Trollheart

Coven of the wolves --- When Bitter Spring Sleeps --- 2013 (Pagan Flame)


Hmm. The joke may very well be on me. When I sampled this before buying it I was intrigued by its laidback, lush, pastoral feel and thought it might all be like that --- kind of Antimatter or Lake of Tears --- but when I checked for this review I see they are listed as (gulp!) Black Metal and that their front (and only) man has been in other bands called, er, Satan’s Almighty Penis and Destroy Humanity Now. Um. Doesn’t sound too pastoral to me. Has Mister Cock-up checked in for a single room with bath, I wonder? Hold onto your hats, people: we’re goin’ in!

Interestingly, after their demo released in 2008 When Bitter Spring Sleeps (we’re obviously going to be calling them WBSS from now on) shared an album with Panopticon, which those of you who are following the “Recommended by…” thread will know really impressed me with its mix of country and death metal. Also interesting is that as Panopticon is apparently one guy, WBSS is also a one-man show. So will this album be anything like "Kentucky" I wonder? I really don’t know what to expect, so let’s just push play and see how we get on.

Ambient sounds greet us and are joined by a nice acoustic guitar as “Like a flame in the fields” opens the album, some really nice keyboard sounding like pipes or flute coming in too, making a nice sort of medieval atmosphere. I hear feedback electric guitar getting ready to snarl though and percussion ramping up, and now yes it gets harder and more aggressive, the electric guitar punching in and the drums slowly pounding away. With a sound like a wounded animal, one-man-band Lord Sardonyx brings in the vocal, and you know, it’s not at all bad. I can understand it: sort of viking or pagan metal is what it puts me in mind of. The song is a slow grinder with a lot of power, and let’s remember this is one man doing all of this.

It’s said about WBSS that they (or he; which should I use, as this is one guy? Let's go with they, as a band or project) really espouse the old pagan ways in their music and retain a reverence and respect for nature and the Earth, so it’s kind of eco-metal maybe? At least, though the tag is shown as Black Metal, they don’t seem to be singing about Satan. Yet. It’s powerful stuff though, and His Lordship is clearly upset with Man as he snarls ”We've honoured your gods/ Far too long/ And now we sing /The Earth's own song.” Fair enough really. The electric guitar and indeed the percussion drops out entirely in the sixth minute of the almost nine this runs for, leaving the pipes and acoustic guitar, then just the guitar to carry the tune with the pipes coming back in right at the end as it fades out.

There are only seven songs on this album, but apart from two short instrumentals nothing is less than eight minutes, and the longest runs for over eleven. The next one is just short of ten, with Lord Sardonyx again railing against the misuse of Earth’s resources in “Rest in the ground” as he asks ”Why do you condemn /The ground you walk upon? /Why poison the soil /That brings you life?/ There is magic in these trees /And lost wisdom /No longer able to see /Through your sleeping eyes.” Sentiments you can’t really argue with. This too starts off gentle but soon kicks up into a harder, faster metal tune with lots of buzzy electric guitar. Sardonyx actually seems to have a really good voice, almost like an operatic tenor, but he uses it in a different way, nearly drawling the lyrics as he sings, and it’s very effective.

It’s also quite incredible how quickly a ten-minute song goes by, and before I realise it we’re at the end, with a quote from Edvard Munch that surely encapsulates the Lord’s beliefs here: "From my rotting body/ Flowers shall grow /And I am in them /And that is eternity". A short instrumental, complete with birdsong effects and some nice acoustic guitar takes us into the title track, which starts off with the sort of walking tread we heard in Moonsorrow’s “Varjoina kuljemme kuoilleiden maassa” back during Metal Month, then a sort of gypsy camp revellery punctuated by the cries of wolves and the shriek of crows, before hard guitar smashes in and takes the melody in a heavy, powerful direction, Lord Sardonyx’s vocal almost chanting as he sings about the lord of the wolves: ”He is father to the mighty wolves /Raising only grey sons/ Hidden deep in forgotten lands /In caverns there he feeds revenge.” Good uptempo percussion joins the guitar and it’s quite the headbanger with some Maiden/Lizzy style fretwork in it. As we move into the third minute the tempo picks up and the song changes from marching through the forest to trundling along on metal rails, possibly in a sled of some sort pulled by wolves, who howl in the background. Again, powerful stuff. There might be an element of Ragnarok, the Norse legend of the Twilight of the Gods here, as His Lordship declares ”Hammer of hearts and steaming breath /They thunder into nighttime fields /To conquer this world of man /A ravenous sea of blood and fangs.” Ragnarok is also called The Time of the Wolf. Hmm. Could be just coincidence?

