An interesting format with the four albums, but another even more basic idea that has been overlooked and doesn't involve writing reviews at all, is the old "Album Wars" and "Metal Wars" concepts where just two/three albums go head to head. Not only would this get votes from the members here, but also from a lot of other members on the site as well, of course just prog and very similar albums would be considered here. But normally when there is an active organizer of the format, it normally guarantees good participation.

It's a good idea, however it presupposes either that a) all the albums are well known and so can be rated (Dark Side vs Close to the edge vs The Lamb for instance), and also removes the main function of the club, in my view, which is to hear new stuff and comment on it. I'm not so sure it would work in this format. But if the others think it would I guess we could try it. I rprefer my new format idea though: gives us all a chance to hear more than one album per session.

I'd also like to suggest another thing, outside of the main "discussion", as it were. If members want to suggest new albums/bands they've come across to see if others here like them, a sort of discovery of the week thing, or even a daily discovery, I dont know. I feel this club should be more about hearing new prog albums and getting maybe into new bands than pitching one classic or well-known album against another. Didn't I already do this in a "Prog Wars" thread anyway? I'm sure I did, and it got very little interest...

But on these "Wars" threads it make no difference whether the albums are well known or not and a lot of the time lesser known stuff would be nominated. The whole idea is that people listen to the two albums on offer and then vote, and if they want to then they can write a line or two. The whole idea is that this concept takes away the burden of writing reviews and increases thread participation.

Also I don't remember you having a "prog wars" thread?

Well I guess we could incorporate the two. My own feeling is that if we just did the "wars" thing this would just become another thread, not a club, and also people might just start voting for albums they knew, or guessed, to be better than others rather than listening to them. To me, this is the sort of thread, or should be, equivalent to lending your albums to your mates or saying hey I heard this great new prog album and then gushing about it, or indeed one you hated and saying why. I jsut don't really like the "one album against another" format: I think it simplifies too much and takes away from the overall ethos of what I had been trying to create here. That sounds very pompous doesn't it? What I mean is I would like people to invest more time than just voting for albums.

Maybe I'm seeing this wrong, but if this became just a Prog Wars thread I'd be less interested in participating, but we could rate the albums after they've been reviewed and then face them off against each other maybe? To be honest I'm not that bothered about that side of it, though of course I don't know how others feel.

Oh, and http://www.musicbanter.com/prog-psyc...prog-wars.html

Right, well since the basic idea seems to have found some sort of agreement (US and I are still wrangling over this "Prog wars" thing), and so as to try to get this underway and so get the club back on track as soon as we can, and as it's my suggestion to change the format plus kind of my fault the club has stalled, I'm gonna kick this off. So here then are the first choices.

Next stop vertigo --- Invertigo --- 2010
http://www.progarchives.com/progress...1719122010.jpg

German prog band who have been compared to Genesis, Yes, Marillion and Spock's Beard (mostly by themselves!) among others, and having listened to this album I can definitely see that, though I also hear echoes of Supertramp around the early eighties on albums like "Even in the quietest moments" and "Crisis? What crisis?" Been listening to this on repeat for a few weeks now and it just gets better every time. Only six tracks so for those among you who fancy an easy ride this might be the one.

A feast of consequences --- Fish --- 2013
http://www.progarchives.com/progress...21192013_r.jpg
I'm sure you don't need me to tell you who Fish is! The brand new effort from the ex-Marillion frontman, this is so new I haven't even had a chance to hear it myself, so will be interested in what anyone has to say about it.

The dream harbour --- Willowglass --- 2013
http://www.progarchives.com/progress...19762013_r.JPG
I reviewed this recently in "Bitesize" and was very impressed with it, especially considering it's basically the work of one man, Andrew Marshall, who goes under the name of Willowglass for his projects. This is his third album, well worth a listen. Oh yeah: it's all instrumental.

War and peace and other short stories --- Sean Filkins --- 2011
http://www.progarchives.com/progress...12462011_r.jpg
One-time singer with Anteater favourite Big Big Train, this is Sean's first solo effort and it just blew me away! Only six tracks yes, but you have an eleven-minuter and two twenty-minuters, so great value. Not to be missed.

So there's the selection guys. Choose which album you want to listen to --- or what albums --- and throw us a review of your thoughts and impressions in let's say two weeks' time, unless anyone wants to move this along earlier? But I think with four separate albums to be reviewed two weeks is about right. Anyone needs the albums let me know and I'll PM ya!

