Homo Erraticus - Ian Anderson

Homo Erraticus (Ian Anderson, 2014)

Part One:  Chronicles
1. Doggerland - 4:21
2. Heavy Metals - 1:33
3. Enter The Uninvited - 4:12
4. Puer Ferox Adventus - 7:13
5. Meliora Sequamur - 3:35
6. The Turnpike Inn - 3:08
7. The Engineer - 3:12
8. The Pax Britannica - 3:05

Part Two: Prophecies
9. Tripudium Ad Bellum - 2:50
10. After These Wars - 4:29
11. New Blood, Old Veins - 2:32

Part Three: Revelations
12. In For A Pound - 0:37
13. The Browning Of The Green - 4:06
14. Per Errationes Ad Astra - 1:34
15. Cold Dead Reckoning - 5:31

Apparently Gerald Bostock is Ian Anderson's progressive rock muse. The concept here: Bostock finds an old book written by local St. Cleve looney Ernest Parritt in which he chronicles all his past and future lives in a sweeping panorama of the history of Britain and the folly of man. Backed by the same band as Thick As A Brick 2, Anderson completely astounds me with this exciting, complex, and epic creation.

Like TAAB2, the songs here are parts of a grand whole, with certain musical themes, transitions, and inversions linking things together. Unlike TAAB2, I detect no nostalgic musical nods - this is a boldly creative album in the style of the best progressive rock. Anderson and his band up the ante: the rock songs rock harder, the pretty songs are gorgeous, and everything in between is more ornate, more lyrical, more modern yet more Baroque. This is the work of an expert, whose musical sense has improved with age.

Witness the flute-driven hard rock of "Doggerland", the dense stream-of-consciousness lyrics of "Enter The Uninvited", the moving portrait of Jesus in "Puer Ferox Adventus", the rollicking romp of "Pax Britannica", the twisty, gnarly instrumental "Tripudium Ad Bellum", the aggressive closer "Cold Dead Reckoning" - all around this is an exciting ride from start to finish. The band flesh out Anderson's compositions with creative aplomb, and Anderson's lyrics constitute some of his strongest and most stirring poetry.

While I enjoy certain songs on the latter-day Tull albums, I had mostly given up on anything really new and exciting coming from Jethro Tull or Ian Anderson.  With the one-two punch of Thick As A Brick 2 and Homo Erraticus, Anderson proves me so very wrong by crafting two modern progressive rock classics.

Arbitrary rating: 5 out of 5 sweeping panoramas

Thick As A Brick 2 - Ian Anderson

Thick As A Brick 2 (Ian Anderson, 2012)

DIVERGENCE:
    Pebbles Thrown
1. From A Pebble Thrown - 3:06
2. Pebbles Instrumental - 3:30
3. Might-Have-Beens - 0:50
    Gerald the Banker
4. Upper Sixth Loan Shark - 1:13
5. Banker Bets, Banker Wins - 4:28
    Gerald Goes Homeless
6. Swing It Far - 3:28
7. Adrift And Dumbfounded - 4:25
    Gerald the Military Man
8. Old School Song - 3:07
9. Wootton Bassett Town - 3:44
    Gerald the Chorister
10. Power And Spirit - 1:59
11. Give Till It Hurts - 1:12
    Gerald: A Most Ordinary Man
12. Cosy Corner - 1:25
13. Shunt And Shuffle - 2:12

CONVERGENCE:
    A Change of Horses
14. A Change of Horses - 8:04
    22 Mulberry Walk
15. Confessional - 3:09
16. Kismet In Suburbia - 4:17
    What-Ifs, Maybes, And Might-Have-Beens
17. What-Ifs, Maybes, And Might-Have-Beens - 3:36

Forty years after Jethro Tull released what was perhaps their masterpiece in the mock-concept album-length song Thick As A Brick, bandleader Ian Anderson releases a sequel.  From his droll liner notes: "If someone had suggested that I might release a Prog concept album in the year 2012, I would have thought him seriously, dangerously even, off his trolley. But that is precisely what happened."  Channelling the vintage electro-acoustic folk/rock/classical style of the original, Anderson and his band deliver a rich and adventurous musical journey worthy of following up its classic namesake.

Not necessarily another long song like its predecessor, TAAB2 is more of a song cycle or rock cantata, if you will. There are plenty of musical pauses throughout to allow the listener breathing room, and many sections are joined with spoken word passages. Musical unity and certain repeated or altered themes make the album into a single, coherent work. Most commonly recurring is a variation (sometimes an inversion) on the chord progression from 1978's "Heavy Horses", and there are several other musical tributes to Anderson's past expertly interweaved. That is not to say this is just an oldies party:  the music throughout is fresh and new, fitting comfortably with the classic Tull sound but carving its own territory.