The song slows down for a bit of ambient instrumental amid the baying of the wolves in the seventh minute, then it's just their calls that take it to its end. Sort of a little pointless really: almost a full minute taken up by nothing but wolf howls and cries and barks. The second instrumental is up next, basically just native-style drums, very slow and hollow, with some recordings of speech playing under it. It lasts for just over a minute and then the epic begins. Clocking in at just under twelve minutes, “The sky has not always been this way” opens with the by-now-familiar birdsong then a nice folky acoustic guitar, suddenly blasted aside by snarling electric as the drums slide in almost unobtrusively beneath it. It’s over two minutes before the vocal comes in, the guitar remaining tough and growly, something like a violin joining it as Sardonyx wails ”The old ones they say /That the sky has not always been this way.”

Really nice instrumental break from about the sixth minute to the seventh then the vocal comes back in, and again it’s another song that though it is the longest on the album seems to be over all too soon, taking us to the closer, the just short of nine minutes “Homestead hailstorm”, which opens with the sounds of rain and muted, distant thunder, the sound of what could be an iron gate swinging in the wind and banging against its gatepost. In fact, the whole song, all eight minutes and fifty-two seconds of it, is just that: the sound of a gentle rainstorm, which, I guess, given the title we might have expected. Still, no music at all? I guess Lord Sardonyx really takes his nature worship seriously!

TRACKLISTING

1. Like a flame in the fields
2. Rest in the ground
3. Crossing paths
4. Coven of the wolves
5. Tomorrow tribe
6. The sky has not always been this way
7. Homestead hailstorm

First off, I must repeat this is all the work of one man, and it’s pretty damn impressive. Though it wasn’t quite the laidback acoustic music I had been expecting from the samples I heard it didn’t veer too wildly away from that, and though the guitar work at times (most times) was pretty heavy, at other times it was quiet and introspective, and the percussion never made itself too obvious or took things over. The vocals were certainly decent and while I wouldn’t list His Lordship as one of my favourite singers he is definitely suited to a genre of metal, maybe doom or pagan but I don’t think black. I don’t feel this album really flagged for an instant, and even though I sort of felt a little cheated with the closer, it was clever, well done and totally in keeping with the objects, aims and beliefs of the man known both as Lord Sardonyx and When Bitter Spring Sleeps. He certainly remains true to his faith, right to the end.

Most of you will probably not even regard this as metal --- I’m not sure I do --- but if you need an album that makes you think about what we’ve done, and are doing, to our home, without all that new age wishy-washy nonsense, then this could be a stepping stone you should try. If nothing else, it proves that you can love the planet and still be hard as nails: I doubt anyone would dare label Lord Sardonyx as a tree-hugger, though he might not mind.

A very surprising and indeed very satisfying album, and I look forward to more releases from this multi-talented artiste.

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Trollheart

I was always a great reader. I’m not any more, for various reasons, though I do still read of course. But I started young: Kipling’s “The Jungle Book” (not the Disney cartoon I hasten to add) at about age seven. I remember waiting till I was old enough to cross the “great divide” between the junior and the adult section of the library I went to, where the books in the latter looked so much more interesting and inviting. The junior, or children’s section, was filled with what you would expect --- nursery rhymes, Ladybird books of this and that, the adventures of the Mister Men and lots of books with dogs, cats and rabbits on the covers, though they did also carry the likes of Enid Blyton’s children’s classics such as the Famous Five and the Secret Seven, and some interesting historical novels and books, suitably dumbed down for kids of course. And a lot of books about space. Sort of started me on my lifelong love affair with science-fiction really.

So I have my favourite authors of course, but you may be surprised to find that that is not what this section is about. Well, it is, but not solely. In this feature I intend to concentrate not only on my own favourite writers --- poets as well as authors --- but ones who have made the biggest contribution to the world of literature down the ages. I’ll be telling you about them and who they are, what they wrote and maybe featuring, certainly in the case of poets, one or two of their works. If there’s any way I can work in a music angle too I’ll be doing that.

