Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

There is something about a new beginning that really sets the fires going, it gets underneath the skin and allows original perspective to take hold; nothing ever truly is let go in this new beginning but the freedom to be yourself is astonishing. Like being freed from a maze you had no idea you were in, to see the doorway open at the other end and enticing you try a different field, that must be the most liberating feeling of them all.

For Maze, Groundhog Day is that release, it is the new beginning that Gary Davis has perhaps needed in his musical career and one that despite the name of the latest single, is not about repetition but redemption, a innovate soul carrying a new message but with the same fantastic voice that held him in such great praise with his previous band.

Whilst comparing bands would be detrimental and quite wrong, there is a happiness, an angry bliss that is remarkable and confident in the tone of the songs, the glee of cool and the unhindered display of early Rock vibe comes out as Maze take control of the situation; the beat, hypnotic, elegant and strong is bordering upon love at first sight and the breathless exhilaration that you know is about to come, is magnified and leaves the listener understanding that being caught in the trap of the maze is just a matter of learning the right way out.

The track is subliminal, it gets underneath your head before you even realise it, like a beautiful and echoing S.O.S. played out on a tender saxophone of heart stomping bass, it asks to be heard in the most splendid of ways and it does so, the sign of liberation grows ever more acute and dynamic.

Groundhog Day is a splendid debut single from Maze, this is what the final moments of 2016 were waiting for, the clock may be ticking down but the heart rate is truly speeding along.

Ian D. Hall