Indeed, Anderson's bandmates gets several opportunities to stretch out, trading solos (even the bass!) in the proggy "Pebbles Thrown", riffing away with jazz-metal abandon in the instrumental bridge to "Adrift And Dumbfounded", or navigating the knotty changes in "A Change of Horses". The band involvement gives this a Jethro Tull feel, and there are plenty of ornate arpeggios, calming melodies, rollicking power chords, and mind-tickling fancies for all.

Lyrically, this album is a straightforward presentation of the possible career paths of child prodigy Gerald Bostock from the original album. Anderson images Bostock as a greedy financier, an abused homeless man, a stoic soldier, a corrupt clergyman, and a humdrum middle-class shop owner. From their diverse paths, the Bostocks all wind up in the same pickle: alone and wondering at life in their retirement. It's a journey filled with cheekiness, chicanery, and some chilling truths, but all delivered with a jolly laugh. This one ranks right up there alongside my all-time favorite Tull albums - right-o!

Arbitrary rating: 4.5 out of 5 Bostocks in the same pickle

Flying Colors

Flying Colors (2012)

1. Blue Ocean - 7:04
2. Shoulda Coulda Woulda - 4:29
3. Kayla - 5:12
4. The Storm - 4:44
5. Forever In A Daze - 3:52
6. Love Is What I'm Waiting For - 3:30
7. Everything Changes - 6:48
8. Better Than Walking Away - 4:53
9. All Falls Down - 3:20
10. Fool In My Heart - 3:47
11. Infinite Fire - 12:00

I wasn't sure what to think about this album when it first came out.  Another Neal Morse/Mike Portnoy project, this time with the Dixie Dregs' Steve Morse and Dave LaRue on guitar and bass and an indie rock guy on lead vocals and guitar named Casey McPherson. I was fascinated by the idea of a Neal Morse project where he would just be the keyboard player, since, when he's also the lead singer, his musical personality tends to take over.  And I know the Dixie Dregs are an amazing jazz fusion band - I've just never listened to them.

When I popped the CD in, I got real worried real fast.  Studio chatter, someone saying "let's try it again from the Blue Ocean thing", a false start... did they mean to put that on the album? But then Dave LaRue's bass starts pumping along on a tricky arpeggiated line, piano and guitar lay in on top, and the song takes off.  Driving melodies, huge choruses, sweet background vocals, playful instrumental accents, and a lightning-fast yet oh-so-smooth guitar solo.  Woohoo!

Turns out, these guys play very well together and bring their considerable talents to bear on a fantastic set of songs.  The vocals are stunning throughout, especially on the emotive "The Storm", the perfectly paced "Everything Changes", and "Kayla" - check out the madrigal-style singing on the bridge, not to mention the chorus harmonies.  Mood and feel are employed masterfully, and challenging instrumental arrangements never distract from the essence of the song. The band does delve a bit into genre, but the songs are fresh and enticing, like the gospel shuffle of "Fool In My Heart", the funky rocker "Forever In A Daze" (awesome slap bass!), or the Beatlesque pop of "Love Is What I'm Waiting For".  It all winds up with "Infinite Fire", a progressive rock epic that hearkens back to Neal's work with Spock's Beard, yet still bears the strong stamp of this unique group of musicians.

The only misstep for me is "Shoulda Coulda Woulda" - only two songs in and we hit the speedbump.  It's a noisy, metallic screamer that just doesn't work for me.  There are some okay vocals in the second part of the chorus, but the verses and the first part of the chorus are almost devoid of melody. I can take a lot of noisy metal, all I ask for is a melody.  It's my half-point deduction.

Arbitrary rating: 4.5 out of 5 masterfully employed moods

Kaleidoscope - Transatlantic

Kaleidoscope (Transatlantic, 2014)

1. Into the Blue - 25:13
    I. Overture
    II. The Dreamer and the Healer
    III. A New Beginning
    IV. Written In Your Heart
    V. The Dreamer and the Healer (Reprise)
2. Shine - 7:29
3. Black As The Sky - 6:46
4. Beyond The Sun - 4:30
5. Kaleidoscope - 31:54
    I. Overture
    II. Ride the Lightning
    III. Black Gold
    IV. Walking the Road
    V. Desolation Days
    VI. Lemon Looking Glass
    VII. Ride the Lightning (Reprise)

Bonus Cover Disc:
1. And You And I (Yes) - 10:44
2. Can't Get It Out Of My Head (ELO) - 4:46
3. Conquistador (Procol Harum) - 4:14
4. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (Elton John) - 3:19
5. Tin Soldier (Small Faces) - 3:22
6. Sylvia (Focus) - 3:51
7. Indiscipline (King Crimson) - 4:46
8. Nights in White Satin (Moody Blues) - 6:13

We progressive rock fans are a demanding bunch.  Here the supergroup Transatlantic featuring Neal Morse, Roine Stolt, Pete Trewavas, and Mike Portnoy have released yet another original album of epic-length prog, and I'm not enraptured.  That "yet" is the key though - it's yet another one. There is a high level of playing throughout, with a pleasing array of sounds, themes, and transitions, but it just doesn't gel for me the way their first two albums did.

