What Are You Listening To?

[Ruby]

COLIN MASSON "the mad monk and the mountain" cd, 2010

was introduced to this guy via a post made by Ruby a while ago....
it hard to place his style, but im going for Progressive with this one....
six tracks in all, four of which are instrumentals...
this guy has as much emotion and feeling in his instrumentals as Knopfler IMO...
track one is spoken word over music, track three is female vocals song is psedo-folky I guess...
of the instrumentals, I like three and dislike one....
tough call between "the mad monk and the mountain" and "the house on the rock" for best track...
im going for The House On The Rock...
from memory, my avourite track has flutes/woodwind in it, sounds a bit like Jethro Tull in places.
why do I like his instrumentals??????
because theyre not repetitive, they ebb and weave, speed up, slow down etc...
anyway, a good album, a cant wait to get my teeth into the other two I purchased...
and Jerome, you'd love his work mate, do yourself a favour and order his cds!

I LIKE THIS ALBUM

worst track: caradon's surprise
best track: the house on the rock

[video=youtube;y3bFXCPe6SY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3bFXCPe6SY[/video]

tracks:

1...the lighthouse keepers **
2...tilting at windmills (inst) **
3...the ends of the earth **
4...the mad monk and the mountain (inst) **
5...caradon's surprise (inst) *
6...the house on the rock (inst) **

3s=0
2s=5
1s=1

rating: 1.9

Well said CH, although based on your scoring system, I’d give it a 2.5 – I love the acoustic interlude of “Caradon’s Surprise” … and once again, to each their own!

You are quite right about the feeling – maybe that’s what is so very appealing - there’s a lot of finesse here, and good taste, on all levels, as opposed to some other new prog work which IMHO, although technically well executed, seems a bit overblown and clinical. Technically speaking, there can be no doubt at all that Colin Masson knows his way around guitars and arrangements – brilliant stuff, and therein lies the rub – it’s not just about the ears … it’s about touching a chord within.

The woodwind you speak of is the humble recorder/s which just goes to show – there is sometimes great merit in simplicity!

I love The Southern Cross too, which is also a concept album with ‘two sides’ despite being in CD/digital format (which Colin humorously elaborates on in an interlude after ‘side one’); quite a lot of influence drawn from the likes of Mike Oldfield and Pink Floyd is evident on both, I’d say.

This is absolutely my favourite kind of music – where even the instrumentals are filled with imagery and analogies - I’d say you were picking up on that from it as well, CH, hence enjoying the non-vocal offerings. There’s an Italian word, ‘chiaroscuro’, which, to quote, “is used to describe the dramatic effect of contrasting areas of light and dark in an artwork, particularly paintings” - I think it applies very well in this instance. A fortuitous stumbling upon - I’m so happy to have it my collection! Interested to see your take on TSC!!