We are excited to announce our upcoming 4th studio album, MANNEQUIN releases 2nd February 2024 on limited edition double orange vinyl, digipak CD, digital download, and streaming. We are now taking preorders from our online merch store at www.kyrosmusic.com
Alongside this exciting announcement, our new single ‘Ghosts Of You’ is available to stream *right now* on all platforms.
We’re also excited to announce that we’ll be heading back out on the road next April alongside Azure. and Leoni Jane Kennedy and hitting up Brighton, Reading, London, and Southampton. Want us to come visit your town? Let us know below
“Our upcoming album, ‘Mannequin’ is like peeling back layers of paint on an old canvas. With each track, we’re exploring the masks we all wear, the stories we tell ourselves to get by.
This album is a real heart-on-sleeve affair for us and it’s probably the most ‘us’ we’ve ever sounded. It’s about what happens when the facade cracks and you’re left with nothing but the truth. Nothing but your true self. We can’t wait for everyone to hear it and perhaps see themselves in it, just like we do.”
And for our new single, Shelby goes on to say:
“This song captures that haunting feeling of chasing the elusive. A theme that carries through a lot of our songs and especially my writing these days. That feeling of seeing remnants of someone or something that once was. The contrast in styles, mashing inspiration from 90s New Jack Swing with progressive rock and big band elements mirrors the feeling of not knowing how to front yourself.”
The Affinity Oeuvre is the 4th Aethellis release and features a collection of instrumentals and songs with lyrics that reflect the challenges people have faced in the past few years. The music styles are eclectic as well, ranging from prog-rock to new wave to pop to jazz fusion; the diversity being representative of the diverse situations people have experienced recently. The latest Aethellis release differs from the previous three as the spotlight is on guitarist/vocalist Mark Van Natta, both compositionally and vocally. Ellsworth Hall and Erik Marks still contributed to the album, however, adding their signature composition styles.
Tracklist 1. Anandia 12:36 2. Affinifunk 03:26 3. Pathdancer 05:28 4. Dreams On Pause 03:40 5. Do Like I Do 03:15 6. Chicago News 03:35 7. Another Car 04:23 8. Let Me Be Me 03:33 9. The Stennis Compromise 02:09 10. Why Do You Keep Fighting 05:03 11. RIP 04:32
Aethellis is:
Ellsworth Hall – Keyboards, Vocals, Guitar, Drum Controller Mark Van Natta – Guitar, Vocals, Bass, Keyboard Erik Marks – Bass
Recorded, mixed, and mastered at Ellstudio, Timonium MD, USA Portions recorded at the Van Natta home studio, Cockeysville MD, USA
16th November 2023: Legendary rock guitarist Steve Hackett will release his new studio album The Circus And The Nightwhale on 16th February 2024, via InsideOut Music. A rite-of-passage concept album with a young character called Travla at the center of it, The Circus And The Nightwhales 13 tracks have an autobiographical angle for the musician who says about his 30th solo release: I love this album. It says the things I’ve been wanting to say for a very long time.
The Circus And The Nightwhale is Steve’s first new music in over two years. It follows the beautiful acoustic LP Under A Mediterranean Sky from January 2021 which rose to No. 2 in the UK Classical chart and, in September of that year, his metallic masterpiece Surrender Of Silence, which hit the UK Top 40. His 2023 live album, Foxtrot At Fifty + Hackett Highlights: Live in Brighton, reached No. 2 on the Rock & Metal Chart. Steves’s new LP promises ballads, blues, blistering progressive rock… and healthy measures of theatre and fantasia.
Recorded between tours in 2022 and 2023 at Siren studio in the UK with guest parts beamed in from Sweden, Austria, the US, Azerbaijan, and Denmark, the line-up for The Circus And The Nightwhale includes some familiar faces alongside Steve on electric and acoustic guitars, 12-string, mandolin, harmonica, percussion, bass, and vocals. Roger King (keyboards, programming, and orchestral arrangements), Rob Townsend (sax), Jonas Reingold (bass), Nad Sylvan (vocals), Craig Blundell (drums), and Amanda Lehmann on vocals. Nick D’Virgilio and Hugo Degenhardt return as guests on the drum stool, engineer extraordinaire Benedict Fenner appears on keyboards and Malik Mansurov is back with the tar. Finally, Steve’s brother John Hackett is present once more on flute.
The new album will be available to pre-order from the 1st December 2023 on several different formats, including a Limited CD+Blu-ray media book (including 5.1 Surround Sound & 24bit high-resolution stereo mixes), Standard CD Jewelcase, Gatefold 180g Vinyl LP & as Digital Album. All feature the stunning cover painting by Denise Marsh.
The full tracklisting is as follows:
1. People Of The Smoke
2. These Passing Clouds
3. Taking You Down
4. Found And Lost
5. Enter The Ring
6. Get Me Out!
7. Ghost Moon and Living Love
8. Circo Inferno
9. Breakout
10. All At Sea
11. Into The Nightwhale
12. Wherever You Are
13. White Dove
Summing up the Circus And The NightwhaleSteve says: It’s a lovely journey that starts dirty, scratchy, and smoky and becomes heavenly and divine. How can you resist it?
