Stormfields

IZZ, Everlasting Instant (Doone, 2015). Tracks: Own the Mystery; Every Minute; Start Again; If It’s True; The Three Seers; The Everlasting Instant; Keep Away; Can’t Feel the Earth, Part IV; Illuminata; Sincerest Life; Like a Straight Line.

Birzer rating: 9/10

IZZ’s EVERLASTING INSTANT (2015).

Concluding their trilogy—which includes the brilliant The Darkened Room and Crush of Night—Everlasting Instant is full of wonders. Though I rarely employ labels, this album makes me wonder if this is more art rock or more prog rock? Like much of the music once made by Talk Talk and now by Gazpacho and Elbow, IZZ produces densely layered and atmospheric albums, mysteries in and of themselves. Lyrically, the album offers the highest of poetic visions, calling us to things much greater than this realilty.

Perhaps most impressively, IZZ sounds at once like a group of very talented individual musicians as well as a cohesive and intense…

The utterly lovely Greg Spawton of Big Big Train has his 50th anniversary today! We salute him! Hip Hip Hooray!! 😎

Spoiler Alert: If you are planning on attending an upcoming Rush concert on this tour and don’t want the setlist spoiled for you, then it’s advisable to not read this. But even if somehow the setlist does get spoiled for you? It won’t make any difference. It’s not the surprise of what they are playing on this tour that makes the show great – it’s that they are playing these songs. At that moment, you won’t be caring whether the surprise was spoiled or not, you’ll just be thrilled that you are there as a witness to greatness.

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During the months from May through September, I usually welcome rain. Anyone who has endured the heat of a few central Texas summers (which start early and last a long time) will understand exactly what I’m talking about. But it’s important to remember the old saying about “be careful what you…

A few weeks ago, I had the privilege (I don’t use that word lightly here) of attending Marillion Weekend in Montreal, Canada. For those who aren’t familiar with the weekend conventions, the band play three straight nights, each with a different setlist and theme.

Friday night featured the Anoraknophobia album in full, plus a few extras. There was a well-intentioned attempt to open the weekend with “Montreal,” a love letter to the city and its fans, but a blown fuse in the venue cut the performance short. (Not to worry, we eventually heard it during Sunday’s encores.) Unfazed, the band returned to the stage after a few minutes and launched into “Between You and Me.”

In my experience, Anoraknophobia is an album best enjoyed with headphones on a quiet evening, so it doesn’t exactly make for the best live album. Still, “Separated Out” and “If My Heart Were a Ball” were…

Following in the wake of an epic May snowstorm, high winds, flooding, and tornados, my two oldest kids—Nathaniel (16) and Gretchen (14)—began our nearly eight-hour journey across the Great Plains about 8:45 yesterday morning. We arrived in Lincoln around 5, checked into our hotel room, and I immediately had an hour-long radio interview with two wonderful women out of Denver.

Scrambling as Kronos devoured the minutes, we headed across town in search of our pilgrimage site, The Pinnacle Arena.

We found it, and we were in our seats by 7:10. The show was supposed to start at 7:30, but it ran about 15 minutes late.

A nearly packed arena revealed a far more gender-balanced Rush audience then I’d ever seen before. Almost certainly because of Beyond the Lighted Stage, wives and girlfriends (it was pretty obvious that most of them were newbies) made up a significant part of the crowd…

A Prayer for Students by Thomas Aquinas

Creator of all things, true source of light and wisdom, origin of all being, graciously let a ray of your light penetrate the darkness of my understanding. Take from me the double darkness in which I have been born, an obscurity of sin and ignorance. Give me a keen understanding, a retentive memory, and the ability to grasp things correctly and fundamentally. Grant me the talent of being exact in my explanations and the ability to express myself with thoroughness and charm. Point out the beginning, direct the progress, and help in the completion. I ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.