The first writer I want to talk about is someone who I actually don’t like. Well, that’s not entirely true. I like the odd story or poem, but in general I find his stuff to be so unremittingly dark and disturbing that it’s like what I assume listening constantly to Depressive Black Suicidal Metal must be like. I know millions of people enjoy his work, and rightly so. But I don’t. Not much anyway. So let me introduce you now to

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

Credited with almost singlehandedly creating the detective fiction genre and very instrumental in both the horror and science-fiction genres, Edgar Allan Poe was certainly a man who put his own life into his writing. A man dogged by tragedy, death and despair, it’s perhaps not surprising that so much of his writing is sombre, reflective and, ultimately, filled with terror, doom and dread. At an early age he lost both his father and his mother, and though taken in by foster parents at the tender age of three years they never really took to him, never formally adopted him and he fell out with them, though he remained in their care up to about 1826, at which time he was seventeen years old. After a brief spell at university, where he began running up the gambling debts that would dog his pretty miserable life, he enlisted in the army in 1827. This same year he published his first ever collection of poetry and short stories, but unlike his later work it sold very poorly, as did his second and third.

However following the death of his brother in 1831 Poe decided his future lay in writing and made an effort to knuckle down to it seriously. Between his less-than-distinguished military career and his time at university it was the most energy he had devoted to anything in his life. Having found something of a benefactor and landed a job at a newspaper he was now in a position to pursue a career in writing, however this was at the time something that had been attempted by few if any Americans: making a living as an author alone. Most who tried supplemented their income with other jobs, or wrote as a sideline, hoping to make a little money out of it. Lack of copyright laws and his own innate alcoholism hampered his efforts, and the latter robbed him of many contacts he could have made had he kept appointments with the gentlemen instead of the bottle.

Tragedy was not finished with Edgar Allan Poe, and it followed him around almost like a little puppy dog, or a black cloud intent on destroying any chance of happiness he might try to enjoy. In 1835 he married his cousin, Virginia, but the marriage would last less than ten years, as in 1842 she would succumb to consumption, dying in 1847, two years after her troubled husband had finally secured the fame and respect he had struggled to achieve all his life. In 1845 he published a poem, the first of his major works and some would say the greatest. It was called “The Raven”.

The publication of his dark, doomy poem made Poe a rich man. That is of course a lie. He was paid the princely sum of nine dollars for it, and indeed he would follow Virginia into the afterlife a mere two years later, in 1849, dying from causes which are still hotly disputed to this day. What is clear is that he was found on the streets in “a state of distress”, taken to Washington Medical College where he died at five in the morning, raving and in great apparent fear, his last words reported as “Lord help my poor soul”.

Though he had a short career, it has impacted upon, as I mentioned, at least three separate genres of literature, with a fourth if you include gothic fiction, though I tend to lump that in with horror (which is probably wrong); the one common thread that tied all his works together is a sense of dread, fear, loneliness and horror: some of his best-known works have become major horror movies, and elements of his stories have been parodied down the years. Another major theme is the loss of a loved one, usually a woman, reflecting his own loss in life. He is still seen as one of the fathers of horror writing, and his legacy stretches across a broad swathe of literature, his influence evident in everyone from Clive Barker to Stephen King: in fact, without Poe it’s doubtful if these, or any modern horror writers, would have risen to the prominence they have. Today’s horror has a lot to thank Edgar Allan Poe for.

As “The Raven” was his first published successful poem, and is even today so identified with him, I’m featuring that first. If you’re unaware of the poem, I’d be surprised as like I say it’s been quoted and parodied by everything from “The Simpsons” to heavy metal, and there was recently a movie which envisaged Poe being blamed for a series of murders which uncannily showed all the hallmarks of some of his darker stories. It was called, you guessed it, “The Raven”. But anyway the basic idea is that a man is reflecting on the loss of his wife when a raven comes into the room and scares him. It sounds stupid, but that’s the premise. However it’s the way the poem is written, the dark aura Poe constructs over the simple figure of a bird perching above his door, and the malevolent intelligence he sees or causes us to see in its unblinking eyes that makes the story so chilling. A man, alone, is brought face to face with his darkest memories and loss, and is held transfixed by them. Below is the entire thing, performed by the late great Vincent Prince. There is, perhaps inconceivably, a better version, spoken by Brent Fidler from the film “Poe: Last days of the Raven”, but I can only find parts 2, 3 and 4 so I can’t use it here. But if you get a chance and are interested in this poem I advise you to seek out the movie. You will not be disappointed.

Without meaning to be supercilious, the language used in the poem is mid nineteenth century and a little flowery, so for the benefit of any who may not have understood or grasped the meaning behind the poem, here’s a modern translation of the important bits:

As I sat reading in my chair one December night, a knock came to my door. But on checking I found nobody there. After I had settled back with my books the knock came, but this time at the window. When I opened it a raven flew in. It perched above my door, on a bust of the Greek goddess Pallas. I thought its eyes looked very odd and came to believe it was the soul of some person passed on, and asked it rather foolishly if it has seen my lost love, Lenore? But the bird said nothing except “Nevermore”. I cajoled it, I threatened it and in the end I became very frightened of it, as it did not move and said nothing but that one word. I came to believe that I was in the presence of a demon, and I cowered under its shadow, afraid to move.

