Category Archives: Music

Only Child, Wintersong: Live With String Quartet. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Time is precious, the performer even more so, and as we find ourselves in strange times, as we place ourselves in the hands of effort and finality, so we must seize the opportunity to find the one who keeps our sanity intact, our heart enthralled and the mind actively pursuing the kind of words that make us think, make us understand that compassion is not just an emotion to be savoured but one that an artist must install into each person they meet to make sure that the world improves, that the love of the Wintersong that enhances the warmth of the season, continues marching on through the rest of the year.

Only Child, Wintersong: Live With String Quartet. Album Review. full post

(489 words, estimated 1:57 mins reading time)

Robby Krieger, The Ritual Begins At Sundown. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

It can be quite understandable that for many there was no afterlife for The Doors after the tragic passing of Jim Morrison, many will have drifted away, the millions will have just hung on the short but ultimately significant list of studio albums and the final hurrah of arguably one of the most important groups to have come out of 1960s America, the brutal, the dominating and utterly beguiling L.A. Woman.

Robby Krieger, The Ritual Begins At Sundown. Album Review. full post

(593 words, estimated 2:22 mins reading time)

Basia Bulat, Are You In Love? Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

What lays for us at the end is always up for debate, the gentle caress as we are returned to the Universe or the bang of unrequited expectation that went unfulfilled, and the question of how we were seen at the end comes racing into view, not if we were loved, but were we in love when the cold finish came.

Basia Bulat, Are You In Love? Album Review. full post

(376 words, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)

Rebecca Hill, The Airing. E.P. Review.

Liverpool sound and Vision Rating * * * *

For some it is a symbol of classical rejoice, the meeting between the heavenly and the spiritually minded and the earthly bonds that we strain to be free of, and perhaps it was the classical scholar and proto Humanist, Petrarch, who observed it best when he wrote, “…And tears are heard within the harp I touch“

Rebecca Hill, The Airing. E.P. Review. full post

(375 words, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)

Kerri Watt, Kissing Fools. Single Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision rating * * * *

History has its fair share of Kissing Fools, whether through their actions causing the downfall of families and empires, or in the personal, the very human act of lips that caress one who is not worth of the attention, of allowing your mind to be controlled by a very basic urge, it all can end, for the majority of times, in disappointment, in reckless sorrow or in leaders losing their heads.

Kerri Watt, Kissing Fools. Single Review. full post

(351 words, estimated 1:24 mins reading time)

Zoe Schwarz Blue Commotion, Chameleon. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

A musician who can change their outlook and shade is to be admired, they might stay within the genre, they might find the relief of crossing borders, but it is to the sound they create which sets them apart, the slight vocal inflection change, the meaning behind their songs given a greater depth and urgency, it is to this, as with all art, that the ability to be a social Chameleon, to be stand out by blending in with everything, to seek out new colours in which place their talents against and see what matches.

Zoe Schwarz Blue Commotion, Chameleon. Album Review. full post

(359 words, estimated 1:26 mins reading time)

The Boomtown Rats, Citizens Of Boomtown. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

To find the moment in Time when a movement started, you must have been prepared to have found the Time to listen in the first place; revolutions don’t just spring up overnight, they don’t appear randomly with no forward planning, they are dreams that can decades to come into fruition.

The Boomtown Rats, Citizens Of Boomtown. Album Review. full post

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

David Gray, White Ladder: The 20th Anniversary. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

If necessity is the mother of invention, then inevitability must be the gentle kiss of love that she places upon your forehead and to which a few will wipe off in embarrassment, but which some will feel the reinforcement of their ideas and allow the comfort to inspire them on, to greater heights, to conquering the nagging fear that their belief had been gnawed away.

David Gray, White Ladder: The 20th Anniversary. Album Review. full post

(424 words, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Peter Croft, Button Box Breakdown. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Whatever your instrument, whatever your musical weapon of choice, it must be played with love, and by doing so the expertise and inspiration will inevitably follow.

The focus has seemingly always been on the guitar, easy to understand why as it does give a superhuman like effect when played dangerously cool or whimsically fashionable, however, other instruments do not lazily idle their time away, hoping that the guitar will have its day and slope off to the sun in blissful retirement; instead they find that special person to whom calls out with unheard ideas and gives them what they desire, an outlet to inspire and inflame the passions of all who will follow their every note.

Peter Croft, Button Box Breakdown. Album Review. full post

(385 words, estimated 1:32 mins reading time)

The Sleep Eazys, Easy To Buy, Hard To Sell. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

The instrumental album arguably finds itself in a unique position when it comes to the public’s attention and the enjoyment they feel when listening to music. Like all art it will always make you think, but unlike albums full of meaningful lyrics and the drawing of words into the realm of the well placed chord, the instrumental is left to fend for itself, it has to be big and bold just to have someone take notice, for people want the line and the hook so they can fall in love, and yet if the listener is so able, the lack of words speak volumes for the artist.

The Sleep Eazys, Easy To Buy, Hard To Sell. Album Review. full post

(435 words, estimated 1:44 mins reading time)