Category Archives: Music

Collateral. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Collateral can be seen as holding a sense of security when all around you is holding you ransom to conform, to toe the wide line of obedience, submission and not trespass into creative insubordination, Collateral though is ammunition, it is knowing that what is in the heart can devastate the mind with urgency and command.

For the four-piece Kent based band, Collateral, their eponymously titled debut album is one that comes on the back of the immensely enjoyable four strong song E.P. 4 Shots, and with their backs covered, the shoot out of great Rock sounds sends shivers down the spines of those who stare like frightened rabbits down the barrel of the warmth, expectation and music delivery to which Collateral have become a force.

Collateral. Album Review. full post

(405 words, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)

HMLTD, West Of Eden. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

The image of Eden is one that, regardless of a person’s religious beliefs or knowledge, is one that resonates, that is deep in the psyche of the individual and that of society as a whole. The significance of the moment where humanity left the security of its embryo, the land of plenty, its connection with a thought of higher power, has placed itself though art into the hearts and minds of all who seek some sort of redemption and the reasons, however tenuous, to their own lack of positive influence upon the world.

HMLTD, West Of Eden. Album Review. full post

(412 words, estimated 1:39 mins reading time)

Aerialists, Dear Sienna. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

A tightrope held between two states of mind is not one that is easily traversed, the fall awaits one conscious or the other and the only way to survive the possible inevitable plunge is to look ahead, pay no attention to anything else around you, and live your life as if it were the only one that matters, a letter to the faithful, a telegram to the world which starts, not in let down with the greeting Dear John, but instead with the upbeat and personal salutation of Dear Sienna.

Aerialists, Dear Sienna. Album Review. full post

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

Sgoil Chiuil Na Gaidhealtachd, The Final Trawl. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

It shouldn’t even be up for debate, and yet every year we find ourselves wrestling with some sort of demon that openly states that the youth of today have no idea what the world is truly about and yet we applaud them when they put their minds together to create art. We warn them though that art doesn’t pay the bills, that they must know, in our words, stop the nonsense and buckle down, become useful to society, not to daydream about offering the world something more valuable than being yet another bean counter and person who says yes to everything the manager utters.

Sgoil Chiuil Na Gaidhealtachd, The Final Trawl. Album Review. full post

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

Joe Gideon, Armagideon. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

When Armageddon comes, invariably we won’t know what has hit us, the seven trumpets may sound, but we will be too immersed in the act of gluing our eyes to the latest gif and retweeting the odd moment of banality to wonder what the noise was, the sound of the bell tolling for us all.

Joe Gideon, Armagideon. Album Review. full post

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

Nicolas Godin, Concrete And Glass. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Not all is built upon what some may consider to be on fertile ground, life has a habit of taken the expertly laid plans and finding ways to makes them shatter into pieces, sands shift, expectations rise and fall, and yet throughout it all, Concrete And Glass will somehow find ways to prove the enormity and scale of how humanity lived, soared and eventually found a way to live with itself.

Nicolas Godin, Concrete And Glass. Album Review. full post

(428 words, estimated 1:43 mins reading time)

Cerrone, DNA. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The best albums invoke memories, the same as all art, if it captures a moment in your mind where you can understand, where you can feel the empathy in your soul, then that it is that your DNA springs to life and fizzes with excitement at the images or sounds that once enraptured your heart.

Cerrone, DNA. Album Review. full post

(364 words, estimated 1:27 mins reading time)

Jeremiah Johnson, Heavens To Betsy. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

An exclamation of disbelief that we all proclaim in one variant form or another, the mouth open in shock and surprise, the eyes wide and staring at the unveiled grace; we can either accept that words of enduring memory will spring forth at such a time, or we can go against type, we can go against the manufactured spells of others and just declare with certainty Heavens To Betsy, this is the stuff of legends.

Jeremiah Johnson, Heavens To Betsy. Album Review. full post

(372 words, estimated 1:29 mins reading time)

Bernard Allison, Songs From The Road. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Philosophy and temperament are normally passed down from one generation to the next, with a sprinkling of learning from others in between and yet we can see with almost perfect precision the depth of knowledge and wisdom gleaned by Bernard Allison from his much-missed father, Luther. It is arguably the easiest philosophy to grasp, that of leaving the ego at the door, and by doing so you embrace humility, a modesty that money cannot influence, and that pride cannot shatter.

Bernard Allison, Songs From The Road. Album Review. full post

(419 words, estimated 1:41 mins reading time)

Magnum, The Serpent Rings. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

You should never judge a book by its cover, although in the case of Magnum’s musical adorations and front artwork muses, it is arguably safe to say that is the detail is what pulls you inside the mythical, somewhat medieval, gothic world created by the renowned Rodney Matthews, and then leaves the visitor at the door pleading to be pleasured by the sound they hear tantalisingly being played inside the citadel, the palace that shows the beauty of The Serpent Rings of to its fullest, untarnished best.

Magnum, The Serpent Rings. Album Review. full post

(428 words, estimated 1:43 mins reading time)