Keyboarder extraordinaire Darrel Treece-Birch – do I really have to tell you again that he’s a mainstay in Brit pomp veterans Ten? – returns with a new album under the Atlantea banner, and if it isn’t as immediately captivating as it’s predecessor, it still packs a mighty prog rock punch that leaves most of the opposition floundering in it’s wake.
Atlantea’s first album, Choices, rooted itself firmly in the seventies and memories of all the big British prog rock reference points, with a dash of Bowieesque panache thrown in to the pot for good measure. On Life, the sound is, at times, perhaps a little sharper, and a lot less reassuring; the hard edge to opening brace Millennium and Round and Round reflects a world slightly more desperate then when last we let Mr Treece-Birch into our ears, and the piercing, mightily assured soloing of Dann Rosingsana seems to say as much.
Light In The Darkness sounds like a World-weary Ian Hunter track and features our titular hero himself on vocals but the next track, the skitterish Better Way catapults the listener forwards through time into an eighties pastiche where paranoia reigns and the drugs are less organic and waaaayyyy more worrisome. It’s a bit different, and fans of the more pastoral side of Atlantea may find themselves excusing themselves and heading for a comfort break if they come across this track in a live setting. The same might be said of the album’s heaviest track, Life, which features some rather good bass work from Eoin de Pore but might have those of a more sensitive bent running for the hills…
Laniakea restores peace and order, taking the listener back to the warmth of the Grantchester womb and featuring superb guitar and vocals from de Pore, and Life hits the prog motherlode again with the five part, eighteen-minute-long Three Lights, a delightful modern day symphony that’ll have fans of the good stuff absolutely salivating at the misty-eyed majesty of it all. Tony Mitchell‘s vocals on this track, like an otherworldly mix of Richard Ashcroft and John Miles, are worth the price of admission alone.
Darrel Treece-Birch’s musical universe is a huge one, full of wonder and delight, and you get the sense that Life, like Choices, is just a tip of the man’s creative iceberg; I can’t wait to hear what he comes up with next, but for now, just sit back and wallow in some of the best music, of any genre, that you’ll hear all year.
Life releases on August 15th.