I think part of the problem might be the length of the songs. On their first album, Transatlantic created one of the all-time classics of the genre in "All Of The Above", where disparate songs and ideas from the band came together in an exciting way to form a single 30-minute composition, and every note felt both right and necessary. That compositional style became the band's (and to some degree Neal Morse's) trademark, but it's a dangerous M.O.  If that magic synthesis doesn't happen, then you've essentially got four or five decent-to-average songs - in some cases bearing little if any relation to progressive rock - whose decent-to-average melodies have to be inflated and repeated beyond their means to try and create an epic. Not a good position to be in.

That charge can be levied against the two long songs on Kaleidoscope to some degree. The piecemeal nature of the song is embraced in the "Kaleidoscope" title (come to think it, "All Of The Above" implies the same), and there are several fantastic sections in both songs, like the spooky jam in "A New Beginning", the exuberant buoyancy of "Ride the Lightning", or the beautifully paced ballads "Walking the Road" and "Desolation Days". The vocal and instrumental parts are all of high quality and consistency throughout, and I do enjoy that Pete and Mike contribute more lead as well as harmony vocals this time around. But patient and repeated listening just leaves me with these pieces, rather than the breathtaking musical journey I was hoping for.  The problem is almost immediate - in the overture of "Into the Blue", chunks of each part in the suite bump up against each other uncomfortably, and in both songs, the requisite emotional half-time epic instrumental that should be at the end happens around eight minutes in, dies out, and is followed by an uneasy transition to the next part. There just doesn't seem to be a strong sense of unity or direction, and both are essential in a long-form composition.

The real treat, in my opinion, is the complex yet focused rocker "Black As The Sky". Pumped-up organ and synth drive a stirring song about oppression and resistance with a mountainous, multilayered chorus. In the bridge, dizzying unison riffs dance over insane time signatures, and each band member trades a vocal line like an oracle shouting out into the void.  Now this is progress!  It's almost counter-intuitive, but it seems like this song and the other shorter compositions have more room to breathe than their cousins that were subsumed into the epics. If Transatlantic's next album had only songs in the four to seven minute range, I would buy it in a heartbeat.

Of course, the set of cover songs is fantastic. There aren't too many deviations from the originals, but the band is just having so much fun playing and singing these classics, I could listen to it all day long. It's likely that disc two is going to be played more than disc one.

Arbitrary rating: 4 out of 5 dangerous M.O.'s

To The Stars - Resistor

To The Stars (Resistor, 2014)

1. To The Stars - 11:47
2. Random Values - 2:59
3. I, of the Hurricane - 4:34
4. Train To Tucana - 7:09
5. Atlantis' Final Flight - 6:08
6. Little Lie - 5:21
7. AnnihilExcavation - 8:38
8. The Boy With His Brain Out In Space - 12:52

Creative guitar-based progressive rock married to adventurous, Lovecraftian lyrics?  Yes please!  I guess only "I, of the Hurricane", "AnnihilExcavation", and "The Boy With His Brain Out In Space" are outright sci-fi/horror stories that remind me of the master of weird fiction, but the other songs include strong themes or resonances, whether it is the shuttle launch of "Atlantis' Final Flight", the monster-like personification in "Little Lie", or the "sensing ancient secrets from afar" lyrics in "To The Stars". With music as epic as the lyrical content, yet always retaining a sense of fun, To The Stars is another great album from this independent Rhode Island-based band.

The thing I love about this band is their tightness and focus.  Fran Turner and Steve Unruh craft dense, rich guitar textures out of which tuneful solos for guitar, violin, and flute are born. Rob Winslow and Barry Farrands on bass and drums (respectively) carve out melodic space for their instruments in subtle ways, yet they are always ready to lock in with the guitars on dramatic unison riffs ("I, of the Hurricane") or to drive the shape and dynamic of a slow-building instrumental section ("To The Stars", "Atlantis' Final Flight" or "The Boy...") until it reaches the perfect tension point.  Then there are those glorious times where the pot boils over, like when Fran's guitar and Steve's violin trade solos on "Train To Tucana" (including, I'm pretty sure, a musical quote from a childhood taunt - or maybe it's from a classic Italian opera, I'm not sure) or when the band delivers hard-hitting, skewed stop-time metal merged with Pink Floyd-style atmospherics on "AnnihilExcavation".  And Steve displays some serious vocal range, hitting soaring high notes and even a few Opeth-like growls (namely when the dead are walking).

For those who like tight, adventurous rock with a sense of humor and imagination, Resistor is not to be missed, and To The Stars delivers.

Arbitrary rating: 5 out of 5 ancient secrets from afar