Ok so I just choose one album here or more etc and give my thoughts in a two week period?

Yeah that's pretty much it. You can choose one or up to four, but ideally everyone choosing a different one and giving a review/report/their thoughts on it after the two weeks (or within the two weeks, you don't have to wait till the end) is the idea.

In that case everybody needs to say which album they're going with to avoid one or two albums being missed out.

I'll go with the Fish album as my main one and add another one as well.

Cool. Yeah, I should have said that but I thought it was taken as read: as you choose your album(s) let us know which one(s) you go for. Of course, as you say, one or more albums could get missed out, but if that happens sure it happens. There's nothing to say all four albums have to be reviewed: it just gives us a wider choice, is all.

So then, Unknown Soldier chooses "A feast of consequences" by Fish

Willowglass for me. :D

Since this seems to be the only active club. Well club with people that are actually interested and participate then I will join it.

I will take Invertigo.

Welcome DJ: look forward to your thoughts!

So, at the moment we have

Fish: "A feast of consequences" taken by Unknown Soldier
Willowglass: "The dream harbour" taken by Anteater
Invertigo: "Next stop vertigo" taken by DJChameleon

Nice one guys! Just leaves Sean Filkins then. Anyone seen or heard from Big Ears? I'll be doing SF myself but interested to see if he wants to try it, or one of the others.

Hm so only one review per album? Guess ill do the Sean Filkins one then. Super ugly album cover tho and that somehow lowers my expectations haha

No, we want to make sure each album gets reviewed but there are going to be more reviews per album as long as the min. are covered.

I believe that's the gist. Correct me if I'm wrong US or TH.

Sure you can review all four albums if you want, but the initial idea is that somebody takes at least one different album, so every album has at least one review.

That's correct DJ. It's up to the members. Scenarios range from:

A. Each member picks only one album, resulting in four separate reviews for four albums

B. Each member picks more than one album, resulting in anything from I guess eight to sixteen separate reviews (unlikely, but it could happen)

C. Some members pick more than one album, resulting in anything from five to maybe ten reviews, or more, depending.

Everyone is free to pick one to four albums, Ninetales. If you want, you can choose all four, or just one. However if you choose all four you are then expected to review them all, which is why it seems unlikely anyone would go for that option. But you can also choose two or three albums if you want. The main point is, whatever you choose you need to review. So it's really up to you.

And the two week limit is really flexible. If you want, you can post your review(s) tomorrow, or if you chose too many albums you can stagger them while the next choices go out in two weeks, though that might be taking on too much work unless you decided not to take part in the next round of reviews.

Hope that's all clear as mud now! ;)

I don't see it as ugly but then, beauty is in the eye and all that.
I hope you'll be surprised. I certainly was.

Have listened to the Fish album and here are my general thoughts. Firstly it should be noted, that I don't have the time that some people do on here to write a big review, as I can just about keep my own journal going at the moment, so the review will be very short and just contain my general thoughts on the album. Firstly I know the Fish era Marillion really well, despite never really ever being a fan of the band and their music, but Fish Marillion always held a sense of nostalgia for me as I remember how popular they were in the UK when I was growing up, in fact they were the only prog band at that time that was popular. As for Fish's solo career I'd only ever heard before his first solo album Vigil in a Wilderness of Mirrors and that came out in 1990 and hadn't heard anything from him since.

I had some trepidation before I listened to the album as I was expecting a middle of the road effort by a mature artist and there are certainly a number of slower tracks on the album that fit this bill. Some are tracks that I would bypass as being boring despite being accomplished but there are others like "The Great Unravelling" which are a strong listen. But what really surprised me was the quality of tracks like the title track "Feast of Consequences" where Fish doesn't actually sound like Fish on certain parts of the song and there's even a hint of Roger Daltrey in there! Then there is the pretty epic at times sounding "Thristle Alley" which I really liked.

Feast of Consequences is one of those albums that I guess really grows on the listener on repeated listens and overall the album is probably better than I was expecting and it's certainly accomplished. 7.5/10

From the mind of multi-instrumentalist and composer Andrew Marshall of Yorkshire comes a 3rd LP from his idyllic Willowglass progressive rock project, The Dream Harbour. As a fan of his second release Book Of Hours back in 2008, the prospect of sitting through this new recording and giving it a proper whirlthrough wasn't to my detriment in any way, shape nor form: hell, it may actually be a cut or two better than that second album I liked so much!

