Italian Fur 2026
Peering into paradise through a prism of the past, British progressors assess eternity and present it with music of the spheres.
In The Garden Of Time Immemorial
The conceptuality of art-rock must come with the stylistic territory – yet, fortunately, there are performers declining to care much about their chosen genre’s aural geography and preferring instead to reach for arena accessibility and arresting tunes and leave cerebral pretenses for lesser mortals to latch onto. That’s what this English ensemble apparently set out to do on their debut album which has quite a few dipartite pieces whose second halves don’t immediately follow the first ones and thus allow the songs to breathe, and such an atmospheric approach is a major element of the record’s microcosm. Not for nothing the relatively heavy “Echoes Of The Ether” appears to be the exception here, the track’s sequential flow emphasizing its airiness, and the balance of female and male voices and soaring guitars contributing to the sheer beauty of the platter and inducing spin after spin of its many wonders.
At first glance, the album’s numbers seem to be steeped in the late-’80s sonics, as opener “Celestial Currents” offers a blissful, albeit anxious, immersion into a vibrant big-sky fantasy, where electronic silver lining and pop-ivories conspire with clear voices and warm six-string riffs to produce immense, and highly danceable, sweetness that will be tested anew further down the line to reveal fresh, intimate intensity. But if “Wings Of Time” spreads its reverie in an well-orchestrated prog fashion to stage a soul-shattering panorama, the ruminative “Through The Misty Glow” leads the flight towards the event horizon which “A Song Of Stars” wraps into resonant cosmic balladry, and “A Spiral Dance Through Endless Time” takes, on a ripple of romantic piano and a wave of symphonic nostalgia, down to earth.
Spicing up such an untethered ethereality, the motorik “Forgotten Suns” shows a blues nerve and folk verve in its nigh-persistent instrumental drive, as sculpted by the band’s three singing guitarists – Lucinda Blackwood, Wally Fitch and Steve Ramos, the latter two sharing keyboard duties with Cecily Crowe, also a vocalist – and drummer Reginald Thorne, who combine magnificence and vigor in a compelling way. However, while recurrent – yet never repetitive – melodic hooks and the weaving of some songs’ titles into the lyrics of other numbers tighten the overall concept, the meta-use of the word “Mellotron” may somewhat damage the entire experience, the experience even a faux dog bark concealed in one of the tracks can’t disturb, the experience the transparent “Where Dreams Collide” sums up without uttering a single syllable.
Co-produced by Walter Holland and Steve Leonard, known for their own memorable works, “In The Garden Of Time Immemorial” is a majestic journey that begs yo be continued.
*****
