Love Sculpture made an amazing leap forward in a relatively short space of time from their album of raw blues and soul covers (Blues Helping) to the much more advanced psychedelic pop and quasi classical structures of Forms and Feelings. It starts with two memorable singles “In The Land of the Few”, complete with Byrds like jangly guitars and an early expression of environmental concerns in their take of Paul Korda’s “Seagul”, a sensitive, somewhat dramatic ballad as it turns out…
Blues Helping (1968). 2008 digitally remastered edition of this classic debut album the group that brought Dave Edmunds to public attention. This issue was mastered from the original tapes and expanded to include both the A and B-sides of their first two singles. His importance in the history of Welsh rock music can't be understated and his recording career began with this trio. Edmunds emerged as a guitar hero of extreme prowess. The group's first single was released as The Human Beans, but their name was changed prior to the release of this album. The tracks include the stunning "Summertime" and the title track, admired on both sides of the Atlantic…
Blues Helping (1968). 2008 digitally remastered edition of this classic debut album the group that brought Dave Edmunds to public attention. This issue was mastered from the original tapes and expanded to include both the A and B-sides of their first two singles. His importance in the history of Welsh rock music can't be understated and his recording career began with this trio. Edmunds emerged as a guitar hero of extreme prowess. The group's first single was released as The Human Beans, but their name was changed prior to the release of this album. The tracks include the stunning "Summertime" and the title track, admired on both sides of the Atlantic…
Whether it's the luscious all instrumental four-album `Seasons' cycle or bombastic classical- influenced rock-operas such as `The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' and its live interpretation `Alive in Theatre', Hostsonaten has always been the most purely symphonic project modern Italian progressive music icon Fabio Zuffanti is involved in, and he and his music collaborators here return in 2016 with `Symphony N. 1: Cupid and Psyche'. Zuffanti and his musical friends, including La Coscienza di Zeno's keyboardist Luca Scherani, Laura Marsano on classical and electric guitars, Paolo `Paolo' Tixi on drums and Danielle Sollo on fretted and fretless bass, are backed up by multi- member brass and woodwind sections as well as a string quartet, and without a doubt they've delivered one of the most proudly grandiose, extravagant and bombastic symphonic Italian works of the year!
A chorus of Disney-fied whistling leads into the synthesised sounds of jungle animals, as impossibly lush, sensual strings transport us to the South Seas setting of some corny Hollywood movie or coconut-flavoured TV ad. What might be chirping bird-calls (sounding suspiciously like short-wave radio signals), and an insistent peck on the piano give way to demented percussion, spiritual-sax and an Alpine brass fanfare that’s drowned out by electrical storms of yowling distortion. There’s electronic raindrops, a duet for bongo drums and ring-modulator, plus various versions of nature music in the expansive, widescreen mode where Sibelius meets John Williams. Add weird electronic wig-outs mixed with kon-tiki lounge and it’s suddenly like John Zorn hanging with Karl-Heinz Stockhausen round at Martin Denny’s place. Welcome to ‘The Exotica Album’ by Øyvind Torvund. This is maximal music, where a gallon’s worth of content is squeezed into a pint-pot of recording time, and it’s great.