"MAGIC PIE: drummer, Jan T Johannessen has sent us the following update ...
Magic Pie artworkHi, Springtime is approaching and the studiowork for the new Magic Pie CD "Circus of Life" is in its final phase. A glimpse of some of the artwork is shown here.

The CD is planned for release in April. There will be a few local concerts in Norway in front of the Rites of Spring festival (ROSfest) which takes place in USA at the end of the month. The concerts will be announced consecutive when confirmed.

A small live taste of some of the new songs from a concert in October 06 can be heard HERE and for further news there's always Magic Pie's MySpace page."

"AEON SPOKE: the progressive, ethereal-rock project featuring Cynic members Paul Masvidal (vocals, guitar) and Sean Reinert (drums), will release its self-titled debut album in Germany on March 2 via SPV Records.
Being the only musicians at their neighborhood elementary school, Sean Reinert and Paul Masvidal first met in Miami, when they were 12 years old, and immediately started writing songs and rehearsing together on what would become an obsessive aural journey from classical to pop to metal to jazz and back within a ten-year period. By their late teens they were playing everything from MAHAVISHNU ORCHESTRA to MILES DAVIS, and learning the songs of the Real/Fake book. Proficiency and perseverance saw their band, the progressive-rock/metal outfit CYNIC, propelled to indie bestseller status. After the excitement of world tours and international kudos, the band quietly dissolved. Shortly after, Paul and Sean relocated to Los Angeles and formed AEON SPOKE with Evo.

Commented the band: "We're okay with art taking itself seriously and approaching it with the weight of the world. Lightness doesn't appeal to us. We want to get down and dirty with human experience and allow our art to reflect that. We're a messy species with minds that complicate everything. The spiritual investigation in our work is not about preaching, as much as it is about healing oneself. Like everyone, we're just trying to get through life the best we know how. Music is a tool and a language. If people can relate to our songs, then perhaps we've done our job."

A free MP3 of the album's first single, Emmanuel, is available for download at this [url=http://www.spv.de/eng/aeonspoke/AEON_SPOKE_-_Emmanuel[E].mp3]location[/url]."

Je vais écouter ça, bien possible que ça soit du tout bon !

Mouais. Pas enchanté par cette écoute.





Sinon, ça c'est du tout bon d'avance, ma tête à couper !

"THE TANGENT: is currently working on three projects: a new live album, a live DVD and a new studio album.
First of three "projects in progress" to report on is the official Tangent Live Album to be released by Inside Out later this year. At present the album is being mixed and edited by Andy at Guy Manning's Burnside facility in Leeds, UK. The album is culled from concerts in 2005 and 2006 in the USA, the UK and mainland Europe. Music from all three Tangent studio albums is represented, as well as at least one cover version. The working title for the album is Going Off On One, and it will be a 3 disc set (to start with) - the THIRD (bonus) disc will be a DVD of the band's "fan" concert in Southend On Sea in September 2006 - with all SEVEN members of the band (so this includes Sam Baine and Guy Manning) crammed onto a "club" stage - but delivering a very memorable performance.

"We were in the UK to play the CRS" says Jonas Reingold, "but a group of the band's fans organised another gig the night after... and sent a video crew along to make sure they captured the moment when we were all together on stage... it was great, the fans and the band working together to make something possible".
A ROUGH VIDEO EDIT of Lost In London is available at youtube and can be found below:



The fourth Tangent album A Crisis In Midlife is still in its writing stages. The Tangent website has the following to report on it:
Still in composition the fourth Tangent studio album is still some way away, but we here at thetangent.org can reveal that it is shaping up very nicely. A few songs have reached our ears here... Not As Good As The Book sounds to us like a bouncy mixture of PFM and It Bites, and Midlife Crisis is a superb song - a more modern GPS Culture type of affair. We haven't heard The Cyber Ex yet... but Andy has said it is "like a cross between Peter Gabriel and Genesis" - errrrrm... Earth calling Andy Tillison!!! A COVER VERSION is planned... "The last thing on EARTH you'd expect us to do" says Guy, but when we tentatively suggested that that would surely be Boom Boom Shake Shake The Room by Fresh Prince and Jazzy Jeff we were met with po faced silence. Also in the frame for the next album are Four Egos One War - an epic track which began life in Andy's Parallel or 90 Degrees band... and in our opinion THE BEST THING HE EVER WROTE.... the track was never released and we here at thetangent.org are ringing him up on an hourly basis to get this song finally properly recorded and released."

