mobiUS are an English Progressive Rock group. Their eclectic style echo artists such as Pink Floyd, Yes and Porcupine Tree. They build on this established and imaginative genre and have developed a style unique to themselves. White Knight are excited to be working with this band, who will shake the world of progressive rock and become a major player.
The band was first imagined as a concept by the composer and keyboard player Tim Newcombe back in 2012. He began writing and after several experiments with various musicians, the concept lay dormant. However, Tim remained frustrated with the offerings by mass market mundane radio stations and vowed to produce something which had the spark of originality.
In 2020 Tim met Alistair McCaig at a music venue in the South of England. Tim shared his ideas and enthusiasm for the genre and Alistair’s experience within the production and mastering space opened the door to the creation of mobiUS Tim had played session with the drummer Andy Clifton and knew by reputation the burgeoning talents of the irrepressible Andy Hughes on guitar and vocals and swiftly moved to establish the vital core of the group. From there Tim enlisted his wife Louise to sing harmonies and play the soulful saxophone riffs that are so evocative in ‘Rain another Day’ Bringing in Sandra Morris and Monika Welch to enrich the performance with their gospel-esque style, was the final puzzle piece in the creation of mobiUS.
During late 2020 and the early months of 2021, Tim was fully engaged in writing and distributing material to the rest of the band. All recording was carried out remotely due to covid restrictions and the final mixes and masters were completed in April with an album release date of 23rd May 2021
A chance meeting led them to a partnership with Caerlyssi Music and White Knight Records, through whom, mobiUS are unleashed onto the world with their unique and immersive style.
In a recent interview, Tim was asked about his motivation and inspiration for the ‘Make the Promise’ album: “This is a collection of musical ideas I’ve been mulling over for some time. I am passionate that music should be a deep form of expression. Something that transcends the standard chord progressions and lyrical subjects of much contemporary music. It seems to me that imagination and ideas are constrained by what is considered a standard chord progression, or fettered by time. I especially like a song or tune to evolve. To develop. To exist and breath as an identity by itself. I love to experiment with time signatures, styles, tempo and timbre changes within the same piece.This allows the piece find it’s own direction analogous to a stream finding its way through a variety of terrains” This brings us nicely to his description of the album.
Watch mobiUS Rain Another Day. Official Video here
Track Breakdown:
Odyssey As the name suggests, this instrumental carries the listener on a voyage of musical discovery. Superficially, it’s a journey into the world, from comfort to danger and returning home. However, subconsciously it evolved into a story of my personal musical journey. Reflective and returning to my roots and love of progressive music. This piece is subdivided into sections – Farewell, Borderland, Beyond, One Step Closer, Alone, Louise’s Theme/Sunshine Eyes, Sub-Fractal, City of a Million Dreams, Escape, Home. Each imbued with excitement, melancholy, drama, peace and hope as befits the particular episode of the track.
Rain Another Day My mother was the muse behind this track. The ethos of the song is moving forward. Keep hold of the past, remember and treasure it. However there is a time to keep those memories but think of the future. As the lines of the song state ‘Embrace the morning sunshine, move towards the summertime’ The piano is evocative of a range of emotions and Andy’s strident vocals bring them to life
So They Tell Me A song about mental health. In particular multiple personality disorders. I hope that it comes across as sensitive. My intention was not to be flippant or sensationalist about this. The complexity in rhythm and the deep and sometimes ethereal layering of timbre’s create a captivating and engaging pastiche.
Spider It wouldn’t be right or correct to not include a track about the pressures of writing or producing music. This song is in fact about that and is an allegory for achievement in any scenario. It’ a song about juggling priorities. Commitments that you may feel inclined to hold onto that directly compete with dreams, aspirations and ambitions. We all face it, we al go through it and we all manage it. Why not make a song about it!
Track Listing 1. Odyssey 1.1 Farewell – 1:50 1.2 Borderland – 2:35 1.3 And Beyond – 3:38 1.4 One Step Closer – 5:33 1.5 Alone – 7:00 1.6 Louise’s Theme/Sunshine Eyes- 11:07 1.7 Sub Fractal – 11:50 1.8 City of a Million Dreams – 14:14
Line up: Andy Hughes Vocals Guitar Tim Newcombe Keyboards Andy Clifton Drums Alistair McCaig Bass Louise Newcombe Backing Vocals, sax Monika Welch Backing Vocals Sandra. Morris Backing Vocals
Credits: All songs written by Tim Newcombe Recording Engineer Tim Newcombe Recorded at BlueSkies Studios Mastered by Alistair McCaig
The festival’s motto. And never could it have proved to be more appropriate than now.
