Random Track of the Day
 

Here's something I used to do in my original journal. Simple enough, like most of my ideas. I dump all my record collection into a randomiser player and then write about whatever comes out. Since my music taste is not quite as eclectic as some, but still relatively varied, it could be anything from country to classical or metal to ambient, soundtrack, maybe even the odd prog rock! Hey, stranger things have happened. Could be something I love, something I hate, something I have not yet heard, something I've even forgotten I had. You know, random.

Anyway, here's what fell out of the machine today.
https://i.discogs.com/F5YWKr8SvTQ-za...g1LmpwZWc.jpeg
Title: “Fast Decay”
Artist: Bram Stoker
Format: Band
Year 2014
Genre: Progressive Rock
Nationality: English
Taken from: Their second album Cold Reading
Familiarity with artist: I only know this album but they only have two more
Familiarity with album/track: As I say above, I know this album quite well
Comments: The best kept secret in prog rock, Bram Stoker surfaced in 1969 as a sort of Black Sabbath ripoff but quickly faded. Flash forward to 2014 and they come out with this stunning “comeback” album (one of the longest hiatuses for a band? Maybe; what’s that - 45 years?) which just has to be heard to be believed. I enthused about this plenty already, so let me just say that this track is heavy on the organ and keyboards and evokes the heyday of bands like ELP, Genesis and Yes, it’s all instrumental and they even manage to sandwich in Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue”. Wonderful stuff.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvVwIdX1aoo

https://i.discogs.com/dt_QN_QdUcOV4I.../MS5qcGVn.jpeg
Title: “Rosemary (Herbacious Mix)”
Artist: Suzanne Vega
Format: Solo Artist
Year 1991
Genre: House, Downtempo, Synthpop, Acoustic (???)
Nationality: American
Taken from: What appears to be an EP or single “Rosemary (Remember Me)” which, so far as I can see, is not on any of her albums.
Familiarity with artist: I was a big fan of her first two albums, after that I lost touch with her music. Saw her live once.
Familiarity with album/track: Zero
Comments: Very different to her usual material (as if you didn’t get that from the unusual genre tags above), I’d say the overall genre here is downtempo, though this is only one of four mixes of the song that appear on this single/EP or whatever it is. Doesn’t really sound like her but I do recognise her voice; the music is all wrong though. Something different I guess. It’s a bit, what’s the word? Dreary. Yeah. It’s a bit dreary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5afyQwNjNA

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...aker_cover.jpg
Title: “Into the Black”
Artist: Running Wild
Format: Band
Year 2012
Genre: Heavy Metal/Pirate Metal
Nationality: German
Taken from: Their fourteenth album Shadowmaker
Familiarity with artist: Some
Familiarity with album/track: None
Comments: Deep into their Pirate Metal phase now, this is apparently the comeback album after Running Wild broke up in 2009. Guess it worked, as they have four more albums after this and are still recording. It’s a good rocker that puts me in mind of early Saxon.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quUpJJtoxMs

https://i.discogs.com/aElYEg2mBLT3iQ...k1LmpwZWc.jpeg
Title: “Descenso en el Maelstrom”
Artist: The Samurai of Prog
Format: Band
Year 2013
Genre: Progressive Rock duh
Nationality: Multi
Taken from: Their second album Secrets of Disguise
Familiarity with artist: I’ve heard one album. This isn’t it.
Familiarity with album/track: Zero
Comments: Lovely cello opening, very stately and majestic and grand, then it jumps into a pretty wild keyboard run and almost into jazz-fusion territory. I feel that it’s going to be an instrumental, particularly since the title is in Italian (or is it Spanish? Not English anyway) and so it proves. To be honest, I wouldn’t consider this the greatest introduction to the Samurai of Prog; they have better tracks than this. But it’s alright I guess.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2zVBshFAWI