew of long-haired weirdos on the cover had a massive influence on the music scene, many of whom are still playing today. When it comes to the current day there is no doubt that Dur & Doux are one of the most important labels in the world when it comes to modern music, with a clear vision of what they want to achieve which is generally far away from the well-trodden path of the mainstream. The opening title track is taken from the Secrètes Sessions, which involves multiple members from the collective, while the rest of the tracks...

(54:02; L'étourneur / Big Owl Records / Atypeek Music) Track list: 1. Sun Song 14:12 2. Modus Operandi 14:59 3. Bad Pills 12:09 4. Chant du Cygne 12:42 Line-up: Anthony Retaille  guitars, vocals Armel Sfaxi - guitars Robin Dufour - drums Prolusion. French band Stoned Diplodocus appears to have formed sometime around 2014. Or at least that was the year when they decided to have a presence on social media platforms. They released a demo the following year, and in 2016 they were ready with their self-titled debut album. "Ante Mortem" is their second studio album, and was released through a small handful of niche labels back in 2017. Analysis. Stoned Diplodocus are among those bands where one can question if they are experimental, progressive or both. What can be stated with a fair degree of credibility is that their compositions are unconventional, and on a few different levels at that. I also get the impression that they aren't all that concerned with residing inside of...

(43:46; La Societe Du Spectral / Bang Bang Booking / Atypeek Music / L'étourneur / Do It Youssef) Track list: 1. Three to One 1:00 2. About Time (part 1, 2 & 3) 33:03 3. Not the End 9:43 Line-up: Not stated Prolusion. French band Spectrum Orchestrum have a history that dates back to 2007, and have a handful or so of album releases to their name as of 2024. The album "It's About Time" dates back to 2018, and was released by a handful of niche labels, as well as being made available digitally through a Creative Commons licence. Analysis. There will always be a little bit of an argument to be had, I guess, for whether music of an improvised nature can truly be described inside the progressive rock category or not. For me it all depends on whether music is conventional, as regarded from a mainstream point of view, and in that regard improvisations will also fit the bill. In this case with a band that know and love their improvised jazzrock. While the line-up isn't...