"PENDRAGON: Shortly after their DVD And Now Everybody To The Stage Pendragon comes with yet another DVD release. Once again shot in Poland, and once again released on the Metal Mind label.
Celebrating the 21st Anniversary of the release of The Jewel, Pendragon members past and present reunited and came together to play a very special concert in Katowice, Poland. The fun and excitement at this incredible concert is obvious when you watch it, it is contagious and it gives you a terrific insight as to how Pendragon have remained so very popular with fans and musicians alike for over 21 years.

On this very special occasion, the band decided to present a very special setlist, including songs from the band's classic debut The Jewel (like the timeless Alaska, Leviathan, and The Black Knight), but also several other classics back from the Marquee Club days (like Fly High Fall Far or Victims of Life) plus a few other surprises. Get ready for nearly 2 hours of some of the best music that the neo/progressive genre has to offer!

The DVD is enhanced with an interview with Nick Barret and John Barnfield, "Behind the Scenes" bonus video footage and more! Also available in a limited digipack edition, including 2 CDs with songs recorded at the concert!

Line-up: Nick Barrett - vocals, guitar, Clive Nolan - keyboards, backing vocals, Peter Gee - bass, backing vocals, Rik Carter - keyboards, backing vocals, Julian Baker - saxophone, guitar, backing vocals, John Barnfield - keyboards and Joe Crabtree - drums.

The Release date: 16 April 2007 (Europe) and 24 April 2007 (US).
DVD
1. Higher Circles
2. The Pleasure of Hope
3. Leviathan
4. Victims of Life
5. Armageddon
6. Fly High Fall Far
7. Excalibur
8. Please
9. Oh Divineo
10. Alaska
11. Dark Summer's Day
12. Circus
13. The Black Knight
14. 2AM
15. Stan and Ollie

Pendragon - Past & Presence DVD
CDs (only available in limited swing case edition)

CD1
1. Higher Circles
2. The Pleasure of Hope
3. Leviathan
4. Victims of Life
5. Armageddon
6. Fly High Fall Far
7. Excalibur
8. Please
9. Oh Divineo

CD2
1. Alaska
2. Dark Summer's Day
3. Circus
4. The Black Knight
5. 2AM
6. Stan and Ollie

Bonus video:
Interview with Nick Barrett and John Barnfield
Behind the Scenes
Nigel Harris on drums at Riffs Bar, UK, 28th Oct 2006

Also includes:
- Photo gallery
- Biography
- Discography
- Desktop images
- Weblinks
- Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound"

Cela faisait un bail que l'on en entendait plus parler... :

"MAGELLAN: have released a new album "digitally" on the "Muse-Wrapped Records" label which deals with download "Sell Flow" technology. Entitled Innocent God the album is available for download on an album or per track basis, and also as a CD. According to the blurb ...

Trent (vocals, keyboards) and Wayne (guitars and bass guitar) virtually approached 'Innocent God' as a creative and personal catharsis. With a new attitude toward their music and a new technology company behind them, the Gardners believe Magellan (which they formed in 1990) is surging forward. The San Francisco Bay-area brothers are joined by prog rock veteran Robert Berry on the album. "Innocent God" is really a transitional album. There's been a musical niche we've been in for the last few years. We've been in the process of moving out of traditional '70s-style progressive rock. Trent says. "Creating long progressive rock songs is difficult. We've taken fewer ideas for songs and developed them more."

The album has seven songs:

01 Invisible Bright Man
02 My Warrior
03 Innocent God
04 Found
05 Who To Believe
06 Sea Of Details
07 Slow Burn"

Incroyable, ça n'arrête pas... !

"THE FLOWER KINGS: Roine Stolt posted a lengthy update on his Myspace site:
...Back to work I managed to make final adjustments and mastering of the new Flowerkings compilation CD and to get together a fancy booklet for the same CD-titeled The Road Back Home, it's scheduled for a June release on Inside Out.
I has 27 songs ,most of them remixed and even changed in some departments ,mainly backingvocal and guitar/keys.
To these ears it all sounds splendid and it will be a joyful ride whenever you get your headphones on and crank it up!! mid June (hopefully the double will sell for a single CD price .

