I love old books, but sometimes the gulf between the culture in which a book was written and my own is so great that I fail to get the original intent of the author. Nadya Williams’ new book, Christians Reading Classics, is an invaluable guide to some of the most time-tested classic works from the ancient world, and it can help bridge that cultural divide. It is divided into five parts, in rough chronological order.
Part I is Longing for Eternity, and it covers Homer’s The Iliad, Hesiod’s Theogony and Works and Days, Pindar’s Odes, and the Histories of Herodotus and Thucydides. Each chapter is relatively short but packed with profound insights. For example, in her analysis of The Iliad, Williams writes,
The externally governed nature of this heroic code – that one is only a great hero if this person is recognized by others and has accumulated great prizes of honor, including prizes that are real people! – is a warning to us as we consider how aspects of such a code appeal to our own desires even today. Each of us wants to be declared good – as God once spoke when he created Adam. In fact, we would like to be declared “the Best”, and we would like this coronation to come unconditionally from absolutely everyone around. But our worth and any declaration of goodness, excellence, and ultimately righteousness is to be found in God alone, not in other people’s view of us. The suffering of the heroes in The Iliad and in other ancient epics, where heroes do all they can to be declared “the Best”, is an important warning of what happens if we place our value in others’ opinion of us. It reminds us of the empty promises of this kind of glory – it cannot satisfy. (p. 9)
[Hello Spirit of Cecilia Reader. On December 2, 2025, I had the great privilege of talking with Big Big Train’s main man, Gregory Mark Spawton. As it turns out, Greg and I have been corresponding with one another since 2009–sometimes a rather frequent correspondence that often included gifts of books, etc.–but we’d never actually talked face to face. So, for me, especially, talking with Greg was an absolute thrill. It’s not often that you get to meet your heroes. I would’ve loved to have met Mark Hollis, for example, but that can never be. So, getting to meet Greg is a real treat. And, not surprisingly, he’s as kind and as intelligent as I’d always imagined him to be. We talked for an incredibly long time–a huge thanks to Greg for his time and graciousness–and the transcript of our conversation is 46 pages long in Microsoft Word. I’ve never edited a transcript before, so this has been an experiment. As such–and I hope you’ll all forgive me–I’m going to publish the interview in a series of parts, based on the topics we covered. Here’s the first part of our interview–focused on Greg’s publishing firm, Kingmaker. Please enjoy. Yours, Brad]
Brad: Well, Greg, this is fantastic that we get to talk. I mean, it’s good for my soul to see you and to talk to you. Absolutely wonderful. And you know, I mean, I don’t want to embarrass you, but I really can’t imagine my life or any of my writing without you as my soundtrack, really ever since I heard The Underfall Yard. You guys—you, David, Nick, and everybody—you’ve just been such a part of my life. Yet, it’s amazing to me that this is actually our first time talking, face to face.
You know, I had interviewed David and had a really good time doing that.
I’d like to talk a little bit about Kingmaker and if you could give me a little bit of the history of that, why you got interested in publishing, how many books a year you guys are doing, how that’s going, how it’s tied to Big, Big Train, etc.
Greg: Yeah, well, life’s a bit strange for me because, as you know, until maybe ten years ago, I still had an office job and I was doing music on the side. As it transpired, I was able to quit work and focus on being a musician full time. And then an opportunity arose to do to work in books as well. So my two sort of loves of my life aside from my wife and my kids and my cats are books and music. So I found myself in a position with Nick Shilton, the Big Big Train manager. At the time he was writing a book on Big Big Train and in order to get it published, we thought actually, you know, rather than just go down a self-publishing route, let’s set up a publisher and see if we can also publish some other music-related books.
And in fact, before we got round to publishing the first Big Big Train book, we published a book by Mario Giammetti, an Italian journalist and the foremost expert on Genesis. And I’d known Mario for quite some time.
I remember I had an email from him: “Do you know any way I can get into the English publishing industry?” So we had great pleasure in publishing those two volumes on Genesis and a couple of books on Big Big Train.