This is of course a completely simplistic and abridged version of it, but it captures the main points put forward in the poem. If you have not read it, I recommend you do, or at least click the YouTube and let Vincent read it to you.

Tales of Mystery and, you know, Imagination:
some of the stories of Edgar Allan Poe in brief
(Note: if you haven't read these and intend to, skip over this section, as there are spoilers for each.)


The Fall of the House of Usher (1839)

The first of many gothic horror/murder stories that would follow a theme of revenge and betrayal. Although Poe had written some stories before this, it is recognised as his first real story and would go on to be made into a major motion picture. It tells the harrowing tale of Roderick Usher, who believes his delapidated house has a life all of its own. He is sick, and so is his sister, who later dies and is entombed in the family vault. However, strange sounds and happenings within the house soon conspire to drive Roderick and his friend, the narrator, mad, and Roderick finally reveals that his sister was allve when they buried her. She comes back then and claims him and they both die. As the narrator flees the house it splits in two and sinks into the earth.


The Masque of the Red Death (1842)

The tale of a powerful prince who, with his retinue and court, believe they will be safe from the terrible plague sweeping the land, the Red Death, which is claiming all in its wake. Amusing themselves by holding a masquerade ball, they are horrified and terrified to encounter the figure of Death himself, who has made his way into the palace and thereby takes the lives of all present.


The Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841)

Possibly one of the silliest stories ever written, certainly the silliest Poe wrote, and yet “Murders in the Rue Morgue” has gone on to be one of his most famous and respected works. Meh. Shows what I know. But come on! A detective rather than a horror story, it introduces us to Dupin, who sets out to solve the mystery of how two women could be horribly murdered in a fourth-floor apartment when there is no sign of entry. Turns out to be an escaped Orang-Utan. No, I’m serious. Perhaps this is evidence that even Poe liked a laugh from time to time, though the story is delivered with his characteristic dourness and fatalism. Still, the closest we come to a lighthearted tale in the repertoire of this master of the macabre.


The Pit and the Pendulum (1842)

A strange story with a lot of inconsistencies, and yet again this has become one of Poe’s best-known and quoted works. Set at the time of the Spanish Inquisition (No I will not say it!) it concerns a prisoner who finds himself on trial and not surprisingly condemned, for the Spanish Inquisition did not tend to believe in the notion of innocent until proven guilty (still not saying it!) and thrown into a dark cell. After a while he realises there is a huge pit in the centre of the cell, and above him is a massive double-bladed scythe, which is swinging slowly from side to side and descending towards him. With the help of rats who infest his cell and eat the meat he has been left, he manages to escape the pendulum as the rats chew through the ropes binding him, but then finds that the walls have become so hot that he is forced towards the dread pit. At the last moment he is rescued as the French take the town and oust the Spanish Inquisition (NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! There! Happy now?) and he is set free.


The Tell-tale Heart (1843)

A classic story of guilt driving a murderer to confess, “The Tell-tale Heart” is about a man who kills an older man because he does not like his “vulture-like eye”, and after dismembering the body conceals it underneath the floorboards. A neighbour, alerted by the old man’s dying scream, alerts the police but the murderer is so calm and affable, believing he has pulled off the perfect crime and will never be discovered, that he satisfies the police officers that it was only his own cry, from a nightmare suffered in the small hours, that the neighbour heard. He invites them to sit and talk to him in the old man’s room, under the floorboards of which he has hidden the body. But though neither officer can hear anything the protagonist believes he can hear the sound of a heart, beating louder and louder, until he can stand it no longer, and believing that everyone can hear it and that he will be damned, confesses and tells the police to tear up the floorboards, whereupon they find the grisly evidence of his actions.


The cask of Amontillado (1846)

One of the last of Poe’s works, this concerns the efforts of one man to take revenge upon another for some insult he was paid. The first man entices the second into a wine cellar, wherein he walls him up alive. That’s it: there are no sudden or unexpected escapes or twists in Poe’s fiction, and rarely if ever a happy ending. If there is a moral here it escapes me, other than that sometimes it is possible to commit murder and get away with it, as the main protagonist goes on to live for at least fifty more years and is never caught.