But even more important we are ready to start work on next TFK studio release. Well it started some time ago with doing demos of course and now we will start reharsing tomorrow and then go into a very cool studio called Varispeed on March 26th .
The studio have a definite 70 retro vibe, it has got 3(!!) NEVE desks and lots of other cool stuff, vintage mikes Hammond, Rhodes, old blackface Fenderamps and all that shit.

The material is of course impossible to be described and should maybe not be, besides too many bands rave about their own music and new recordings way too early, I am of the opinion that the music speak for itself and shall not be hyped, however .........my very firmly rooted gut feel is that the material we have is by far the best symphonic prog that we've ever had and as if this was not enough Jonas is even more enthusiastic and both Hasse and Tomas are very fired up too. So maybe there is something in there after all and when I say "symphonic prog" I mean it in the true sense. I.o.w . it means there is virually no "filler" ,I mean what some people have accused us for, filling out the CD's with ambient, jazz or electronic experiments.
Whatever you feel about that opinion this CD will not see as much as 5 seconds of it .

Nor have we been aiming at more modern mainstream prog or metal like Porcupine Tree, POS, Mars Volta, Tool, Spocks or Neal Morse for that matter and there will be no real surprises, no experiment for experiments sake ..
So this new CD will only contain the destilled VERY BEST of what most of you concider to be the heart of prog.
The sound is very much Flowerkings and that means in the spirit of when prog was at it's peak,melody reign and bombast was a good thing.

So if I were to describe it for someone who had been sleeping or in a coma since 1978 ( no I'm not talking about all the A&R folks on the major labels) I'd probably say it's a mix of Shine On Brightly, Selling England By The Pound, Brain Salad Surgery, Tales From Topographic Oceans, In A Glass House, Abbey Road, Utopia, Hamburg Concerto, Refugee, The Snow Goose, In The Court Of The Crimson King, Eldorado, One Size fits all, Jesus Christ Superstar and Dark Side Of The Moon......... Yes it is turning out to be 100% certified symph/prog !!! well now that can change of course and we end up with something like the latest Dimmu Borgir ......""*?%€#

Anyway rest assured that we will pour our hearts into doing the best prog album in 35 years,now if you ask Jonas he's convinced it is going to happen .....and that's a bit odd coming from Jonas .The working title of the album is .......xxxxxxx ,no I won't spoil that fun,or give it away to some copycat (anyway it is a very cool and fitting title that says all about our music ) ....

Anyway we're looking at a few "epics", a main piece of 24 minutes and two "shorter" tracks of around 12 min, plus Tomas have a fast and furious instrumental and I have the odd 5 min track with the quirky 11/8 timesignature; Hasse and I share the vocals about 50/50 and the drumming will be excellent and very proggy (you don't know what I know ), we have Hammond, Rhodes, Wurlizer, Grand Piano, Rickenbacker 12-string, 2 real minimoogs and plenty of odd percussion ...... sounds predictable ?.....sure it is but who gives a shit as long as the music is a trip.

Expect nothing but a trip back to when prog ruled and was even hip,we're goona take you there guys....... promise !!!"

Bonjour les références en plus, que des trucs énormes...

Tiens, j'avais failli m'interesser a Magellan il y a peu. Alors, ça donne quoi et ça lorgne du côté de quel groupe ?

Bouef, pour ma part ça ne donne pas grand chose. Le peu de souvenirs que j'en ai c'est un truc décousu, avec des moment superbes noyés dans un un tas de trucs pas terribles. Mais ce sont de 'vieux' souvenirs, faut voir.

nouvel album de Neal Morse en acoustique :

Neal Morse – Songs From The Highway
Recorded in January of 2007 with only one acoustic guitar and one vocal, this is some fresh, intimate and different stuff than you’ve ever heard from Neal. And the songs are amazing. There are some real classics on this one. From the touching “There is Nothin’ God Can’t Change” to the haunting “That Crutch” to the amusing qualities of “The Talking Mega-Church Blues”, this is a CD that will speak to you for a lifetime. These songs are based on Christian themes but they are not just for Christians. They are for anyone who can appreciate a great song with an open heart.

