Connor Bracken And The Mother Leeds Band, Nightbird Motel. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Intensity is a crown that doesn’t fit snugly upon the head it is made for, some will wilt of transferring their stage presence to the studio and visa-versa, never the twain joining, connecting in a fruitful manner, the performance or the live experience somehow misfiring in the arms of the other partner. However, when it comes to certain places on the planet, certain areas that exude an energy that defies the logic of a system entrenched in a belief of all’s fair in love and tour, that sense of intensity can easily be seen to be influenced by the passion of those that went before.

Connor Bracken And The Mother Leeds Band, Nightbird Motel. Album Review. full post

(502 words, estimated 2:00 mins reading time)

Strike: Lethal White. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tom Burke, Holliday Grainger, Kerr Logan, Robert Glenister, Sophie Winkleman, Christine Cole, Robert Pugh, Sophie Colquhoun, Nicholas Agnew, Suzanne Burden, Paul Butterworth, Judi Kenley, Joe Johnsey, Andrew Hawley, Ralph Davis, Suzanne Toase, Natalie Gumede, Joseph Quinn, Alfie Tardi, James Mellish, William Gurney, Nick Blood, Safron Coomber, Jamie Ankrah, Joel Gillman, Robyn Holdaway, Kathleen Cranham, Danny Ashok, Jaqueline Boatswain, Julie Morgan Price, Silas Carson, Jack Greenlees, Ruth Lass, Natalie Walter, Adam Long, Nicholas Burns, Mandana Jones, Ann Akin, Shenagh Govan.

Strike: Lethal White. Television Review. full post

(471 words, estimated 1:53 mins reading time)

Native Harrow, Closeness. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Our collective experience at this time is one that hopefully we will never have to feel again, it is built on foundations of falseness, of impurity, and one that can make a simple gesture make us feel as though we have connected upon a realm of spiritual enlightenment; such declarations are only a shadow. However, a real sense of Closeness is at hand, if we should recognise the signs, there is a purpose, an intimacy of clarification and insight waiting; it just depends if we have the fortitude and the understanding to be as one, to be co-operative with nature, going forward.

Native Harrow, Closeness. Album Review. full post

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

Ben Burke, The Life I Left Behind. Single Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The future is unknown, exciting, perhaps apprehensively provoking, filled with energy and concern in equal measure, and yet it is one that that should be grasped with both hands, for the past, in all its forms, has only served as an appetiser for the journey and fight to come.

The Life I Left Behind, we have to tell ourselves, is one that should remain in the past, viewed maybe through the respect afforded by rose tinted glasses, but also with maturity, with experience, for in growth the change we seek is one of responsibility, a life left behind is not forgotten, but it is also only a stepping stone to a more secure and fulfilling life.

Ben Burke, The Life I Left Behind. Single Review. full post

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

D. E. McCluskey, Crack. Book Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

We are quick to condemn the guilty for the crimes they have committed, the awful acts of ruin and despair they have brought to people’s lives, we seek to justify calling them evil, even when it is clear that their actions originate in the complex and dark recesses of the mind, a trauma, the after effects of PTSD; it is just easier to label all who cross a line of civility and humanity as evil.

D. E. McCluskey, Crack. Book Review. full post

(656 words, estimated 2:37 mins reading time)

Nightmare, Aeternam. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Time moves on, sometimes in full view of those it affects, the moments between events and happenings seemingly constantly flowing, like a raging river which refuses to yield to human interference and regulations, moment after tumbling white rapid moment etched on the mind of the observer forever; for some the timeless motion is only seen in fits and bursts, the sense of the eternal rest very much in evidence, the mindfulness that a river flows regardless of whether it being watched a powerful symbol of patience and fortitude.

Nightmare, Aeternam. Album Review. full post

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

Scabeater, Idiot Mule. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It takes time to become the artist others know from the start that you are, to reach the point in your own mind that others have passionately believed you were from the moment they first heard you. Some are gifted enough to have that honour bestowed upon them from the very beginning, others have it confirmed in their heads, others have the greatness thrust upon them, and occasionally these moments exist in one spell, one blinding moment of absolute brilliance to which the listener finds themselves holding their breath and waiting impatiently, crucially, for the next song to send them to another place, another time.

Scabeater, Idiot Mule. Album Review. full post

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

Sue Hedges, Songs In A Different Light. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

All that you believe that you know, is but a partial understanding of the whole picture. We see the finished canvas that has had artist’s angst plagued upon it, the countless hours of dedication, of fear, of joy, but we never notice, unless we are truly fortunate, the change that overcomes, not just the painter, but every artist or lover of a particular skill to which they not only want to master, but which they wish to adapt, to bend in a new and exciting direction.

Sue Hedges, Songs In A Different Light. Album Review. full post

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

Rory Gallagher, The Best of Rory Gallagher. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

A taste is often all you need to appreciate just how beautiful, piercing, penetrating and soul enlarging a piece of art can be, gratifying certainly, passionate and easily rousing the mind to ask for more, to seek the obscure, to revel in the artist’s and creator’s minds.

Rory Gallagher, The Best of Rory Gallagher. Album Review. full post

(524 words, estimated 2:06 mins reading time)

The Strunts, Too Much Of Everything. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Timing is only everything when serendipity deigns to lend a hand, the sense of fortune, the coincidence and the happy accident are all there to fulfil a schedule that even destiny would not turn its nose up at, that it would not sulk at the thought of entertaining; for such moments of meeting between a group of people is not to place your mind in a strunt; it is there to bring on joy and humour, to bring an end to the misery of thinking you are alone.

The Strunts, Too Much Of Everything. Album Review. full post

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