And hot off the press is a huge book on Peter Hammil and Van der graaf Generator and it is really a really big thing, you know. It’s so detailed. Peter Hammond is one of the most interesting lyricists in progressive rock. So his work for me requires and benefits from quite a detailed analysis, which is what this book does.
Kingmaker is a business, so you know we have to commission or publish books that will not lose money, but, on the other hand, we want them to be things that we would want to read and that we’re interested in.
So that’s our modus operandi, you know. Would we enjoy reading that book and is it going to work for us in terms of business? And it’s been great. It’s been quite a ride. We’ve got a Yes book that we’re working on that we hope will be out next year. And we’re aiming for all of the publications to be as good as they can get in terms of how they’re written and in content. So yeah, it’s been a been a very interesting process.
Of course, you’ve been in the publishing business as an author—a published author for many, many years—but this is much more of a new experience for me.
Brad: I like it, Greg! And I I proudly own the Genesis volumes and I’ve got, of course, the Andrew Wild books—all just really, really excellent. So I’ve enjoyed what you’ve done.
I knew you loved books, but I didn’t realize that you would be so much in love with them that you would become a publisher. So I thought that was great.
Greg: Yeah, it was just one of those moments where me and Nick sort of looked at each other and just said, “let’s see what we can do here.” And then I remember Mario pitching a Genesis book to us. And so we met him in London a few years ago, liked him, got the books translated. In fact, quite a few of our books have started life in the Italian language because there’s a big prog rock community there. It’s probably the second most vibrant market, certainly in terms of 70s prog rock. And, I’m kind of at a reasonable level of Italian now myself. So, I’ve been doing a little bit of translation work.
We’ve got a new book that’s coming out on Tony Banks as the first English language biography of Tony Banks. That’s coming out in February, I think, or January. That’s another great read and it focuses on Tony’s solo work rather than his work with Genesis. It goes through the Genesis years but it focuses on an area of his work that’s not really been talked about much.
If it goes well, we’ll try and get some books together on the other members of Genesis and take it from there and see where we end up.
Brad: Yeah, I pre-ordered the Tony Banks, so I’m very much looking forward to it now.
Greg: So that said, I find Banks a bit of an enigma really because the guy that wrote, say, Firth of Fifth or Madman Moon has also written some quite cheesy pop stuff at times.
There’s nothing wrong pop music. I love pop music, but I love pop music that’s not cheesy and is well crafted.
And some of his music, some of his solo music, has kind of strayed into that and it’s slightly enigmatic for me to find a character or an individual that can do on the one hand something as absolutely sensationally written and composed as Firth of Fifth and then something on the other side of things.
And the biography is critical. It’s a critical analysis of his work. So by no means . . . we’re not putting him up on a pedestal. We tell the truth. And, so it’s interesting for me for that reason.
We’re in awe of what he can do, so we’re not completely critical, you know, just as I’ve written some terrible songs sometimes. We’ve all done it.
We’ve all done it but I struggle with him on that, the same with Mike Rutherford. I can’t see how they can’t see how I think—objectively—elements of their music from the 70s are simply more interesting, at a higher level of art, than some of their later sort of big stuff.
That’s what I struggle with there, you know, that they don’t seem to be able to see that. For me, it’s so obvious, but then we’re not always the best judges of our own material.
Brad: Yeah, I I’m reminded Neil Peart was just horrified when Asia came out—that Carl Palmer could go from ELP to Asia .
Greg: It is, you know, and Nick Shilton’s my manager’s and my publishing partner’s route into prog rock was via Asia. So, you’ll be off his Christmas list now.
Brad: I actually enjoy that first Asia album, especially Sole Survivor.
Greg: I think some of it is pretty good fun, but I, you know, it’s hard for me when you’ve got a band like UK who are still making incredible albums in 1978 and then going to Asia maybe a couple of years later.
