Reviews of Prog Rock, Classical Music, Art Rock and Jazz
★★★★★ Johnson’s book is a deeply personal and human meditation on music and mental health, and the redemptive power of love Stephen Johnson "...As I got out of the taxi Kate fixed me with a look of intense, focussed concern and walked straight up to me: What’s happened?" This moment from Stephen Johnson’s new book, …
***** How a magnificent new book helped me rediscover the maverick's music The Cover of ROCK and ROLE by Joe Banks published by Kingmaker Publishing. Often, the route to discovering new music is fairly conventional; there's no Damascene moment. I found The Cure and Joy Division (and many other bands) by listening to John Peel …
Steven Wilson is known as ‘The most successful British musician most people have never heard of’. So how did I find him? (updated April 2022) Steven Wilson and Nick Holmes at a book signing in Manchester in April 2022 In February 2009, Steven Wilson did something uncharacteristically violent; he destroyed five iPods. He shot the first …
Here is some electronic music that I wrote under the name Tangerine Trees a few years ago.... Track One... Track Two... Track Three... with thanks to Tangerine Dream for inspiration.
A huge compression of grinding guitar riffs and stupefying bass, only upstaged on occasion by drumming that reminds me of the time my pet frog was squashed by seven falling refrigerators. Paul Ferguson, Amazon Review of Thrak by King Crimson, February 2003 I hope Paul’s frog survived. In case you are wondering whether Paul liked the album, …
The festival of Christmas was central to my relationship with my Father who died thirty years ago, in April 1994. Every year, I used to listen to the Nine Lessons and Carols with him on Christmas Eve on BBC Radio 4. A week or so earlier, he would conduct his local church choir at St Werburgh's in …
Continue reading "My Father, John Charles Holmes 1933 – 1994"