Category Archives: Music

Erja Lyytinen: Diamonds On The Road -Live 2023. Live Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Live albums are defined by their nature to aim arrows of desire straight at the heart of the discerning and fanciful listener, they are created not only to showcase the brilliance of the artist in the setting of their choice, but to install the craving to witness the machine and the soul working in harmony for themselves; it is a symbol of union that has been proactively astute for decades and does wonders for the morale of both the musician and for the loving inquisitive public.

Erja Lyytinen: Diamonds On The Road -Live 2023. Live Album Review. full post

(478 words, estimated 1:55 mins reading time)

Steely Dan: Aja. Album Reissue Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

It is not what you know, but what you come to understand that means you have found revolution and evolution to be twins sharing a similar heart, a beat that time will always provide even when you don’t realise its was always waiting for you to catch up and be part of the movement going forward.

Evolution and revolution beats within every pulse of music, and perhaps for Steely Dan that was the driving force as Walter Becker and Donald Fagan sought expanse, as they strove for a kind of enlightenment and ambition in the album Aja.

Steely Dan: Aja. Album Reissue Review. full post

(454 words, estimated 1:49 mins reading time)

Magnetic Skies: Empire Falling. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The connection we believe we seek is not always apparent, it can come out of nowhere, it comes as we build monuments to all that we once held dear, it arrives unannounced as we see the past demolished in favour of new beliefs and loves, and as we come to understand the time it takes to see an Empire Falling, so we are struck by the enormity of the task in front of us to create a realm that will not suffer the same fate again.

Magnetic Skies: Empire Falling. Album Review. full post

(401 words, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

Richard Wright: Wet Dream. Steven Wilson Remix. Album Reissue Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It seems incredulous that one of the godfathers of Progressive Rock should witness his own solo career defined by what could only be described as inertia, even apathy as he struggled to live in the shadows of two of the biggest presences and one of absolute enigma as they created music that would span into the coming decades with brutal certainty.

Richard Wright: Wet Dream. Steven Wilson Remix. Album Reissue Review. full post

(590 words, estimated 2:22 mins reading time)

Toyah: The Changeling. Album Reissue Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

When an album has the feel of a concept perfectly weaved through it, and yet does not have the final essence that gives it that stamp of recognition, that is the sign of total mastery by the artist, and arguably what might be considered the best album of a career because of it.

Toyah, the undisputed Queen of Birmingham’s gig theatre experience, stepped out of the adulation received for the album Anthem, and perhaps found a different way to express her own feelings, her emotions, and turned the poetry and art within her rage to one which is almost Progressive, beyond verse, it is punk but with an extra emotional drama attached to it.

Toyah: The Changeling. Album Reissue Review. full post

(368 words, estimated 1:28 mins reading time)

Joe Bonamassa: Blues Deluxe Vol.2. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Often a performer will acknowledge the influence of a band or songwriter in a way that an odd song will creep into their repertoire on stage or feature with a wistful air of appreciation on an album; it is a more than a nod to the past, it is a tribute that all who create art must admit to if they are to be seen as sincere and earnest about their craft.

Joe Bonamassa: Blues Deluxe Vol.2. Album Review. full post

(480 words, estimated 1:55 mins reading time)

The Brand New Heavies: Never Stop – The Best Of The Brand New Heavies. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Never Stop…for the moment you do you run the risk of people believing you have become an irrelevance, you become forgotten, only finding your name being mentioned in passing in a popular evening gameshow or recalled as the music for an arthouse film’s midway credits.

The Brand New Heavies: Never Stop – The Best Of The Brand New Heavies. Album Review. full post

(370 words, estimated 1:29 mins reading time)

Ian David Green: Songs To The Dust. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

We scatter dust to the wind when time has reached its end, when that faithful friend has left us and we wish to ensure that they travel onwards, that their force, their soul, will keep being part of the world and all it can envision beneath its wings.

Ian David Green: Songs To The Dust. Album Review. full post

(413 words, estimated 1:39 mins reading time)

3: Rockin’ The Ritz: NYC 1988. Album Review. Album Reissue.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

The brightest star can be seen for only a short time, that does not mean its value is diminished, it does not mean that it only exists in our memory for the least amount of time, it just reflects the volume of luminosity that it offered as its brief  reign was felt by all who saw it, who was influenced by its appearance, or who have only found its existence through the mention of a greater power. That star will be forever astonishing.

3: Rockin’ The Ritz: NYC 1988. Album Review. Album Reissue. full post

(438 words, estimated 1:45 mins reading time)

Huey Lewis & The News: Sports. 40th Anniversary Release. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

With all respect intended, the 80s were arguably the moment when popular music hit its absolute zenith. The 60s were magical, the 70s illuminating, but the 80s seemed to bring music completely to a different audience that required a diversity of sound, the first sense of expanding genres, blurring them, marketing them with aggression, the battle to be the hero or heroine on the walls of the new teenagers, the Generation X wave and to make the most of the new modes of delivering sound to the senses…that was the moment when it truly reached its moments.

Huey Lewis & The News: Sports. 40th Anniversary Release. Album Review. full post

(490 words, estimated 1:58 mins reading time)