I think the problem was the business. The music business was just headed down that money, money, money, commerce, commerce, commerce route. We all live in a capitalistic society and, you know, we have to accept that that’s how things are, but it’s a shame that they throw out the baby with the bath water.
But John Wetton, who wrote a lot of that stuff . . . he liked pop music.
I think we forget that at the root of probably the best prog rock is often very well-crafted songs rather than, you know the sort of extensive instrumentals. I think it’s when you get those two things together, that’s when I love prog rock.
So, for example, a song like Cinema Show—it’s got four or five minutes of really beautifully composed acoustic pop and then it goes into this sort of extended instrumental playout.
So you get the best of both worlds and that’s why I love prog rock really because you know you can do more than just the one thing, but you still, I think, at its best, you should have the song at the core of it in my opinion.
Brad: Thanks, Greg, that’s great. I don’t want to jump into Woodcut yet, but obviously you guys do that with the Woodcut extraordinarily well. Yeah, yeah, you succeed. Believe me.
Back on Kingmaker, do you guys have a set number of books you’re trying to publish a year or is it basically as things come to you?
Greg: we’ve made a decision to do no more than four a year.
Brad: That’s what I figured.
Greg: It’s basically three to four and we’ve got a pipeline of several books ahead so we know we’re going to be in a year’s time. We’re beginning to think of books maybe two or three years hence from now. But it’s hard, you know, it is hard work doing more than that. And I think that the focus has got to be on quality, not quantity, because, you know, we could suddenly go down a different route where we were churning out books.
That’s the interesting thing setting up a publisher—with a bit of a track record now. We get people pitching us books all the time. Nine times out of ten we just say no A) because we don’t think it’s going to work commercially or it isn’t of interest to us or B) because we just don’t have the time, you know, as we want to manage these books through from the beginning to the end and,we’re a small publisher. So you know, it’s a hands-on thing for us.
Brad: just curious about the logistics. Do you actually have a full-time layout person and are you doing the copy editing and who does your printing for you?
Greg: So we got lucky. We found a printer down in Norwich way, in the east of England. Again, a small publishing house printer—they’ve got a really good graphic designer and he’s really focused on getting it right. He will do the layouts for us.
In terms of editing, it depends on the book really. For one forthcoming book, the writer Joe, he kind of edited himself to be honest. He’s a writer editor.
And of course, then we just get Professor Geoff Parks, who’s our completely overqualified proof reader, but he goes through things, you know, proofs, and he’s really very precise in terms of both syntax and grammar and all those things that you need.
In terms of my editing role, yeah, I have actually edited a couple of the books and that’s been fun. [Greg laughs] I’m not a very detailed person. My wife would just laugh at the thought of me doing anything that requires a sense of detail. And of course editing does require that, but I tend to be more of a kind of ideas editor, I think. For example, with Mario, there’ll be times when I’ve said to him, ‘actually there’s an aspect here that I don’t think works’ or ‘I find this interesting and perhaps you could talk a bit more about it.’
That’s the kind of role I’ve had and it’s been nice, and there have been some good friendships made.
We’ve had a couple of books that have been good that have been ghost written, such as Mark Kelly from Marillion’s book. A great book. It was initially ghost written and then, I think, about halfway through, Mark began to pick up his own voice here, really. I think having been back over the chapters with the ghostwriter, he was able to say, do you know, he was able to assume the voice of the ghostwriter and his own voice. And that was quite interesting because by about halfway through, I could no longer tell who’d written what chapter. Mark’s a really clever guy. He really got it together so it was hard then to tell the difference of what had already been through the ghostwriter or what had just gone straight from Mark. So that was an evolving process as well.
And we’d like to do some more Marillion books because I think they’ve a really interesting story. Very interesting.
Brad: Yeah, I have Steve Hogarth’s two volumes as well, which I I really enjoy. It’s fun to go back to those.
Well, thanks, Greg. That’s fascinating and I’m really glad that’s working out for you guys. I think it’s just a great, great project and I’m really happy to support that.