This is a small selection of Poe’s stories, which number well over fifty, but all follow a general theme, of disillusionment, often disgust in mankind, of loneliness, despair, revenge and betrayal, loss and hopelessness. Few if any of Poe’s protagonists are heroes, with the possible exception of Dupin: most of them are either evil men --- as in “The Tell-Tale Heart” or “The cask of Amontillado” --- or uncaring, such as Prince Prospero in “The Masque of the Red Death”. Occasionally they are innocent, or at least uninvolved, bystanders, such as the narrator of “The Fall of the House of Usher”, or the unnamed prisoner in “The Pit and the Pendulum.” Indeed, that story is one of the few of Poe’s to have what could be considered a happy ending, as his characters usually die or are horribly marked by their experiences in his tales.

His poetry fares no better. Much of it is concerned with the afterlife, with such titles as “To one in Paradise”, “For Annie”, “To my mother”, “Deep in Earth” and “The conqueror worm”. Even his most famous, “The Raven”, concerns a man who isolates himself from the outside world and spends his time grieving for his lost lover to the point that he drives himself mad, thinking he has been visited by a demon in the form of a raven, and is paralysed both with fear and possibly anticipation that he may be taken to be reunited with Lenore.

The impact of the work of Edgar Allan Poe on today’s fiction cannot be overstressed. I’ve already said that the great horror, gothic and even science-fiction writers working today owe him a debt of gratitude, even if they don’t know it, and he set new standards for literary critics, as well as inspiring --- probably unintentionally --- a whole host of so-called psychics who believe they can channel his spirit and write in his style. Of course, he had his flaws, and they were many, and his detractors, among them some literary giants like WB Yeats, Aldous Huxley and of course his great rival Henry Longfellow.

But whatever you think of him, whether your read him or not, whether you enjoy what you read or not, and even if you have somehow never heard his name before, the chances are that Poe has influenced your life in one way or another. If you’ve ever read a mystery, science-fiction, horror story, enjoyed a gothic movie or even listened to early Iron Maiden, he’s in there. As I already noted, there was a movie recently using Poe as the main character, and in the latest smash US crime drama “The Following”, the serial killer uses Poe’s works as the basis for his grisly murders.

These constant adaptions and reinterpretations of Poe's work, and links to him continue to keep the man well to the forefront of the public eye, and ensure that though from time to time he may fade into the background, he will always be with us, waiting, watching, subtly influencing and opening and re-opening the doors of his dark world to ever new legions of fans and followers. Like the heart of the murdered man in “The Tell-Tale Heart”, the genius and the influence of Edgar Allan Poe is still beating under the floorboards of literature, thumping loud in the ears of the human consciousness, and it’s doubtful it will ever be stilled.

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Trollheart

Musical connections

As I said, if I could link in music I would, so here are a few songs, even albums, that have been influenced by Poe’s writings. There are in fact far too many to catalogue them all, so I’ve tried to concentrate on bands I know, or know of.


Tales of mystery and imagination --- The Alan Parsons Project ---1970

This was the Alan Parsons Project’s first album, and every song concerns or is based upon stories or poems Poe wrote, including “The system of Doctor Tarr and Professor Feather”, “To one in Paradise” and of course “The Raven”.


Almost half a century prior to that though, Andre Caplet was setting “The Masque of the Red Death” and “The tale of Arthur Gordon Pym” to music in his “Conte fantastique”, published in 1924.


Joan Baez recorded her version of the last poem Poe ever wrote, “Annabel Lee”, in 1967.


Queen’s “Nevermore” was based on “The Raven”


And of course Iron Maiden recorded “Murders in the Rue Morgue” for their second album.


“The Fall of the House of Usher” was made into an opera by Van der Graaf Generator’s Peter Hammill in 1991


Even the late Lou Reed recorded an album called “The Raven” in 2003, featuring spoken and musical interpretations of Poe’s work


Nightwish have a song called “The Poet and the Pendulum”...


... and Symphony X use it as the basis for their song “King of terrors”

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Isbjørn

I read some of Poe's poems just recently, including The Raven, of course. Interesting to see your take on it. I didn't read the entire post, since I have not read any of Poe's short stories and I'm not a fan of spoilers (thanks for warning us). As for Gothic fiction, I also consider it a part of horror, though I don't really think I've read any non-Gothic horror. From what I understand, Gothic fiction is a fusion between early horror and Romanticism, and I think it's more atmospheric and emotional than "ordinary" horror, though I could be wrong. Wouldn't be surprised if I am.

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Trollheart

Thanks man. Great to know someone's reading. Makes all the difference after all the effort I put into this new section. Cheers.

