Author Archives: admin

Satin Beige, Gig Review. Unit 51, Threshold, Liverpool. 2016.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The world may be in a mess, a state of confusion and disorder in which we are permanently told to feel afraid, to be watchful, to not engage or try to change, that being fearful of the person next to you is natural and to always trust those in charge because, like children, we cannot be trusted to make a difference, that we must follow blindly the excepted so called leadership.

Satin Beige, Gig Review. Unit 51, Threshold, Liverpool. 2016. full post

(389 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

Driftwood.

I reach out for driftwood

splintered and damp but at least buoyant

a life preserver

in place of the straight

talking jacket,

splintered, fractured driftwood

as torn as me, as breakable

in this tempest sea,

I’m breaking apart as the water pulls me under

and I can feel the suffocating nausea rise

as the sea lurches, tossing

me hope,

breaking my spirit in a matter of waves,

the waves that wash down my throat,

that I spit out bone by bone,

that I cannot, like an old ancient King,

Driftwood. full post

(230 words, estimated 55 secs reading time)

Ninebarrow, Releasing The Leaves. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

To be considered as sounding warm, inviting or even welcoming is to some a death knell, the sound of pleasantries made to be engaging, yet despite the wary nature of such social niceties, to use warm, musically demonstrative and even tender when talking about Dorset’s Ninebarrow is not to be friendly, to add Dorset charm to the world of literature, instead it is to be seen as graceful, elegant and stylish; for in Ninebarrow’s Releasing The Leaves lays the foundation stone of the next generation of Folk music at its very best.

Ninebarrow, Releasing The Leaves. Album Review. full post

(394 words, estimated 1:35 mins reading time)

Ensiferum, Two Decades Of Greatest Sword Hits. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Time is an illusion; it is only the passing of day into night that allows meaning to be understood, 20 years can pass quite simply in the blink of an eye, it is more to do with the Mayfly like effect that we live our lives in that you can be young aspiring sweating teenager one minute and the next knocking at the door of 40, the best of your life revealed only by how you view your actions.

Ensiferum, Two Decades Of Greatest Sword Hits. Album Review. full post

(402 words, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

Zakk Wylde, Book Of Shadows II. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

New Jersey gets bad press, especially in comparison to its near neighbour across the bay, New York, on this side of the Atlantic, but for anyone who has spent serious amount of time there, maybe ventured beyond the calling card of Atlantic City, the brushed walkways and the large unexpected Elephant named Lucy that remains static but a huge draw of things to do that don’t involve gambling, for anyone willing to venture in and see what life is truly about, then in Zakk Wylde you have the perfect man to accompany you as you make your way to Cape May Court House and relax in the release of Book Of Shadows II.

Zakk Wylde, Book Of Shadows II. Album Review. full post

(460 words, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

Behind The Ungroomable Whiskers.

I have no idea who lives

underneath the beard,

I haven’t seen their face

for a generation,

a third of their life,

I haven’t had the pleasure

of getting to see the craggy lines appear

on fermenting grey skin

except underneath the eyes

which have become sterile,

magnified and indifferent

to everything besides love;

but what need is there of love

when you are hiding

the kiss beneath a mop of underside hair

that keeps your chin warm

in winter.

 

Behind The Ungroomable Whiskers. full post

(191 words, estimated 46 secs reading time)

John Jenkins, Her Soldier Boy. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Sometimes a piece of music cannot be contained, it may scream to be allowed out of the mind and into the wide awaiting world and there is nothing that the musician or the audience can do about it, except for sitting back, making sure that all is secure with the area for a while and allowing the sweeping change laid out before them to tactically submit in the shape of a greater force. It is a greater force that comes before the listeners as John Jenkins with Vanessa Murray offers the beautiful yet wistfully dynamic Her Soldier Boy in a unregimented parade of class and vitality.

John Jenkins, Her Soldier Boy. Review. full post

(381 words, estimated 1:31 mins reading time)

Words Are Better Than Sleep And Rest.

In amongst the cackles,

the small wheezes that sound

like someone learning how to play

the saxophone,

buoyed by codeine

agitated by symbolism

and wracked with the fury

of an inward tempest,

I found an excitement

that could not be displaced

that would not lay still

and somehow I knew

upon this April morning,

cold and damp, fitful and feverish,

that my head, fit to explode

like an unwanted atom bomb

lost in transportation,

I knew I had an idea…

I gave in

Words Are Better Than Sleep And Rest. full post

(99 words, estimated 24 secs reading time)