Track list:

1. Isaiah 60
2. There Is Nothin’ That God Can’t Change
3. That Crutch
4. I Dreamed Of A River
5. Talking Mega Church Blues
6. You Can Be Delivered
7. Resurrection Ground
8. What He’s Done For Me
9. Prayer For Germany
10. Make Me A Dishwasher
11. Pierce My Heart
12. Maybe If We Praise Him

"THE FLOWER KINGS: In two news updates from Roine Stolt ... the first posted the day after our April Fools Days Newspage ...
Hi ALL

I just returned from a fabulous week in the studio, where all of the band were laying down the basic tracks for our new CD.

First of all, a big NO, Hasse Froberg is not leaving the band and he have no plans or no desire whatever to go to India to teach, nor have his wife or kids (april fools) Then a big YES, Zoltan Csörsz have recorded with the band and we are all VERY excited about the quality and the sheer committment that Zoltan have put into this recording. It's too early to tell if Zoltan will play on the tour, but we won't rule it out, it all depend on our individual schedules, what however seems unlikely at this point is that Marcus will sing lead (april fools) or can commit 100% to drumming on this tour or future tours, more news to follow later.

The recording week have been a great experience for us all, we've been in a great studio facility that have tons of vintage gear and we've had it 24/7 so we've lived there and we've worked with our trusted team of Petrus Königson as engineeer and we've had Per Nordin there videofilming the sessions, so we have hours and hours of filmed material.

The result is as far as we can see a great symphonic & progressive rock album that have more of the Retropolis/Stardust/Flower Power vibe, but perhaps a bit more "progressive" in the sense there are no short easy listening songs, however there are very melodic and likewise catchy sections integrated in these epics. A few of these songs were really difficult to play, the intricacy of time signatures had us on our toes, but it was great fun. Yes there are similarities to songs like Stardust We Are or Garden Of Dreams but perhaps even as much to the Transatlantics epics.

The energy level was on a hi all the time and I guess it shows, again Zoltan did a terrific job behind the kit, easily as good or better than his work on UTF, it even has a bit of Terry Bozzio tom tom extravaganza and a few short solo spots that are all terrific.

The sound quality is head and shoulders above what we got from the Medley on Paradox Hotel, Petrus is a genious and the Varispeed studio with it's 3 NEVE desks and old U 47 Telefunkens, Neumans etc. is the coolest and the best studio I've ever recorded in, the result is top notch and the vibe there was all late 60's and early 70's.

We had the pleasure to use a custom modified ( by expert Brian Davenport) Hammond B 3 that sounded just fabulous and along with that we will, or have used real Minimoogs, Wurlizer, Fender Rhodes pianos and a Grand Piano. This means that this album will see more of the vintage keyboard sounds than on any other TFK record, I feel it goes well with the songs that have great melodic and warm melodies that take me back to the glory days of Procol Harum, ELP, Genesis, Yes, Focus, Gentle Giant, Jethro Tull, Deep Purple and The Beatles. I have tried to remember the feeling of standing on stage when the band sound great and we really feel like we're moving air and we're moving peoples hearts and I've tried to write from that perspective, perhaps with a less intellectual style and more of a direct soulful vibe.

Now we have a few weeks of overdubbing vocals and percussion, xtra guitars and keys and hopefully by mid June we have delivered a steaming hot new CD album to Inside Out that we're proud of and that will take you back to the glory days of prog.

In my opinion TFK have never sounded better and never delivered such a compact collection of what we do best, I admit we took a few (interesting) detours but this is what defines the band, this is as close as it gets to what I set out to do 12 years ago.

btw, Did I mention that Hasse will be singing with us next tour ......and next ......

And we'll make shure to prepare the drumkits with asbest too........

and no drummer will take the lead mike, nor will we turn our amps up to more than 11, we will try keep it just below that 11 mark.

Roine
The second news update comes a few days later ...
Well, the only thing we know for shure at the moment is that Marcus could not, or did not want to let The Flower Kings have priority over his own popgroup Clark this month. This has been the case a few times since he started with the band and even if we can understand and respect his decision it will still leave a very big "IF" for us everytime we plan a tour or a recording.

Personally I felt that if Marcus prefer to go do gigs with his pop group rather than recording an album with Flower Kings it probably means his feelings for TFK and the music genre are not hot and will probably not change for the better in near future, Marcus simply is not a big prog fan, nor a fusion or "weird music" fan. He prefers more mainstream pop productions with solid drumming, I love that too but I feel TFK are going in a different direction.

So reality is that Marcus love and prefer another type of music than the average TFK fan, even if he did a great job on both Paradox Hotel and Instant Delivery, so goes his priorities, without doubt.