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Trollheart

With the fourteenth Asia album released only days ago --- technically the fourth under the new/old lineup, but minus Steve Howe --- and considering how disappointed and dismayed I was by the previous outing, 2012’s godawful “XXX”, I thought it might be time to revisit what I consider one of Asia’s best albums, the seventh in an almost unbroken line that stretches back to their debut in 1982 and the last truly great album to feature vocalist, singer and songwriter John Payne. To my mind, Asia struggled with their next release, got it together with 2008’s “Phoenix”, did okay with the followup but then blew it with “XXX”. What the current one will be like I have yet to hear, but this reminds me of a time when Asia were a band you could always rely on to turn out consistently brilliant albums. The end, perhaps, of an era, did we but know it?


Aura --- Asia --- 2000 (Recognition)

You can say what you like, and laugh all you want, but I really feel Asia began to lose their way when they abandoned the idea of titling albums with words that began and ended with “a”. From their self-titled debut in 1982 we’ve had “Alpha”, “Astra”, “Aria”, “Arena” and then this one, after which they called the next album “Silent nation”, and since then they’ve really disposed of the idea, although 2010’s “Omega” does kind of retain echoes of the old days, both in title and quality. Now it’s probably, almost certainly coincidence, but it’s hard to argue against the fact that the first seven albums (I don’t count “Then and now”, as it’s half a greatest hits album, nor “Rare”, which is all instrumental) showed the band at their height, and even with a lineup change halfway when Payne took over for 1992’s “Aqua”, a kind of comeback album as prior to that the band had not released any material since 1985 -- again, I don’t count 1990’s “Then and now” --- the quality remained, indeed improved as the albums mounted up.

It’s hard for me to pick out a favourite Asia album. Many of them suffer from the odd weak track (I find “Astra” in particular to fall into this category) but almost all have powerful, strong ones to keep them interesting. Probably my alltime favourite would be “Alpha”, their second album, followed perhaps by “Aqua”, but this is certainly high in the rankings. I won’t say it’s a return to form for the band as the previous album, “Arena” was pretty damn special too. That album featured what I believe is the first, and to date only, example of Asia starting with an instrumental that then leads into the title track. But I’ll probably review that later at some point.

“Aura” is the first, and only, Asia album to credit only Geoff Downes and John Payne as the actual band, with everyone else who plays on it shown as “additional musicians”. But then, there are so many of these: Pat Thrall, Guthrie Govan, Michael Sturgis, Ian Crichton, Elliot Randall, Chris Slade, even Steve Howe, though I assume that’s because he played on older tracks that were used? I can’t confirm that though. He had surely not rejoined the band at this point, though he would later. Some of the above musicians would indeed join the main band and feature on 2004’s “Silent nation”, on which there would be, again, additional players.

The artwork, any Asia fan will be able to tell you, is by Roger Dean, who had created the art for the covers of the previous albums since the debut, but who would not be involved in the somewhat lacklustre and very un-Asia cover for “Silent nation”. Perhaps realising how deeply he was tied in to the band, or perhaps because Payne had been replaced by original singer John Wetton by then, Dean would return to create the artwork for all further albums from “Omega” onwards.

A drum roll takes us into a sprightly keyboard line as “Awake” opens the album, Payne singing about his hopes for humanity if only we can put aside our prejudices and hatred. The song is apparently based on a poem but I don’t know it so can’t comment. It’s very upbeat though, with restrained guitar and some fine vocal harmonies, a chorus that consists of only one word but Payne puts a universe of emotion into those two syllables. Some nice piano work from Downes, who handles all keyboard duties. There are tons of guest guitarists but no way is he allowing anyone to steal his thunder! And who can blame him? The man’s a keyboard genius and Asia would certainly not be the same without him. This, among other songs on the album, really showcases though how strong a singer John Payne is, and how, over a short period from 1992 to 2004, he really made Asia his, no mean feat when you consider he was trying to almost erase the memory of the original vocalist. And more or less succeeded. Even now, he tours with his own band, Asia featuring John Payne, and they do great business.

A superb turn from David Grant’s Gospel Choir, taking the song into the realms of the spiritual and leading into “Wherever you are”, on which Payne and Downes are assisted by 10cc alumni Graham Gouldman and Andrew Gold. It’s a nice mid-paced song, though it’s a little pedestrian after the explosive opener. It has a nice tinkly keyboard line and some pizzicato strings synthwork with a decent rhythm, a fine solo from Payne and some crashing guitar from him near the end. Asia seldom if ever cover another artiste’s song but this is what they do next, with a version of 10cc’s “Ready to go home”, a striding, emotional desire to see one’s homeland, perhaps, starting out on a low, whistly keyboard line with an impassioned vocal from Payne and some great backing vocals too.