So what do we have here exactly? To put it one way, Andrew's music plays out like a lush Baroque fantasy painting, complete with the vintage keys, flute, plenty of guitar and a host of other instrumentations. People have likened his particular compositional approach to Steve Hackett and Anthony Phillips of Genesis fame, but in reality what we have here is something more akin to the Canterbury Scene being extrapolated by, say, someone like Keith Emerson of ELP. And what I mean by that is that despite a decidedly pastoral, whimstical feel throughout, songs like the 20-minute 'A House Of Cards Pt.1' possess that quality of ever-shifting extravagance and indulgence that made songs like 'Tarkus' or 'Karn Evil 9' so iconic within the burgeoning era of "art" rock back in the day.

That being said, whatever your tolerance for purely instrumental fare, much of the music here is the specter of Beauty incarnate. The title track in particular is quite the marvel, transposing his finger picked guitar under some of the best "old school" synthesizer work I've heard in recent memory. And when that flute comes in...well, your ears perk up whether you like it or not. :wavey:

Although I'd like to see sir Marshall change things up stylistically on future records, I would definitely say The Dream Harbour is his best set to date, so listen below and judge for yourselves! 8.5/10

Thanks guys! I think this is the way to go. If I really love (or hate) an album I'll more than likely review it for my journal, so shorter, snappier entries are probably better here than long-drawn or "Trollheart-style" reviews. Of course, if that's what you want to do you're perfectly welcome, but I'll probably follow the example of Ant and US and do a relatively short review of my album.

Which should be up tomorrow or Saturday.

Given the date, I'd say extend the deadline to the end of the month, after which the next person up should have their four choices ready for us. Naturally, the deadline is not carved in stone and if you miss it you can still post a review after it, but it would be nice to get everything tied up so that we can all concentrate on our next album(s).

Who's next anyway? :confused:

Just added the album cover to mine, so it looks neat like Ants;)

War and peace and other short stories --- Sean Filkins – 2011
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tlHsDtVTCy...an+Filkins.jpg
I was never really supposed to hear this album. I had no idea who Sean Filkins was, but downloaded it on the advice of Progarchives, who included it as one of their top albums of 2011. It was only when I was out and looking for something new to play off my Zen that I came across it and thought “Ah sure why not? It'll probably be crap.” But it wasn't.

The voice of Sean Filkins, I later found out, can be heard on Big Big Train's albums from 2001 to 2009, including the excellent “Gathering speed”, and this is his first solo effort. Produced by Karl Groom, guitarist with Threshold, it features guest appearances from some of the cream of progressive rock, with the likes of John Sammes from Indigo Pilots on keys, John Mitchell from Arena and It Bites on guitar, Gary Chandler from Jadis and Spock's Beard's Dave Meros. There are only six tracks in all but he does not skimp on the length of tracks, with two twenty-minute tracks and another that runs for eleven. The opener is weird but once you get to know Filkins's music, typical of the man. Titled “Are you sitting comfortably?” it's literally an introduction to the album, with the sound of tea being poured, cups clinking and a televison or radio switching on, while in the background “Jerusalem” plays on a low organ. Quite Pink Floyd circa “The final cut” really.

There are some excellent tracks here, and Filkins makes great use of sound effects, particuarly in the third track, “Prisoner of conscience part 1: the soldier.” However it's in the almost-closer, the twenty-minute epic “Epitaph for a mariner” that we really see Filkins come into his own. With an opening from another hymn, “Eternal father, strong to save”, it sets the scene for the story of a sailor trying to survive a massive storm at sea, and goes through many different changes along the way. I think I would have liked the album to end on this but there is another track to close, and though it's good it's a pale shadow of “Epitaph”, which features some amazing guitar work and some quite stunning, almost electronica synth as well.

All in all, a pretty excellent album and one I'm very glad I got to hear, if only accidentally. Looking forward to his next effort, whenever that may emerge.

Rating: 9 out of 10

OK lads I know we're still waiting for a few reviews (Ninetales and DJ I believe: not sure if Big Ears is coming back?) but I'd like to move on with the next choices so whoever is up can you get your four albums together so we can select the one(s) we want to review for the first half of December?

Any reviews not yet posted can of course still be, but we need to move on and keep this going.

Thanks
TH

I'll give the other lads another day or two to get their reviews up. Otherwise, I'll post up the next four albums at that point. :)

You can post up the next four albums. I don't know about Ninetails but I will have my review up either tonight or early tomorrow morning.