Steve is currently on tour in North America, continuing his Foxtrot At Fifty + Hackett Highlights run. Next year he will tour the world extensively, including a brand-new UK tour under the name Genesis Greats, Lamb Highlights & Solo, and that will see him return to the legendary Royal Albert Hall. For the full list of dates, head to: http://hackettsongs.com/tour.html
Leading symphonic metal band, XANDRIA, have released a new official video for fan favorite “Your Stories I’ll Remember”. The track is taken from XANDRIA’s latest and most successful album to date, ‘The Wonders Still Awaiting’, which peaked at #9 on the official German album charts.
XANDRIA returned with an impressive new lineup, enchanting their fans with new songs during this year’s ongoing European tour with label mates DELAIN. The two symphonic metal frontrunners will play three more shows in the Netherlands and Belgium from November 17-19. XANDRIA is also looking forward to their headline tour through the UK, Germany and Switzerland with Phantom Elite and Skarlett Riot, kicking off on November 25th.
Watch the Official Video for “Your Stories I’ll Remember”
XANDRIA opens an exciting chapter with the eighth studio album, ‘The Wonders Still Awaiting’. Mastermind Marco Heubaum returns with a new lineup and leads the band once again into wonderful spheres, without renouncing their characteristic trademarks. The impressive vocal wealth of Ambre Vourvahis – ranging from rock grit, operatic highs and even death metal growls – opens the unit’s sound to a wider palette of colors. Songs like the opening epic “Two Worlds”, “The Wonders Still Awaiting” and “Ghosts” manifest the thematic mood of the album while constructing incredible soundscapes of pure symphonic metal. XANDRIA addresses issues of social inequality and the quest for a just world. “Paradise” showcases some of the album’s strongest hooks, captivating with great metallic pop melodies. The veil of various influences is lifted once more in “Illusion Is Their Name”, dashing all deception with heavy power metal vibes. Tracks like “Your Stories I’ll Remember” and “Scars” show the intimate side of XANDRIA on one hand, while combining rhythmic heaviness on the other. The latter is reminiscent of a James Bond theme, dressed in a heavy musical soundscape. The epic nine minute album closer “Astéria”, featuring Greek lyrics written by Ambre Vourvahis, lands as the album’s exclamation point, proving with a grand finish that the five-piece has fearlessly started a revolution in the symphonic metal genre – commencing an impressive new era of XANDRIA with ‘The Wonders Still Awaiting’.
Recorded at the Keswick Theatre, Glenside, PA on October 21 st 2022, here we find Renaissance performing alongside the Renaissance Chamber Orchestra to celebrate Annie Haslam’s 75 th year. I have long been a fan of this band in its multiple iterations, and there is no doubt their 2002 live album ‘In The Land of the Rising Sun’ is one of my favourites, so when I heard about this I was definitely interested.
There have been multiple iterations of the band over the years, but most people point to the line-up of Annie Haslam, Michael Dunford, John Tout, Jon Camp, and Terry Sullivan as being the classic, but Michael and John are no longer with us while Jon and Terry long ago departed, but Annie is still there keeping the flame alive. These days she is joined by Mark Lambert (guitar), who was a member in the Eighties, Rave Tesar (keyboards, piano), who played on the ‘Rising Sun’ album, drummer Frank Pagano (who has been there for more than a decade), Geoffrey Langley (keyboards, who joined in 2016) and new bassist Leo Traversa, so this is certainly a valid line-up asopposed to Annie and a host of session musicians.
This double CD set covers decades in music, and we get music from Renaissance, Annie Haslam’s Renaissance and her solo albums, and there is no doubt great thought has gone into the arrangements as the use of the additional musicians provides amazing depth. There are two keyboard players, and their repertoire has been greatly expanded with the use of real strings and horns. I am sure anyone who went to see this tour would have had a wonderful time, and those who purchase the album will be the same people and will happily relive the experience, but I wonder how many will purchase this for pure listening pleasure as opposed to collectors?
Musically this is wonderful, and one cannot fault anyone involved as their delicacy and accompaniment is superb, but we cannot look past the fact that Annie is now into her eighth decade, and it sounds like it. That she is not using effects to mask this is to be admired, but while the range is still there, her voice is now quavery and can be quite shrill. She hits and holds the notes, but sometimes they are a little sharp, and I soon found I was not enjoying the album nearly as much as I expected or wanted to. One could never give this to someone as an introduction, it is only for those who already know the material and are pleased to be able to experience Annie performing the songs which they did not expect to still hear played in this fashion. That she can still hit the notes in “Symphony of Light” is incredible, and “The Sisters” is a triumph with wonderful performances from all involved, but sadly somewhat let down by the vocals. Back in the Eighties I was one of the biggest Jethro Tull fanatics around, but when I last saw them in 2004, I vowed never to see them play again as Ian’s voice was totally shot in the live environment. The arrangements and performances from the musicians involved are superb, and there are plenty of opportunities for them to weave their magic, but sadly it is often let down by the vocals, which is a real shame as many of us view Renaissance as being built around Annie and her amazing voice. Sadly, time has taken its toll. 6/10 Kev Rowland
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