Big Big Train announce first ever narrative concept album ‘Woodcut’; launch first single “The Artist”Photo credit: Cécile LopesBig Big Train, the award-winning, international progressive rock band, will issue their 16th studio album via InsideOutMusic on February 6th, 2026. Woodcut is a landmark release for the international group, whose line-up draws together members from England, Scotland, Italy, the USA, Sweden and Norway, in that it marks their first ever full-length conceptual piece – quite a statement given the musical depth and storytelling qualities of a band formed in Bournemouth way back in 1990. Woodcut is a continuous narrative exploring creativity, sacrifice and the thin line between inspiration and madness.
The band recently teased the new record with the launch of a short passage of music, which can now be revealed as the album’s introductory piece ‘Inkwell Black’. Today they are also pleased to reveal the first single from the album, ‘The Artist’, which is accompanied by a stunning video created by Crystal Spotlight. Watch it now here: https://youtu.be/lu2Xm2gMMWYBassist Gregory Spawton comments: “Woodcut tells the story of a character we call The Artist, who is struggling with his creativity and with life. One day he is able to fashion a woodcut which he considers to be beautiful and different. Maybe it’s a dream or maybe it’s real life, but he finds himself stepping into the woodcut scene and into an alternative world.”
Woodcut sees all seven band members making stunning contributions, with frontman Alberto Bravin taking the lead as producer: “This time it’s kind of a new statement for the band. ‘Woodcut’ is a big step forward for us,” Bravin comments. With more than 400 individual recorded tracks of music to edit, streamline and piece together, and also with the connectivity of the album’s storyline and its themed instrumental sections to consider, this was a task of gargantuan proportions.
“I felt a huge sense of relief when Alberto took over as producer,” says Spawton, the band’s final original co-founding member. “Although this is only Alberto’s second studio album with BBT, he is very aware of the traditions of the band and has also brought his own sense of energy to the music.”Woodcut feels like a Big Big Train record quite unlike any that came before—an assured union of music, storytelling and visual invention. The album is graced with a striking cover design from Dorset (England) based artist Robin Mackenzie – a black and white woodcut print, of course, derived from a woodcut which the band commissioned from him specifically for the album.
Available as a Limited CD + Blu-ray edition, including extensive liner notes as well as Dolby Atmos & 5.1 Surround Sound mixes by Shawn Dealey of Sweetwater Studios, the album will also be available as a stunning Gatefold 180g 2LP with special embossed cover, Standard CD Jewelcase & Digitally in both Stereo and Dolby Atmos versions.Pre-orders are now available here: https://bigbigtrain.lnk.to/Woodcut-Album
Featuring 16 tracks across 66-minutes of runtime, Woodcut feels epic without outstaying its welcome. From the intimacy of ‘Inkwell Black’ to the grandeur of ‘Counting Stars’, Woodcut is a defiant analogue statement in a digital age—a handcrafted, deeply human exploration of art, faith and endurance.
The full track-listing is as follows:
1. Inkwell Black 00:56 2. The Artist 07:16 3. The Lie of the Land 02:55 4. The Sharpest Blade 04:16 5. Albion Press 05:46 6. Arcadia 05:46 7. Second Press 00:37 8. Warp and Weft 03:45 9. Chimaera 05:37 10. Dead Point 05:28 11. Light Without Heat 03:22 12. Dreams in Black and White 02:34 13. Cut and Run 06:19 14. Hawthorn White 01:54 15. Counting Stars 05:40 16. Last Stand 03:34
Greetings, Spirit of Cecilia readers! In this post, we share our thoughts on the latest album from a group we have long admired – Norway’s Gazpacho.
Tad: Brad, the first Gazpacho album I picked up was Missa Atropos (2010), and I have to admit, I couldn’t get into it. Jan-Henrik Ohme’s vocals seemed kind of weird, and none of the songs had memorable melodies, to my ears. However, on your recommendation, I bought their fourth album, Night (2007), and I fell in love with it. Their use of repetitive riffs throughout the entire album had a hypnotic effect on me, and it remains a favorite of mine.