Okeydoke. :drummer:

Ya ill post mine tomorrow morning methinks. Sorry for being so late :D

Invertigo - Next Stop Vertigo
http://www.ppr-shop.de/WebRoot/Store...togo_front.JPG

Take this mini-review with a grain of salt because I don't listen to prog bands regularly. I don't know why it bothers me but I know being in this club I will have to get used to listening to 7 to 9 min. tracks. I did like how easy they play on entire album transitioning from a very smooth mellow sound to a more metallized one at different times. Special ended up being my favorite track and I really loved the melodic solos in it. Take Your Time is also another track that really stood out to me. Sebastian Brennert's voice is very soothing and lends itself well to the dueling between keyboards and guitar playing. If I had to give this album a rating it would be 3.5 stars out of five. Overall it is a nice and catchy album with enough memorable parts to be fully appreciated by all prog fans I believe.

Nice one DJ, specially for someone who isn't really that into prog. I certainly found the album very relaxing; parts of it really reminded me of Supertramp. But yeah, long epic songs often go hand-in-hand with reviewing prog albums I'm afraid. Glad you got something out of it though.

Just to let you know though, we rate out of 10, so can we take it that's a 7/10 for you?

War and Peace & Other Short Stories by Sean Filkins
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tlHsDtVTCy...an+Filkins.jpg

Aight let's do this biz. I should preface this by saying that kind of like dj i am in no way a veteran at prog listening. I wouldnt say i actively dislike it or anything, but i would rarely find myself pining for prog sans a few choice favorites. Thats probably the reason i wanted to join this club; it's a way for me to expand my tastes so to speak.

Anyway on to the album at hand. This album actually surprised me quite a bit. I have this strange habit of predicting how much i will like an album based solely on its cover and and like i said previously, I dont think this one is very good (Is that Ron Jeremy sitting on the bench?!). But, well, I dont think this is album is bad. The first half of The English Eccentric reminds of Genesis (something from Selling England by the Pound maybe??) and may be my favorite part of the whole album. It's extremely catchy and the vocals came it at the perfect time to compliment it. One of the biggest criticisms I have of this and prog in general is that it has a tendency to drag on too long. I am a fan of long songs, many of my fav songs are 10+ minutes, but I found that a lot of Filkins' songs seemed to veer off in a whole bunch of directions without much closure before a new song started. Both The English Eccentric and Prisoner of Conscience (i did like the beginning of walking through leaves with birds chirping tho) end on these guitar solos that wouldve rathered not be there and Epitaph had this long grandiose intro that was haulted by the awkward transition to his vocals. That being said, the rest of Epitaph was very good. I actually quite like how the album ended too. A very mellow ending to an album full of excitement.

I found myself liking the vocal parts of this album more than the instrumental parts, which is odd since I usually find myself latching onto the latter. The only track I didnt really like was Prisoner of Conscience pt 2. It sounded eerily similar to Dont Stop Believing by Journey *shudders*. Still this album did exceed my expectations and maybe I should stop judging a book by its cover (unlikely though haha). Id probably give it a 7/10 if forced to rate it.

I think a big hand is in order for our two new members, who despite not knowing much about or particularly liking prog have grasped the nettle and made a very decent fist of their first reviews. Sorry you didn't like WAP&OSS Ninetales but I must say I loved it, and didn't expect to. However it is more an album that appeals to lovers of prog rock rather than your casual listener (I, too, thought the forest parts were great, plus then the idyllic scene blown apart by the roar of a jet engine overhead: how's that for juxtapositioning?)

But well done both of you and hope you manage to get something that's more to your tastes this time round. Welcome aboard!
:clap:

Oh no i did like it. More than I expected infact. Didn't love it (maybe I will in time) but the good outweighed the bad

Guys, I had a PM from Big Ears (maybe some of you did too, I don't know) wherein he tells me he's decided to leave the club. He's upset about a difference of opinion that seemed to arise while I was away regarding some album by Subsignal, says someone more or less laughed at what he said.

Now, I wasn't there and I'm not going to point fingers, nor do I want to know who he had the problem with --- whoever you are, you know --- but I would like to point out, if it needs saying, that everyone's opinion should be respected here. If DJ thinks Genesis are crap I'll argue like hell with him but will always be respectful and expect the same. If Ant hates Shadow Gallery I'll talk to him about it, but in the end I find it's very hard to change someone's mind when they love, or more specifically hate a band or artiste, so I normally don't personally push that.

