Category Archives: Music

Stevie Nicks: Stevie Nicks: Complete Studio Albums & Rarities. Box Set Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Even to the adoring listener, a single will only offer what amounts to a snap shot in time of what has been consuming the artist, the influence almost transitory…unless it forms part of the larger picture, the album in all its glory which is the equivalent perhaps of an Instagram message, but more of a detailed novel which frames the length of time in which the artist has given over which might be a few months, or in some cases, years between arrangements and full release.

Stevie Nicks: Stevie Nicks: Complete Studio Albums & Rarities. Box Set Review. full post

(454 words, estimated 1:49 mins reading time)

Steely Dan: Pretzel Logic. Album Review – 50th Anniversary Reissue.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Logic often be damned, and lucidity be unquiet, for to create art we need to listen to voices in the air that speak to the inner turmoil of existence, and be prepared for the brilliance that shines from being in tune with observation, being on the same wave length as the colours that shape the images that becomes the sculptures of music, of novels, of poetry and drama…for logic only takes you so far, what we need to truly love life is the translucence of self-expression.

Steely Dan: Pretzel Logic. Album Review – 50th Anniversary Reissue. full post

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

Dexys: The Feminine Divine. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Whatever you may think of Kevin Rowlands, the voice behind the exceptional Dexys Midnight Runners, there can be no doubting of his commitment to the cause to which he sets his mind, the issues that get under his skin take root and manifest into actions and words, they are absolute and honest.

Dexys: The Feminine Divine. Album Review. full post

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

Rab Noakes & Brooks Williams: Should We Tell Him. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

We have lost more than we know in the last few years, and whilst Time inevitably catches us all unawares, the shock of the legendary performer taking a final bow from the stage as the music slowly fades, will always leave a lasting sadness to all who have had the pleasure, the honour, of listening to them, and arguably so with greater conviction, those who have lost their mentor and friend.

Rab Noakes & Brooks Williams: Should We Tell Him. Album Review. full post

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

Brooks Williams & Dan Walsh: Fortune By Design. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Collaboration is a strange and magnificent beast.

To involve someone else in your imagination takes courage, you don’t know how they will react to even the slightest change in mood as ideas flow thickly, or as slowly as precision dictates. To collaborate in art is take on a greater degree of trust that is akin in many ways to that of a marriage. Each side has their own interpretation of what will ensure success or a brief beautiful liaison, each moment is a learning curve that is steep and possibly undermining to the overall creation; and this is never truer than in the debut offering rather than in the long-established contribution.

Brooks Williams & Dan Walsh: Fortune By Design. Album Review. full post

(347 words, estimated 1:23 mins reading time)

Gareth Heesom: There’s A Place. Single Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Everyone that you encounter will arguably agree that as a music fan, the festival event is a particular experience that fills the mind and soul with something special, that no matter where, There’s A Place that sticks in the mind that nothing can ever replace,; a line-up that through the day, past the heat of the afternoon and long into the night’s blistering almost religious like fervour as the music roars, as the music leaves a shrine to your love and existence on this spinning ball.

Gareth Heesom: There’s A Place. Single Review. full post

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

Jake Aarons: Always Seeking. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Looking for something in the world that will take your mind off the diamonds you have neglected upon the way will have you Always Seeking where the dust has grown, and the riverbed has gone dry.

The vantage point of discovery is seemingly lost as time goes by, and yet if you understand that the waters of life are more valuable than that of mere trinkets and gems, then you know that the trail laid will always see you home; so that which you were seeking becomes a prized possession…the gift most loved, that of the sound of a human heart telling its story when you are ready to hear it being told.

Jake Aarons: Always Seeking. Album Review. full post

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

Gwenan Gibbard: Hen Ganeuon Newydd. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Those New Old Songs…they resonate in ways that beguiles the mind. For those that speak in a different language, where the vocal is coded in mystery to the non-native speaker, it is the universal that explains the words, and the feelings that are unearthed as it sways to the voice is where the listener finds their own explanation of why it captures their heart.

Gwenan Gibbard: Hen Ganeuon Newydd. Album Review. full post

(393 words, estimated 1:34 mins reading time)

The Pawn Shop Saints: Weeds. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

We have been conditioned to believe that allowing weeds to grow is the product of an unproductive mind, that they destroy the love and attention bestowed on the colourful and popular plants; and by nature’s fancy, are to be chopped down with a vengeance that is akin to a biblical gesture of deliverance.

Weeds plays more than a part in the world, weeds are the first things we notice when the world insists it is too perfect for anything other than flawless; that the wild and uncontrollable, that the eager and hardy, those that withstand storms with greater ferocity deep in their stems must give way to fragile and dull, and often overhyped, flowers in the pristine soil.

The Pawn Shop Saints: Weeds. Album Review. full post

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

Sam Burton: Dear Departed. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Just as others see a version of us that even a close friend wouldn’t recognise by its description of our emotions and attitude, so we ourselves are confronted by a thousand facets of who we are when we gaze in the mirror or when we are startled by our reflection in a shop window when the bad hair day is the least of our social problems.

Sam Burton: Dear Departed. Album Review. full post

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