AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST
GRANT MOON has a rummage down the back of the Prog sofa for the ones that nearly got away…
The self-titled debut from Torontobased collective UWUW (We Are Busy Bodies) is a brilliant, refreshing mash-up of horn-led prog-pop with squalling psych guitars, vocal hooks and intelligent, skew-whiff arrangements. Apparently singer Marker Starling’s lyrics broach apocalyptic thoughts and Jean-Luc Godard’s movie
Alphaville, but when the music’s as gauche and avant-funky as Scattered Ashes and Staircase To The End Of The World, the vocals are just another layer in the sunny, uplifting sound.
Ali Ferguson is the guitarist for ex-Genesis/Stiltskin singer Ray Wilson, and the Scot’s third album
The Contemplative Power Of Water (Little Blue Room) showcases his seasoned fretwork and composing skills. David Gilmour’s lead style is at the root of Ferguson’s own thick, lyrical and exquisitely controlled electric lines. These, along with his earnest vocals, are couched in ambient backwashes, folky textures and 90s-era electronic beats on a mature, richly rewarding, eco-friendly set. Fronted by vocalist/guitarist Ben Trenerry, Durham trio Prince Bishop cite ELO, Radiohead and Supertramp as influences on their debut album All Is Due (bit.ly/princebishop). There are some glimmers of Jeff Lynne and Roger Hodgson’s brightness on poppy tunes like Come Alive, and some Thom Yorke-isms on Truth Lies In Between. Oblique post-rock chords add depth to their thoughtful, clever and ambitious rock, and while a producer’s firm hand would have ironed out the wrinkles,
All Is Due is a really promising opener.
Thrash, space rock and punk collide on the fifth album from Dublin experimentalists Yurt. V – Upgrade To Obsolete (Yurt/Little Plastic Tapes) is another uncompromising assault of gang vocals, metallic, doomy riffing coloured with analogue synth bleeps, flanged guitars and oddball melodies. Like, say, Voivod, there’s a deceptively intricate method to this trio’s metal-clad madness, which is delivered with maximum elan and zero tosses given about the mainstream. Good on ’em.
Just as committed but much more sombre, Los Angeles heavy prog rockers Vitskär Süden follow their self-titled 2020 debut with The Faceless King (Ripple Music), a clangorous, atmospheric album with themes of “rebirth and the lust for power”. There’s a gothic feel to droning opener The Way, which sets the hellish, post-industrial landscape the record casts us into. Singer/bassist Martin Gardner presides, high priest-like, over the sinister, po-faced doom.
And finally back to Canada for Ontario quintet Taking Balfour. Their second album Dawn Of Polaris is a commercial, arenaready set of intricate prog metal with its nu-metal roots showing. With catchy, hefty songs like Awakening and
The Watcher And The Witness now on their setlist and charismatic singer Spencer Gill clearly growing in confidence, this band deserve to find their kin among fans of Soen, Voyager and even Karnivool.