When King’s X found themselves forced to cancel, after realizing that even daily physio was not going to suffice to get Ty Tybor’s fret finger back into good enough shape to prepare properly for their performance at this year’s RoSFest, the festival organizers found themselves in a bit of a fix.
But ‘community’ is a keyword for the annual Rites Of Spring Festival, and a group of musicians, captained by Dave Kerzner stepped up to ensure that the weekend’s entertainment would not be marred by a gaping hole in the line-up.
Sunday night’s headliner spot will now feature Dave KerZner and his newly formed All Star Prog Band featuring world-famous session man, Fernando Perdomo (Carmine Appice, Out to Sea, Echo in the Canyon…), Durga McBroom (Pink Floyd, Steve Hackett, Blue Pearl…), Billy Sherwood (Yes, Arc of Life, Circa, Asia…), Nick D’Virgilio (Big Big Train, Spock’s Beard, The Fringe, Genesis…). Dave also promises to surprise the audience with a magnificent set-list and a few surprises and special guests.
Performers & Schedule
Friday, April 15th 08:30 – 10:30 PM – Jerry Harrison and Adrian Belew Remain in Light
Saturday, April 16th 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM – Lobate Scarp 02:00 PM – 03:00 PM – Ten Jinn 05:00 PM – 06:30 PM – Robert Berry’s 3.2 08:30 PM – 10:00 PM – Jon Anderson with The Paul Green Rock Academy
Sunday, April 17th 11: 00 AM –12:00 PM – Head With Wings 02:00 PM – 03:00 PM – The Tea Club 05:00 PM – 06:30 PM – Pattern-Seeking Animals 08:30 PM – 10:00 PM – Dave KerZner All Star Prog Band Thank you for supporting RoSFest.
RoSFest is set to end with a fantastic party atmosphere for musicians, fans, and organizers!
PATTERN-SEEKING ANIMALS, the California-based band featuring Ted Leonard (lead vocals & guitars), Jimmy Keegan (drums & vocals), Dave Meros (bass) and John Boegehold (keyboards), are pleased to announce the band’s third studio album titled Only Passing Through, to be released through InsideOutMusic on April 1st, 2022. The album is the follow up to the critically acclaimed 2020 release Prehensile Tales.
The band check in on the new album here: “Only Passing Through, our third album picks up where Prehensile Tales left off but soon takes several stylistic detours as it progresses. Everyone involved made this album a lot of fun to make and we’re all looking forward to it to finally being heard.” John Boegehold
“This new album draws from a lot of different sources and pushes all of us to bring out our best. We all had to dig pretty deep to express out the right spirit of each song. To call it Prog would be highly inadequate. We’re all over the map and yet, there is still a very distinct sound that threads through the whole album. I’m very proud of this record and excited for people to hear it!” Jimmy Keegan
Today sees the release of the animated video for PROPER JACK FROSTER, the latest single from BIG BIG TRAIN, taken from the forthcoming WELCOME TO THE PLANET album. Proper Jack Froster is based on a story from Gregory Spawton’s childhood in the Midlands in the UK in the 1970s.
Work on the video by Swedish animator Love Andreas Gson Fagerstedt began before the untimely, tragic passing of Big Big Train’s singer David Longdon on 20th November 2021. David’s partner and the band have decided that the video should still be released to help to promote the forthcoming album to the fullest extent possible.
Watch the video here:
Big Big Train’s March 2022 UK tour will now not take place; ticket holders should contact their point of purchase for information on refunds. Prior to David’s death the band had been on the verge of announcing a North American tour consisting of over 20 shows in May and June 2022. This projected North American tour will also not be taking place.
The band will be making an announcement next year about its future, including regarding the September 2022 shows that are scheduled to take place in the UK. Ticket holders for these September shows are encouraged to retain their tickets for the time being pending that further announcement. No further comment will be made about the band’s future before next year.
As with COMMON GROUND, WELCOME TO THE PLANET sees Big Big Train retain their progressive roots but also take influence from all spheres of music. The four recent singles “Proper Jack Froster’, ‘Made Of Sunshine ‘The Connection Plan’ and ‘Lanterna’ are also included along with keyboard player Carly Bryant’s first Big Big Train writing credit and lead vocal on the captivating title track. The album is completed by the delicate acoustic ‘Capitoline Venus’, the beautiful ‘Oak And Stone’ and a pair of dazzling instrumentals, ‘A Room With No Ceiling’ and ‘Bats In The Belfry’, written by guitarist/keyboardist Rikard Sjöblom and drummer Nick D’Virgilio respectively.
