Jess

Harnell released his only solo album, The Sound of Your Voice, in 1995. He is the lead vocalist in the pop/metal mashup rock band, Rock Sugar, which evolved from his previous band, Loud & Clear. With Loud & Clear or Rock Sugar, Harnell released five albums: Disc-Connected (2003), self-titled demo album (2007), Festival of Fire (2008), Reimaginator (2010), and Reinventinator (2021).

Third time around for Jess and the Ancient Ones sees them take a magical mystery trip to the dark side of the sixties as seen through the eyes of modern-day occult rock musicians. This time the band went for an organic and human approach and produced a very old fashioned album, 9 songs and 34 minutes, recorded and mixed together with their live sound engineer. Groovy, heavy, psychedelic beat music? Hard death rock? Occult head-exploding meltdown? All of them and more. “I cannot put a label on it, I just make it as it comes”, says band guitarist and composer Thomas Corpse, who also created the lysergic cover art to The Horse and Other Weird Tales.

Although it’s been only nine months since the release of their brilliant and spellbinding debut album, Finland’s Jess and The Ancient Ones have already moved on. Once again recorded with Swedish sonic wizard Tore Stjerna of Necromorbus Studio in their hometown Kuopio, ‘Astral Sabbat’ sees them pushing forward the boundaries of the sound established on their first full-length and forging their own path, as personified by the rather unusual choice of cover song: ‘Long And Lonesome Road’, originally written and recorded by Dutch rock outfit Shocking Blue, mostly known for their mega-hit ‘Venus’.

Third time around for Jess and the Ancient Ones sees them take a magical mystery trip to the dark side of the sixties as seen through the eyes of modern-day occult rock musicians. This time the band went for an organic and human approach and produced a very old fashioned album, 9 songs and 31 minutes, recorded and mixed together with their live sound engineer.

Steeve LAFFONT grew up in France in a family of Sinti , originally from Italy, now based in Perpignan. Self-taught, he began playing piano at 6 years and his uncle Mario PETRICCIOLI bought him his first guitar three years later. That’s when the passion for music and especially for his new instrument actually begins. It discovers and learns a natural harmonies and rhythms of the original music of Django Reinhardt when he then added his compositions, influenced by the rhythms of modern jazz. It’s only a few years, a level that allows him to play during musical evenings with family and friends with the greatest jazz manouche: Tchavolo Schmitt, Bireli Lagrene, Raphal Fays, Stochelo Rosenberg and Boy Bauer.

On Cosmic Wink, Jess Williamson’s third album following the self-published Native State and Heart Song, an artist emerges as another self in love, under California’s influence, and a part of an even wider consciousness. Cosmic Wink is a record about how vulnerability can feel something less vulnerable when love - true, deep love - creates a latticework of strength underneath the frame of our humanity.

Some have likened Herbert von Karajan's "chamber-music approach" to Wagner's Ring cycle in terms of his scaling down or deconstructing the heroic roles. This approach has less to do with dynamics per se than it does with von Karajan's masterful balancing of voices and instruments. He achieves revelations of horizontal clarity, allowing no contrapuntal strand to emerge with an unwanted accent or a miscalibrated dynamic. The texts are unusually pinpointed and distinct, although the singers don't convey the experience and dimension of Sir Georg Solti's cast on London. There are exceptions.