Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
When the art of the Progressive is hidden from sight, when it takes on the clothes and appearance of something else entirely, that is when it has done its job well and with sincerity wrapped around every fibre of tissue ot commands.
The point of the Progressive is to stand alert in someone’s else’s shadow until they have become used to your presence and start to exhibit and extol the virtues and acts of life that the Progressive runs into the territory of the revolutionary; and every act in the end needs to be revolutionary.
Such is the effect that Duncan Lyall has on the genre, that every note, twist and profound beat of his brand-new album, Milestone, is an embedded in the soul of the activist and radical initiative. This should come as no surprise for those who have already warmed to him through his presence in the Treacherous Orchestra, his collaboratory work with Mary Chaplin Carpenter, Vince Mendoza, and Mark Knopfler, and the sterling application of the bass within the creative field laid out by the sensational Kate Rusby.
Landmark moments are to be cherished, and when they radical enough to break the seal of expectancy and be seen as more than just a glimmer of the recently adopted pose offered by one and all, the sense of fashionable stamp bleeding out of every pore, then you know you have come across something special indeed, a piece of art that stands apart from the machine.
Ambitious, furious, calm, collected, and influential, Milestone sees the collection of six songs, Wind In The Trees, Barnacarry Bay, Two Corbies, Roli, Z, and Titan take to the stand with pride, with affection, with the truism of the progressive soul wanting to break free and gain more insight into the traditional, before turning it on its head and installing the first declaration of moving the goalposts in favour of the listener and the performer, rather than pandering to the habit and the conventional.
A terrific album, Milestone is elegant in its delivery, simply mutinous and beautifully radical in its point of view.
Duncan Lyall releases Milestone on July 9th 2021 via Red Deer Records.
Ian D. Hall