They’ve just released their twelfth album (not counting a few live sets), Magic 8 Ball, and I think it is one of their best. It sounds like they have decided to embrace their talent for writing excellent “pop”-style songs, and this album includes eight thoroughly enjoyable tracks. After the deep and philosophical musings of 2020’s Fireworker, Magic 8 Ball strikes me as a more lighthearted and accessible offering. I love it!
Brad: Tad! Always a pleasure, my awesome friend. And, to imagine that we get time to talk and write about things we absolutely love. Life doesn’t get much better than this.
Yeah, I’m just a few years short of two decades of loving Gazpacho. Sometime in the early 2000s, I really fell in love with Kscope and started purchasing everything the label was putting out. To this day, I have a pretty strong Kscope collection.
At the time, if you remember, the label was also putting out samplers. On one of those samplers, in 2007, I was exposed to Gazpacho’s Night, and I purchased it immediately. To say that I was taken with it would be an understatement. Though I have loved everything Gazpacho has released, Night and Tick Tock remain my absolute favorites–standards by which I not only judge Gazpacho but all bands and all prog. Once I encountered Night, I went back and purchased Bravo, When Earth Lets Go, and Firebird. Those first three are much more art pop and art rock than their later stuff. Beginning with Night, the only real way to describe their music is prog or post-prog.
To be sure, I’ve never missed an album. Each new release is a treat, to be sure. Crazily enough, I even bought Introducing Gazpacho–a best of collection–simply because I wanted to support the band. I even have a specific shelf in my home office in which I display my most prized music. Gazpacho sits beautifully next to my Talk Talk, Big Big Train, Marillion, The Flower Kings, and Glass Hammer collections.
Somewhat infamously (at least in my household and with my wife), I was so taken with Fireworker at St. Croix, the previous Gazpacho album, that after purchasing the stand-alone CD, I purchased the blu-ray of the album. Then, I was so taken with the blu-ray, I purchased the deluxe book/boxset of the album. So, I have all three different versions of that glorious album! So, yes, I’m a bit of a Gazpacho nut.
Now we have Magic-Eight Ball and it fits into its own category. Indeed, this new album strikes me as a cross between their prog and post-prog albums post Night and their art pop albums, pre Night. The first five tracks really fit well within the prog and post-prog realm, but the last three tracks–especially “Magic Eight Ball” and “Immerwahr”–really feel like the first few albums. That is, they’re more art pop or art rock than prog or post-prog.
That said, I really love this new album, though on my first few listens, I was a bit taken aback by “Magic Eight Ball” and “Immerwahr.” I’m just no longer used to Gazpacho being pop!
Tad: Brad, I think you’ve hit on something – Magic 8 Ball really is a summation of what Gazpacho has done, going back to the beginning. Let’s talk about the songs themselves. The album opens with the stately “Starling”, which pulls me in with Ohme’s warm and intimate vocals. The instrumentation is primarily piano with some gorgeous violin work from Mikael Krømer. There is a sense of longing to the melody as it slowly builds in intensity. By the end of its 9-minute length, the guitars are roaring, but it’s never overwhelming. I love the gentle closing lyrics: Oh, let us be reborn. It’s one of my favorite opening tracks in the entire Gazpacho discography.
The second track, “We Are Strangers”, is one of my favorites of the album, and it’s a great choice for a single. Don’t laugh, but when I first heard it, I kept thinking it reminded me of something, and then it hit me: the chord changes and Ohme’s vocals are very much in the vein of classic Duran Duran! I mean that as a compliment; I think Duran Duran made some of the best pop music of the ‘80s.
