Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Ashbury Keys last, for now, full album was released back in 2004 and as with their debut release, the follow up Dancers and the E.P. Wake Up that was to come, the music that this power-pop trio creates is of such a high standard, a cornucopia of quality that it feels such a shame that Growing Up was the last big piece of work by this incredibly likeable band.
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There have been many celebrated writers throughout Ireland’s incredible literary past, Seamus Heaney and James Joyce to name but two and in both of these great men and their renowned, illustrious works can be found the template of story-telling that encompasses Kevin Doherty and his latest album Seeing Things.
Like Joyce in his seminal book Dubliners or one of Seamus Heaney’s many poems there is a construct of narrative that is almost unique to both these men and Kevin Doherty. The music, whilst hauntingly beautiful and as serene as the countryside of Ireland is almost secondary to the voice, the splendid outpouring, humbly delivered but with an exuberance, a joyful melancholy that is hard to beat or replicate.
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Sometimes it seems that you can come across a band that you instantly fall for when you weren’t even looking. As when you stop looking for that one special person and just concentrate on the small things that make you happy and take life on a day to day basis, out of nowhere they come and take root in your life. Such is the effect of Glasgow band King King and their Blues styled rock and their album Standing In The Shadows on the heart that for a while you cannot think of anything better to listen to every night.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
If any more proof were needed that the Metal scene in the lands that make up the large expanse of Scandinavia, a huge resounding piece of musical evidence makes its way via Spinefarm Records in the form of Finnish band Kalmah and their brand new album Seventh Swamphony.
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Somewhere between Ashbury Keys debut album being unleashed and the release of Dancers in 2001, the Texas Power pop trio took a trip from very good into the territory of the outstanding band they would become.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10
Even the disinterested and unfathomable will concede somewhere, no matter how begrudgingly and with fists clenched in anger, that Status Quo must be doing something right to have released 30 albums and over 70 singles. The music that in part defined an era for their fans still has the power to get a broad smile from almost anyone at some point, to nod in agreement should it come on a pub jukebox and enjoy the brief respite the simply crafted songs offer. It is up-beat and sometimes can be shockingly great stuff.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Invisible Empire/Crescent Moon marks a new line in the sand for K T Tunstall, perhaps the start of new beginning for the Scottish singer/musician as she comes to terms with life and what it offers.
The raw emotion that filters through every track on the album is one that will endear her to her legion of fans as every sinew, muscle and vessel is to put the test, given a reason to howl at the desert moon. Ms. Tunstall takes advantage of this feeling and produces a thoughtful and somewhat considered performance in the studio, whilst all the time seeking answers to some very age old and relevant questions that every human being asks at one point or another during their life time.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
At one point, you can almost catch yourself thinking, and with the greatest of respect to the legend and dearly missed Ronni James Dio, why oh why did Black Sabbath ever fracture and tear themselves apart? The answer quickly springs to mind and you are left lamenting what could have been during that period but like all good tales of good and evil, of heroes and villains, the Black Sabbath story is not finished yet as their stunning new album 13 will attest.
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In the end it doesn’t matter where you are from, that really is not the point as you can be born in one city and then move the next day. What it comes down to is where you have felt comfortable in your life and what you achieve whilst you live there and what you leave behind. The three men that make up the folk band Gary Maginnis & The Like certainly have that left the very best part of them in the North-West of England whilst retaining that singular splendour of Belfast very much in their hearts and in their ability to tell a story, nowhere is this more exemplified by their new release of Ghost Town Blues.
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Somewhere in the deepest darkest parts of the North, away from the bright lights of Manchester, the larger, older and sometimes forgotten mill towns that cut into the countryside that borders Yorkshire and its bitter but sometimes friendly rival Lancashire, a sound is stirring. Some great acoustic music is finding its way out of the moorlands and into the thoughts of the wider world.