Ah, Atlantis… the first Utopia, mentioned by the Philosopher Plato first in his Dialogue Timaeus and then again, in almost insane detail in it’s follow-up, Critias. A benighted land doomed to it’s fate, an Eden rent rotten by the sheer fallibility of human nature – we mess it up every time we get the chance, and have done for aeons, it seems…

So, are Cats In Space – long beloved Pomp Rock Gods of this parish – positioning themselves as the first neoplatonist heavy rock n’roll band with new album Atlantis?

Of course they ain’t. The CIS Atlantis is a far more of a Space 1999 kinda place (just take a look at the cover) rather than some sort of dystopian concept album about lost lands and man’s venality and foolishness. And anyway Toto got there first with their 1978 hit Hold The (Divided) Line… So, whilst they may not have created a whole new metaphysical genre of rock and roll for themselves with this new album, at the end of the day our heroes have turned up trumps and delivered an album that’ll have you packing up your troubles (in something hopefully more sparkling and froufrou than an old kitbag) and remembering just why you fell in love for them so hard in the first place.

That’s right – headcat Greg Hart and company have ratcheted up the rock quotient on Atlantis and set the controls for the heart of their first two albums, in the process creating some of the most spine-tingling choonery they’ve yet committed to wax… And who needs Plato when you’ve got Marc Bolan and Brian May as inspiration?

But that good stuff all comes later. The album actually starts off pretty slowly, with a triumvirate of tracks that, whilst never actually stinking the place out never really get up to the sort of ramming speed we’ve come to expect from the band. The hint of greatness is there, of course, but there’s nothing in Spaceship Superstar, Revolution or Sunday Best that even hints to the sheer majesty of some of what’s to come. But after that? strap yourselves in, ladeez an’ gennelmen…

Listen To The Radio is the first track to really gets the juices flowing, bridging the gap between the first three tracks and the rest of the album nicely. You’ll already know about I Fell Out Of Love With Rock n’Roll, of course, and as a single choice it fulfils it’s brief of introducing new vocalist Damien Edwards to the faithful. With it’s rueful tales of rock’s dog days of the nineties after the heady and hedonistic seventies and eighties it’s also the song that’s closest in nature to Narnia; It’s quintessential Cats, and it draws the first half of the album to a grandiose, if slightly brooding close.

The second half kicks off with the stinging, theatrical heavy rock of Marionettes, wherein we really find the soul of the album. Edwards gives a commanding performance here, recalling the much-missed Uriah Heep frontman David Byron with his West End delivery and sing-anything-you-can-throw-at-me panache; the second half of the song is as devastating slice of  seventies-inspired rock as you’ll hear in this or any other year, and it’s a song you can see holding it’s own in the Cats’ live set for a long time to come.

The Thin Lizzy-styled guitars at the start of Queen of the Neverland really gets the blood pumping and the fingers twitching – there are quite a few air guitar moments on Atlantis, let me tell you – whilst Magic Lovin’ Feeling’ (a song that can only fairly be described as Bostonian) is surely set to become the feelgood hit of the summer down here in the Antipodes over the coming months. And on Sentinel Daily Radio, natch. If the hairs on the back of your neck aren’t standing to attention before the song’s helium-fuelled first chorus is over then there’s a fair chance this band isn’t really for you…

Can’t Wait Tomorrow is a smooth ballad – Framptonesque, some might say – which conjures up mental images of listening to Capital Radio in the back garden as the Summer of 1976 attempted to boil us alive, and features a very languid and very brief harmonica break which is the surprise hero of the song; however, whilst it’s a superb track in it’s own right, it doesn’t prepare you for what’s coming…

Put simply, Seasons Change is not only the best song Cats In Space have yet come up with, it’s up there with the best song writing and performing anyone, anywhere has come up with in the last few years. A scintillating mix of John Miles, The Isley Brothers, Manfred Mann’s Earth Band… you name it, this glorious kitchen sink of a song fits it in somewhere in it’s four and three quarter minute duration; but to simply play spot the influence with such a masterly song is to wilfully play down the sheer skill it takes to come up with something as wonderful as this; Edwards in particular is spine chilling in his delivery, especially the power of his upper registers, but every member of the band plays their part in creating this song, building up layer after layer of sound from the crashing, uplifting powerchords of Hart and guitar partner Dean Howard through the glittering, mesmerising keyboard work of Andy Stewart to the thumping, febrile feline heart of the band that is bassist Jeff Brown and drummer Steevi Bacon. Gentlemen, I salute you and thank you for the single most delicious listening experience of 2020.

Of course, you’d think that would be it – Seasons Change would surely be a song impossible to follow, right? Well, no – the band choose to end things with the title track and pull off this seemingly impossible task with an understated pomp epic (can such a thing exist? it can now) that actually helps you get your breathing back to normal after the mayhem you’ve just experienced. It’s a great move, from a great band who’ve come up with another great album.

Plato who?

 

Atlantis releases on November 27th. Get your decompression suits ready…