I don't know if Big Ears is overreacting: in all the time I've been here I've never taken offence from anything said here, even if it was that people hated my choice or my review. I usually took it in good part. But the offending posts have been deleted so I can't say what went on. I would just hope that from now on we could all respect the opinion of everyone else. We're not all going to think the same on every album and that needs to be recognised. This club thrives and will survive on healthy debate, but also an innate respect for all opinions.

I am sad to see Big Ears go; I think he was a great contributor and I've told him the door is open for him to come back any time he wants, but he definitely seems to be hurting from this experience, so I respect that. I jsut hope we will see no repeats, and some day the large-eared one may make a return to our shores. In the meantime, again the watchword is respect. Nobody's going to agree with your opinion one hundred percent of the time, but they have every right to hold their own opinion and should not be laughed at or ridiculed because theirs differs from yours. At worst, I would hope such arguments could be sorted out in PM, but this does not seem to have happened in this case.

So let's try to make/keep this place a friendly club, and not lose any more members, okay?

Thanks guys.
Peace and respect, always.
TH

Woah, you mean someone laughed at his review of Touchstones awhile back? I recall reading it and thought it was fine. :confused:

Anyway, I'll post up four album choices later today.

OK it seems I misunderstood Big Ears. It's not that anyone was nasty to him, he just is annoyed that his review was ignored. I'm not sure whether he's being oversensitive here: if it was me I would say something like "Read my review you bastards! I spent time on this! By god someone had better comment or I'm going on a killing spree!" with the appropriate smiley. That's how I'd handle it: a gentle, humourous hint. But I don't know BE that well and maybe he gets upset if ignored, I really don't know.

So I guess all I said in the previous post can stand, because it's good practice, but doesn't seem to explicitly apply to Big Ears. Nobody upset him, other than apparently ignoring him, and I really think you know if you want to be involved in something like this you need a thicker skin.

Anyway, that's the amendment so you can now all amuse yourselves in whatever depraved way you prefer until the next reviews... :thumb: :)

I guess at the time that his review was ignored, was the time when the club was going through a bad phase and had a lack of interest from its few members. It was just a case of bad timing and not indifference I'd say to his review.

^ Yes, it is not that someone said anything or that I have a complex about being ignored, it is that I cannot see any purpose in being the only person to review, or comment on, someone else's choice. If the thread has a new lease of life in my absence, all well and good.

It has only had a new lease of life in the last week or so, largely due to the new format suggested by Trollheart, which now allows for a longer and more flexible listening period. Before that the thread was pretty much dead.

Alrighty then my fine proggy friends, here's four delicious albums to choose from!

The Custodian - Necessary Wasted Time (2012/2013)
http://www.progarchives.com/forum/up..._custodian.jpg

A spacey, immersive prog-ject from the very talented Richard Thomson (the frontman for death metal band Xeranth). For fans of Porcupine Tree, Pink Floyd and Anathema, this here might be right up your dark alleyway!


Moon Safari - [Blomljud] (2008)
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l6NdUixgWx...jud+(2008).jpg

I've raved about this band before here on MusicBanter, but now seems like a good opportunity to re-introduce them. They have a very unique, beautiful sound somewhere between Yes and The Beach Boys: all five of the band members sing together, resulting in some impressive harmonies. They also list Bruce Springsteen as an influence, though you won't hear a whole lot of that here. I'd recommend listening through the album here on their Bandcamp page, as the lyrics are available as well-

Blomljud | Moon Safari


David Sylvian - Gone To Earth (1986)
http://www.leninimports.com/sylvian_...th_cd_2003.jpg

Amazing solo album from the former bandleader and frontman of Japan, featuring Robert Fripp on guitar and electronics throughout (plus some songwriting credits!). For fans of jazzy, ambient-oriented progressive rock that doesn't sound quite like anything else out there, this is going to be a lot of fun for you!


Toto - Falling In Between (2006)
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...WL._SY300_.jpg

Besides being one of the tightest and most impressive live bands of all time, Toto are known for dabbling in a variety of styles from their inception in the late 70's all the way to the present day. Like early Ambrosia, they're something of a crossover act who meld pop, rock, funk, AOR and progressive rock into something hard to classify. Falling In Between was their last studio album and arguably their strongest, catchiest AND proggiest record as well, so I'd actually recommend this one to any of you.

OK well I liked Moon Safari so yoink!

I would strongly disagree with the inclusion of Toto however: for me they have always been an AOR band, but you know, if I have the time then maybe I'll just listen to that too and see if I'm wrong. Good selection, Ant! Be interesting to see who picks what.

Blomljud --- Moon Safari --- Trollheart