It kicks up in intensity shortly, but remains a slow song, almost a prayer in a way as Payne sings ”Lord shine a light for me/ I’m waiting to be born.” Powerful, stirring organ from Downes paints a sepulchral backdrop as Payne sings in almost, but not quite, a gospel style, and the choir from the opener return for a fine performance. A fine guitar solo too from Guthrie Govan, who would go on to become a permanent member of the short-lived band which would only record one more album before being pushed aside in favour of the original lineup in 2008.

The tempo rises then a little for “The last time”, with a bouncy synth melody leading us in and a busy bassline from Payne, while Steve Howe handles the guitars. As I say, I don’t know whether this is because he recorded original sections of this song, as in, it’s an older Asia song, but I doubt he would return only to perform on one track. Anteater can probably tell us. There’s a very typical Asia vocal harmony on this, recalling the best from “Alpha” and “Aqua”, and you can certainly hear the influence of the original guitarist and founder on the track. A very stirring bridge as Payne sings ”All these fields/ That once were green/ Have turned to smoke and steel/ The sun will fall, and the last moon rise/ Don't turn this tide away.”

A dramatic synth line then with bubbling keyboards in the background and a rising guitar as “Forgive me” nods back in the direction of previous album “Arena”, with a jaunty line in the melody which belies the lyrical theme, which seems to be another of Asia’s many eco-related ones but may also have something to do with TV evangelists as the line ”I am direct salvation/ Just send in your donation/ I can promise that you'll be saved” would seem to indicate. Great beat in the song and again a fine, fine performance from Payne. One of my favourites on the album is up next, as “Kings of the day” opens strongly with a rhythm that’s hard not to nod your head or tap your feet to. Some nice sparse fretwork from Govan again, and Payne sings like a man possessed as Downes lays down the soundscape against which his bandmate bares his soul.

If any track on “Aura” can be described as funky, Govan’s guitar here makes this the closest they come, but the strong keyboard presence from Geoff Downes keeps things decidedly progressive rock oriented. It’s not really even AOR, which is a label that befits some other Asia albums: this is pure prog rock. Super little guitar solo halfway through, again quite funky and jazzy, while the final two minutes or so of the song are taken by an extended instrumental that displays both Payne and Downes at their best. There are a few words thrown in, but basically it’s enough of an instrumental to me to qualify for the label.

“On the coldest day in Hell” opens on gentle acoustic guitar and breathing synth with a reflective idea in the lyric as Payne asks ”Do you remember years ago? /All our hopes would ebb and flow/ We thought we'd find a promised land /Our footprints in the sand.” It’s probably the closest to a ballad on the album, which, given Asia’s propensity for two or three on an album, is surprising. Payne’s voice is soulful as a fallen angel here and Michael Sturgis does really well on the percussion here, holding it back and making it very tasteful. Great synthwork from Downes complements a lovely acoustic guitar solo from Govan and a sublime vocal from Payne to end the song as it starts to fade out, but then ends on a dramatic keyboard passage.

This takes us into the longest song on the album by far, almost nine minutes of “Free”, which is certainly also the rockiest, kicking the tempo right up and bringing back memories of tracks like “The heat goes on” and “Rock and roll dreams”. Downes goes crazy on the keys here, squealing and twiddling all over the place, with Steve Howe back on guitar, joined by Pat Thrall and Ian Crichton, and with Payne himself that makes four axemen: you can really hear it in the guitar attack! Despite being the longest and hardest rocking track, “Free” is far from my favourite on the album, in fact it comes in close to the one I like least. But there’s no denying the energy and passion in it. I’m not quite sure why it needs to be as long as it is though: I think a five or six-minute version would have worked just as well.

There are of course several guitar solos in the song, including one on what sounds like Spanish guitar, but Payne throws down a really nice bassline in about the fourth minute too as the thing builds back up to a crescendo and heads into the sixth. I’m glad however to report that, although as I say, “Free” is not my most liked track here, “Aura” does not suffer from the “midpoint syndrome” that so many albums do. It’s consistently good all the way through, and despite the oddly pop nature of the next track, “You’re the stranger” is still a very good and very much Asia track, with whining synth and interesting percussion from Luis Jardim. Great vocal harmonies too; the song is mid-paced and somewhat restrained after the finger-blurring fretwork and speed of “Free”, but in ways it’s just what’s needed, as the chance to catch your breath after that monster is definitely welcome.