This means we cannot predict the near future 100% but it seems less likely he will change his position and join TFK full time and we'll have to look for a new drummer if we want 100% commitment.

As for Zoltan, we will see how things develop, all we can agree on at this time is that he just did a fabulous job on the new CD and that his playing style may fit our music better as it has developed on this new record, besides he's a sweet guy deep down and really passionate about his music and his drumming. After all, what didn't work out 100% around 2004 might work out today, but it's too early to tell ... stay tuned.

But there's always that young dude & great drummer, Mike PornToy ...

Roine"



Je commence à me lasser sérieux, en plus le dernier ne m'avait pas accroché... Ferait mieux de se concentrer sur THE TANGENT, qui eux proposent vraiment une musique "exploratrice".

Stolt n'est plus dans The Tangent depuis 2005, et vu que c'est lui qui fait quasiment tout chez les Flower Kings, ca changerait pas grand chose.

Oui, enfin ça veut juste dire qu'il n'a pas participé au denier album !

Puis disons que comme dans THE TANGENT il n'était pas tout seul les autres devaient modérer son influence.

A propos de THE TANGENT, tu connais PARALLEL OR 90 DEGREES Seo ? (le groupe d'où vient le 'clavieriste')

Jamais entendu parler.

Rigole pas, c'est d'la bonne !

Il me semble que Kaipa a sorti ou va sortir un nouvel album ?

Oui... !

Je croyais bien que personne ne s'intéressait à ça, tu veux la news ?

flower kings, the tangent, Kaipa, c'est un peu le meme cercle tout ca... Je viens de voir le disque sur le site de inside out

Tout à fait, la même "famille", au moins musicale !

"KAIPA: New album and new guitar player for Kaipa!
In May 2007 KAIPA will release their 9th and brand new studio album "Angling feelings" on InsideOut Music. This is the first Kaipa album with new guitar player Per Nilsson. Kaipa’s mastermind and keyboard player Hans Lundin and Per are old friends and worked together recording the album "Hagen: Corridors of time" in the late 90’s. Per is nowadays mostly famous as the lead guitar player in Swedish metal band Scar Symmetry.

Hans has written all the songs for the new album and in co-operation with the other members Morgan Ågren, Jonas Reingold, Per Nilsson, Patrik Lundström and Aleena Gibson he has formed the final result. Sound clips from the new album will be available at MySpace.

Hans describes the birth of this album: During the summer of 2005 I worked with the Kaipa box and I didn’t make any attempt to write new music. When I started to write the songs for this album in October 2005 I was afraid that I was totally out of ideas but the fact is it was like opening a magical box and in less than three months most of the songs for the new album were written. With this album I allowed the music to find it’s own direction and sometimes flow in very unexpected directions but also to be very simple when I felt it was necessary. I wanted to make a progressive music but not in the traditional way. When I listen to the final result I think the best description of the music on this album would be: Progressive-fusion-folk-rock. The title track “Angling feelings” is inspired by Jan Ternald’s original artwork for the album and as a fact I think during the whole writing process I tried to keep up this positive vibe I find in this artwork. This is probably the most joyful and relaxed recording session I’ve ever been involved in and I hope you can hear it in the final result.

1. Angling feelings
2. The glorious silence within
3. The fleeting existence of time
4. Pulsation
5. Liquid holes in the sky
6. Solitary pathway
7. Broken chords
8. Path of humbleness
9. Where’s the captain?
10. This ship of life

Kaipa consists of: Hans Lundin: Electric, acoustic and virtual keyboards, vocals, Per Nilsson: Electric guitars, Morgan Ågren: Drums, Jonas Reingold: Electric basses, Patrik Lundström: Vocals and Aleena Gibson: Vocals. Special guest on the ablum is: Fredrik Lindqvist: Recorders & whistles (Track 1, 2, 8, 9 & 10).

Release dates: Germany Austria Switzerland: May 18th, Europe: May 21st, North America: May 22nd"

Comment les fans des Flower Kings font pour digérer les doubles albums identiques qu'ils sortent tous les 6 mois ? (sans compter les 500 sides projects) ! Avec les morceaux de 20 minutes, chaud chaud à assimiler tout ça

Honnêtement je suis plutôt en phase d'indigestion là. Surtout de THE FLOWER KINGS himselves.