Grace and Fire - 2026 - Live at De Boerderij

(32:25; OOB Records)






















Recorded at Poppodium Boerderij, Zoetermeer, Netherlands on 12th October 2024, this captures the British prog metal quintet when they supported Threshold on the ‘Through Time’ European tour. Founder and guitarist of that band, Karl Groom, produced and mixed their debut which led to being invited onto the tour, and he has also mixed this six-track release and will be on deck for the second album as well. For the debut André Saint (vocals), Aaron Gidney (guitars),  Tim Ashton (bass) and Graham Brown (drums) had a few different session musicians providing keyboards, but they are now settled as a quintet with the arrival of Joshua Gidney.  

Although they are regarded as many as prog metal, to my ears they have more of the progressive hard melodic rock style which came out in the Nineties, often linked to the Neo Prog movement, especially the likes of Galahad (where Tim was a member, twice) from that period or Walking On Ice, and is a very British sound. They can riff hard, as on the likes of “Eyes of the Seer” where one hears why Karl has been so interested in getting involved as early Threshold can be heard, but the overarching vocal melody line puts a different twist on it altogether. André has a wonderful style, very clear indeed with just enough emotion to give it breadth, while the quartet behind him are locked in very tightly indeed with Josh showing no signs of being a newbie. This is exciting and thrilling progressive rock with modern hard rock melody balls and no wonder the crowd reacted in the way they did.

Getting this tour and being seen and heard by many more people will obviously have been huge for the band, but they got there on musical ability and great songs, and I am definitely looking forward to the next studio album as this digital-only release has whetted the appetite for more, much more. 

Kev Rowland, July 2026

Links:
https://www.graceandfireofficial.com/
https://oob-records.com/

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