Elliot Randall this time joins Guthrie Govan on the guitar, and rips off a fine solo as the song powers along, more ecology themes in it as Payne asks ”Where the eagle used to fly/ They carve their concrete in the sky /Tearing at our mother's skin /Taking all her blood within /Remember how it used to be?” A powerful guitar then punches in as “The longest night” almost winds up the album with a strong, stirring vocal and ominous keyboard, the tempo slowing down but this is no ballad. Based on the Wilfred Owen poem, the song decries the futility of war, as Asia have done down their career with songs like “Too late” and “Countdown to extinction”, as well as “The day before the war” and others. It’s a powerful indictment, Payne giving it all he has on his final outing on the album. The closer is a typical Asia instrumental, and also the title track. It’s a fast upbeat piece with as you would expect plenty of input from Downes on the piano and keys, and flourishes from Payne on the guitar. More great percussion from Sturgis and a sort of choral vocal with the synth complements a really nice organ sound. One last solo from Payne and we’re out of here.

TRACKLISTING

1. Awake
2. Wherever you are
3. Ready to go home
4. The last time
5. Forgive me
6. Kings of the day
7. On the coldest day in Hell
8. Free
9. You’re the stranger
10. The longest night
11. Aura

Note: there are three bonus tracks on my CD, but as per my usual MO I won’t be talking about them. In addition to detracting from the purity of the album itself I find it takes long enough to write these reviews and I always have one eye on how many more tracks are left, so including bonus tracks just makes more work for me. For the record, of the three, the best is probably “Under the gun”, though the other two aren’t bad. As is often the case with additional material though, the quality of none of the three is quite up to the overall level of the album itself, another reason why a) they’re bonus tracks and b) I don’t review them.

Despite what I said in the introduction earlier, for a while I used to approach a new Asia album with the smallest amount of trepidation. Every one had been great, I would think, up to this. Surely this one will be the one that breaks that pattern? And when you’re paying full price for a CD as I used to, that’s something of a gamble to take. But I always felt in my heart confident that Asia would deliver, and they always did. I suppose it’s ironic that the first time they failed to was with a digital download, so that although “XXX” fell far below the standard I had come to expect from this band, it only cost me a dollar or so to find that out. Still, it was a huge disappointment, sort of like the first --- and so far, only --- time Marillion let me down, or when I suffered through “Abacab” by Genesis. You just don’t want your favourite bands to turn out bad albums, even if you get them for free. It’s part pride I guess and part a feeling of being cheated, even if it’s not out of money. There’s also the fear that this is the tip of the iceberg, the point at which the artiste’s material will begin to nosedive in quality and that the next album or albums you get from them you can expect all to be as poor as this one, or worse.

I haven’t, as I say, listened to “Gravitas”, the latest offering from the new/old/new Asia yet, but my expectations have been battered down after the last one, so I’m not really expecting all that much. I may be overstating the case, but I feel that after this album the shine began to rub off a band which had existed for nearly twenty years at that point, and though they achieved something which is rare enough in music, a second rebirth with the album “Phoenix” and the reassembling of the original 1982 lineup sixteen years after they released their debut on the world --- an album which still contains their only hit singles ---the only way from here was down.

“Silent nation” did not overly impress me, “Phoenix” was admittedly excellent and “Omega” a decent followup though nothing terribly special, while quite possibly the death knell for Asia was sounded two years ago with the album that marked, ironically, their thirtieth anniversary. John Wetton, far from revitalising Asia (which didn’t need revitalising anyway and was doing quite well under John Payne, thank you very much) seems almost intent on destroying his legacy, taking apart a decade of great music and leaving us with only the older albums to enjoy. That said, “Gravitas” could be their best album yet, though I think I see a pig flying … oh no wait, I’ve reviewed “Animals” already, haven’t I?

If the latest album is to be Asia’s last gasp, and if it’s anything like “XXX”, maybe it’s better they give it up as a bad job now, before we’re subjected to a string of substandard albums. Personally, I’d rather they made “Gravitas” their finale and left us with superb albums like this one to remember, and try to block out the awful memory of “XXX”.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Isbjørn

Do all Asia covers look the same? Because the one from Ki's journal looked very similar, just green.

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Unknown Soldier

Yes they were never the most imaginative of bands.

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Trollheart

The basic design remains the same, yes, but there are differences. If you Google them you'll see Alpha is different to Aqua (the latter is a marine-themed thing) but both are basically blue. Then Arena and Aura are both kind of orange, while Aria is again blue so they do mostly look the same. The difference would be Silent Nation, which is nothing like any previous or later cover, and to some degree Phoenix and Omega.

But yeah, a quick glance would not really tell you, unless you were a fan, which album you were looking at.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Anteater

Aura is a great record, possibly Asia's best as far as sheer progginess goes. 'Under The Gun' really should have made the main tracklist though, because its one of the catchiest songs they've ever done by a longshot under any lineup.

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