Category Archives: Music

Richard Durrant, The Girl at the Airport. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The edge of Noir comes calling, the thriller so carefully played out that Trevor Howard, Orson Welles and Graham Greene could sit back in reclining chairs somewhere in the South American sunshine and tell old tales of spies, cheating at the game and crimes of passion long before the credits roll and the music leaves the audience to appreciate the finality of it all. Some episodes of the Noir culture lend themselves perfectly, some come along and leave a crater of enjoyment so wide it is possible to understand the scale of its arrival just by the impact it leaves on the memory.

Richard Durrant, The Girl at the Airport. Album Review. full post

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

The James Brothers, Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision rating * * * *

It is the simplicity of the message that often carries across a joy in performance caught for posterity, a simple measure of a well delivered story finding an ear of appreciation into which a meaning, a semblance of truth can be measured and gauged; it is in these stories of love, life and head on Folk music of an Antipodean nature that The James Brothers pursue as if running towards some great sunrise, some new dawn, in the distance.

The James Brothers, Album Review. full post

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

Jez Hellard & The Djukella Orchestra, Heavy Wood. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Long may Folk music remain in the hearts of all those who are touched by it, for it seems at times it is the one genre that relishes in its ability to knock at the door of corporate insanity, of Government lunacy and the madness of the well proportioned and bring them to a semblance of account or at least raise the awareness of what is happening in the world within the listener.

Jez Hellard & The Djukella Orchestra, Heavy Wood. Album Review. full post

(407 words, estimated 1:38 mins reading time)

Findlay Napier, VIP Very Interesting Extras. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Life is a balance between wanting to slip quietly into the pages of history having lived a life of good introspection, loved by family and friends but not wanting to cause ripples in the water and the need to leave some kind of mark so that history, in which ever guise, will look back upon your life on Earth with more than a curious footnote attached to your name; to be the one six million that whose name might inspire countless others to live a life and not be content to become a whisper in the breeze.

Findlay Napier, VIP Very Interesting Extras. E.P. Review. full post

(418 words, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Eleanor Friedberger, New View. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

A New View is always welcome, it might disappoint, it could possible enrage the status quo, it could even blossom and flower and become the picture in which clarity is offered down the line, the healthy regard for the alternative view.

For Eleanor Friedberger the New View is much more than a set of songs in which to capture a mood, a reflection of all that she holds as truth and belief, it is a an outlook that is infectious, a vision in which the American songstress sheds light on the interaction of relationships and their dynamic and how in some cases the world can turn when a different path is chosen unexpectedly; when you fall for the person that you shouldn’t and yet an inkling of perspective comes out of the blue.

Eleanor Friedberger, New View. Album Review. full post

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

Dream Theater, The Astonishing. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

A concept album is an experience in which some fans love to immerse themselves into and others, arguably with more demands on their time or the relentless march of the quick sound bite has taken its progressive toll on the concentration levels might curse their fortune to have to take in the new Dream Theater album, The Astonishing.

Dream Theater, The Astonishing. Album Review. full post

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

Phil Hare, The Twilight Tone. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

It takes a lot of courage to take the poetry of W.H. Auden, arguably one of Britain’s finest 20th Century poets, and turn it into a Folk song of equal and impressive strength, then for Phil Hare nothing it seems is impossible to play with, to give a slice of extra soul too, and as he enters The Twilight Tone that exists between good natured ambience and angry response, that marriage of emotions is beautifully crafted and well preserved, an almost symbiotic relationship that just keeps giving.

Phil Hare, The Twilight Tone. Album Review. full post

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

Miranda Sykes And Rex Preston, The Watchmaker’s Wife. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

There is something endlessly fascinating about hearing a set of songs that you know have been stripped down and given no treatment whatsoever except that of the genuine love and respect from the musician or band taking on the arrangements. That no extra appear, no overlapping of voices to dissuade the listener from taking an even keener approach to taking in the hopeful message or the downbeat regret that music offers. It is a fascination that sits well at the heart of Miranda Sykes’ and Rex Preston’s album The Watchmaker’s Wife.

Miranda Sykes And Rex Preston, The Watchmaker’s Wife. Album Review. full post

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

B-Leaguers, Death Of A Western Heart. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

The Phoenix may be a creature of legend, of implausible birth and dramatic happenstance but it is a being to whom much is owed, especially when describing a band to whom out of various embers have arisen and offered a glimpse of the new Power Pop/Pop Punk sensation that will surely blow the socks off and enthuse the minds of those that come to hear of them over the next couple of months and beyond as their album Death Of A Western Heart takes hold.

B-Leaguers, Death Of A Western Heart. Album Review. full post

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

Jones, Happy Blue. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

It is arguably the vulnerability of the heart, the moment of exposure in the defenceless feelings that hit us when we are most frail, most delicate, that have the potential to bring out the very best in us; either we dig deep into reserves that we had no idea existed or we allow Time to beat us, we allow sentiment to become glory, idealistic and tangible but instead an offering that those we grieve for would see as insubstantial.

Jones, Happy Blue. Album Review. full post

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