New listens...

[3-LockBox]

in prog:

It Bites - The Tall Ships. Retro adult pop rock, but in a good way, a fitting follow-up to Kino's Picture ( I say that because of John Mitchell's involvement).

Martin Olford - The Old Road. Retro arena rock, but in a cheesy way. For fans of the genre really. Maybe fans of Arena, Pallas, or Pendragon would appreciate it.

Frost* - Experiments In Mass Appeal...maybe, if its 1986. I actually like this one though. While their last album, Milliontown, was like a harder edged, slightly proggier version of the aforementioned Kino album (again, because of John Mitchell's involvement), this album sounds like a good follow-up to the last Enchant album, Tug Of War (which I like a lot). But if Enchant's style was a tad too '80s for you, then you may want to move along (alas, John Mitchell is not singing on this new one).

Non-prog listening :

I'm still digging that new Land Of Talk album, Some Are Lakes, and I'm also enjoying the klatest from TV On The Radio and The Sea And Cake. A new one I'm still trying to digest, the latest from Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping, is an odd duck. I think I said on this here board some couple of years ago that these guys may be the new XTC, but this new one is all over the map, flirting with the hyper disco pomp of Scissor Sistors and the power pop of middle period Queen. The production kills it in places, with its groove killing stop-start mixing. I've actually noticed this on a few other releases recently and I hope its a short lived fad.