Ok, wow. As a big Genesis fan and one who has followed the solo careers of most of the members, I’m pleasantly surprised by (and shocked that I’ve missed it all this time) the debut solo album from early Genesis member Anthony Phillips. “The Geese & The Ghost” (1977) is stunning in it’s beauty and brilliance.

This review from daveconn at progarchives.com captures it well.

ANTHONY PHILLIPS was little more than a footnote to the great career of GENESIS; that is until he released “The Geese & The Ghost” in 1977. Blending orchestral and acoustic instruments, PHILLIPS’ debut album had a grace and grandeur unseen since the days of “Trespass” and “Nursery Cryme”. Featuring the participation of MIKE RUTHERFORD, PHIL COLLINS (on vocals), JOHN HACKETT, JACK LANCASTER and others, it was ANTHONY’s money shot, and he made it pay off in a big way by delivering the best music of his life. In a sense, ANTHONY has become a victim of his own success, since subsequent albums have fallen invariably short of “Geese”’s goals, but that’s a discussion for another day. If you enjoyed the pastoral prog rock of early GENESIS, more wonders await you. There is, for example, the story of “Henry: Portraits of Tudor Times”, in which the players from the Age of Chivalry walk again. There are songs featuring PHIL COLLINS (“Which Way The Wind Blows”, “God If I Saw Her Now”) that match “More Fool Me” for beauty. There is the stirring title track, “The Geese And The Ghost”, with its gentle agility sure to delight GENESIS fans who thought the realms of magic lost to the late ’70s. To put this into perspective, there are only a handful of albums to my mind that will delight core followers the way “The Geese & The Ghost” does. For GENESIS followers, Voyage of the Acolyte becomes the reference point (though that was a deliberately darker work). For YES fans, JON ANDERSON’s Olias of Sunhillow or RICK WAKEMAN’s “Six Wives of Henry VIII” yield as much pleasure. Some of “Geese”’s credit must go to MIKE RUTHERFORD as well, who appears alongside PHILLIPS throughout and shares his affection for acoustic adornment. In a sense, “Geese” also stands as RUTHERFORD’s best solo album outside of GENESIS. Listening to this album in “Spring or Summer”, when the scent of a world in bloom wafts gently through the window screens, is to be in concert with life itself. If you don’t own this yet and have played “Foxtrot” down to nubby grooves, do yourself a favor and grab this golden goose.

Buy it! The Geese & the Ghost

The new album, Blood, from OSI is already out in Europe and is set to be released stateside on May 19. Special guests – Gavin Harrison – drums / Mikael Åkerfeldt – vocals/lyrics on Stockholm.

Attention power pop/Jellyfish fans! Check out Secret Powers! Fun power pop! Two albums out so far. Listen to tracks on their MySpace page.

From a Kool Kat Music review:

You just gotta check out all of the unbelievable, sugar-filled pop ingredients that went into this charming, extremely special, intoxicating pop cocktail outta Missoula, Montana – healthy heapings of Jellyfish, Jason Falkner, and Roger Manning, a pinch of Beach Boys, a smidgen of Paul McCartney, a teaspoon of ELO, a dash of Supertramp, a drop of Jackdaw4, and tiny jiggers of Supertramp, The Nines, Ben Folds and Gabe Dixon!

From NotLame’s entry for their new album:

The band was one of 2008`s strongest debuts and a best seller at Not Lame and here is #2. “Secret Powers sounds like pop. It sounds like washing your tricycle on a bright waxy blue sunny day. It sometimes sounds like long feathered tresses and platform shoes, sometimes like Nehru jackets and sensitive facial hair. It sounds like girl-watching and dopey desire. It sounds like melted ice cream, dirty feet, and sticky faces.

The following is taken from the Transatlantic web-site.

TRANSATLANTIC, the progressive rock “supergroup” comprised of Mike Portnoy (Dream Theater), Pete Trewavas (Marillion), Roine Stolt (The Flower Kings) and Neal Morse (ex-Spock’s Beard), have reunited after a 7 year hiatus to begin work on a brand new studio album.

The band began work on the album in early April in Nashville and are expected to have it released by year’s end if all goes as planned.

TRANSATLANTIC have previously released two studio albums to tremendous critical and fan acclaim: 2000’s SMPTe and 2001’s Bridge Across Forever. The band toured on the heels of each release with an American Tour in 2000 and a European Tour in 2001 and released subsequent Live DVD’s/CD’s from both tours before going their separate ways for an indefinite hiatus which lasted almost the entire decade.

Come June 23, I know what I will be picking up, my copy of Dream Theater’s 10th studio album, Black Clouds and Silver Linings.  In addition to the standard CD version, Dream Theater will also release a vinyl LP and 3 disc special edition CD (one CD of instrumental mixes of the album and one with six covers).

Additionally, Dream Theater will headline the Progressive Nation Tour.  The bill is better for the European edition (Bigelf will be with them for one thing), but the U.S. line up is nothing to dismiss.  I am currently checking out Beardfish (watch for a review soon) and have been very  impressed.

Liverpool Hope University is now offering a Master of Arts degree in “The Beatles, Popular Music and Society.”  So for those of you who always thought it would be interesting to take that history of rock n’ roll at the local jr. college, here is your chance to hop the pond and really dig in.

I used to really like last.fm. But this is a concern. last.fm is owned by CBS and may or not be willing to hand over user data to the RIAA (which you should also be boycotting… I can tell you how).

Read the TechCrunch article that says last.fm may be handing over data.

Read a rebuttal that says that last.fm is not handing over data.

Either way, you can see the potential here for your data to be abused. If all I listen to all day is Porcupine Tree, Jellyfish and Neal Morse, it’d be great for every record label to see that from the perspective of “hey, we should release more of this kind of music.” But the more I think about it, the more I just want these record labels to die already. I mean… I’m being exposed to and purchasing the music I like without any problems thanks to the internet (esp. individual artist web sites that sell music directly), word of mouth and indie sites (cdbaby.com).

So I would prefer that last.fm not share anything at all with the RIAA or any record label that doesn’t own the actual music being heard. I’ve deleted my account.

Since we have been so quite for so long I thought I needed to offer a few links to a few bands that I have found via myspace.  Enjoy!

The Greenhornes

The Binges

Buffalo Killers

The Willowz

The Ettes

Black Bonzo

Astra

Can you hardly wait for Guns n Roses to release Chinese Democracy?  Did you really think they ever would?  Have you stopped caring long ago about anything Axle says or does?  Well, regardless of what your current opinion of Axle Rose’s “Guns” they release their much awaited/mocked album this Sunday, November 23. 

The 14-minute “Carnival of Light” from 1967 does exist and Paul wants the public to hear it.

Read about it here.