Where has the time gone? We cannot believe it ourselves; it seems like yesterday that launched a record label to give a voice to those that needed to be heard. We discovered Echoes Landing on an old social network and fell in love with their self-titled debut leading to our decision to build Melodic Revolution Records (MRR) to promote that album. The band would later change their name and is better known as Scarlet Hollow who are still with MRR. To date we have released a single, an EP and two full-length releases in addition to two solo albums by these talented musicians.
This was just the beginning; we now celebrate our fifteenth anniversary with over 100 releases to date.
As a thank you to our supporters old and new, we have assembled a special digital release, “Sands of Time A Music Revolution 2006/2021”. We hope that this release will provide our listeners the opportunity to rediscover music that you may have forgotten about and discover music you may have never heard.
We consider all music progressive that has a new and cutting-edge sound and doesn’t follow the formulaic patterns of mainstream music. “Sands of Time A Music Revolution 2006/2021” is a testament that not all great music must be released via mainstream record labels. What you will experience it is an album that represents our slogan “Music you didn’t know you would love”. The album starts with the very first artist/band that we signed to the label and ends with our latest signing.
Although the sequencing of the album is straightforward; it was not an easy task to curate the songs for this release. Our first thought was to use the songs that grabbed our attention which resulted in the signing of an artist/band. However, after months of consideration and deliberation, we decided to showcase fan favorites.
This album is an excellent representation of where we started, where we have been, and where we are going. “Sands of Time A Music Revolution 2006/2021” also includes music by many fantastic artists from our sub-label PeacockSunrise Records, which is firmly in the where we are going category. PeacockSunrise Records is a natural progression of us and is still in its infancy but growing fast.
“Sands of Time A Music Revolution 2006/2021” is not for sale, but as of today it is available for full streaming. Each track has a link which will provide more band and album information and in most cases links for more music and ways to support the artist/band. Sadly, some of these artist/bands may no longer be together; they may have morphed into other bands or may not even be in this business of creating music.
We would like to dedicate this release to some people that were very important to us and our history. First, we would like to dedicate this album to Phil Naro who was part of over a dozen releases including DDRIVE, Unified Past, When Friends Come Out and Play, Colin Tench Project, Corvus Stone, King Friday, Kings, Backhand among others.
The second dedication goes out to Colin Tench who released many albums, singles and EPs with Andres Guazzelli, Corvus Stone, The Minstrel’s Ghost, Andy John Bradford’s’ Oceans5, Colin Tench Project, Halo, Transmission Rails and more.
And to Peter Jorgensen, we had just started our musical partnership earlier in the year with the release Immaterial Witness by his band Phoen1x. There were plans on releasing many more.
Thank you for sticking with us over the years and being part of this journey. If not for you… MRR and its family of artists would not exist. We look forward to serving you for many years to come.
Thank you for sticking with us over the years and being part of this journey. If not for you… MRR and its family of artists would not exist. We look forward to serving you for many years to come.
Nick Katona President and Founder Melodic Revolution Records and PeacockSunrise Records
Released November 21, 2021
Catalog No. MRRDR 201175 Album Art by Nick Katona, Zene Háza, Florida Ⓒ 2006/2021 Melodic Revolution Records and PeacockSunrise Records. All rights reserved.
17th June 1965 – 20th November 2021 Big Big Train are extremely saddened to announce the death of David Longdon this afternoon in hospital in Nottingham, UK at the age of 56 following an accident in the early hours of Friday morning. He is survived by his two daughters Amelia and Eloise, his mother Vera and his partner Sarah Ewing.
Sarah Ewing comments: “David and I were best friends, partners and soul mates and I am utterly devastated by his loss. He was a beautiful person and I feel so lucky to have known and loved him.”
Greg Spawton comments: “We are absolutely stunned to lose David. It is unspeakably cruel that a quirk of fate in the early hours of yesterday morning has deprived him and his loved ones of a happy future together and all of the opportunities, both personal and musical, that awaited him next year and beyond.”
David joined Big Big Train in 2009, immediately making a significant impact with that year’s The Underfall Yard album. He proceeded to record a further eight studio albums with the band, including the forthcoming Welcome To The Planet, as well as fronting the band for a series of highly acclaimed concerts from 2015 onwards. In addition last year he released an album with the late Judy Dyble under the name Dyble Longdon. On the day before his accident he had been in the studio working on a new solo album.
“David made a huge impact on my life both musically and personally,” Spawton continues. “I loved him like a brother and already feel his loss very deeply. He was a true creative visionary with extraordinary depth of talent. But above all he was a first rate and very kind man. His family, friends, BBT bandmates and crew will miss him terribly.”
The band’s Welcome To The Planet album remains scheduled for release on 28th January 2022. A further statement regarding the band’s 2022 concerts and other activities will follow in due course.
The band and their management request privacy for David’s family and friends at this extremely difficult time.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