The third track, “Sky King” is another relatively hushed and intimate track. Once again, Gazpacho has come up with an incredibly beautiful melody that is sung with delicacy by Ohme. Even when Jon-Arne Vilbo’s guitars come crashing in, it sounds like Ohme is whispering in my ear. The mix of this album is masterful – every instrument is clearly delineated, even during moments of glorious guitar-heavy noise.
So, three tracks in, and I’m already hopelessly in love with this album!
Brad: Thanks, Tad. An excellent analysis. I love how track four, “Ceres,” begins with a haunted-sounding piano, and it continues throughout the song. The rhythm of the song is extraordinary, especially the percussive elements mixed with the vocals. The whole thing sounds simply driving, but in a properly gentle way.
Track five, the bizarrely titled “Gingerbread Men,” in contrast to the previous track, begins hesitatingly, playfully hinting at a loss of direction, before the guitar comes confidently in and persuasively centers the song. There’s some really unusual sounds–maybe someone playing piano strings as percussion? I like the lyrics, though I’m not sure what they’re supposed to mean:
Through the haze Swallows flying high While we sleep In a world of steel There’s no peace
It is my belief That my life has been discreet Door slammed shut The big bad wolf of night Fragments of hope in this endless climb Lit up by traffic lights Broken dreams Parading gingermen Aftermath Turn away From them
And:
And now the cars go by Silver ghosts Of all the gingermen Washing out Washed away With the rain
You bettеr pack a suitcase Escape beyond thе city limits Or watch your old self disappear Before the end is writ in dough It can only be delayed
Track six, “Eight Ball” is shocking and discordant, only because it’s so poppy, contrasting with not only most of Gazpacho’s post-Night music but with the first half of this album in particular. Indeed, “Eight Ball”’s actually downright whimsical, something that would not be out of place in an 1890’s carnival or early twentieth-century musical. I’m getting Ray Bradbury vibes, mixed with some animated classic Disney! Despite being poppy, “Eight Ball”’s really good, and it makes me realize that I should never box Gazpacho into any particular category.
The poppy feel continues with the seventh track, “Immerwahr,” though not the whimsy. This sounds a lot like a Marillion song–especially with the guitar on it. I especially like the lyrics:
Leaving Chekhov in the drawer Throw the bankers at the window Where the panic and the fear Palest moonlight ever Silver everywhere Was the greater meaning Hiding in the past Did we send it all to bed While the spirits of the poor Jitterbug on judgement day
Track eight, “Unrisen,” finishes the album. While more poppy than the first five tracks of the album, it’s the least poppy of the final three songs. The strings are especially gorgeous, and I had no idea if they’re real or synthesized. There’s a definite playful quality to the keyboards, too. And, once again, I really like the lyrics, though I’m not sure what they mean.
Now you’re an astronaut lost in endless universe Within thosе lines are older days of othеrs, I withhold the nameless why In glass and velvet green
Mystic cryptic secret whispers Let them be the dreamless sleep for you
See how they drift in clouds and See how they smile Higher, higher into the deep blue Sail the sea of tranquility
They remind me of the lyrics from the earliest Gazpacho albums.
Tad, I’m not sure how to conclude this. I really like the new Gazpacho, and I think it’s a fine addition to their output as a whole. What really draws me to Gazpacho, though, are their concept albums. As such, while I’ll certainly and happily return to Magic-Eight Ball, I’ll probably return more often to Night, Tick Tock, Missa Antropos, etc.
Tad: Brad, thank you for sharing those lyric excerpts. I have a hard time understanding the meaning of most Gazpacho songs; I think they aim more for a mood or atmosphere than for a specific message.
I’m glad you noted the whimsical nature of the title track – when I first heard it, I also thought of a carnival ride! It’s somewhat unique in their catalog, and I like it a lot. Now that you mention it, I think the entire album is suffused with whimsy, including the title. Did you ever have one of those magic 8 ball toys? You asked a question, shook it, and an answer would float up to a little window: “Maybe”, “Definitely so”, etc.
I’d like to also give some praise for the opening bars of the closing track, “Unrisen”. With the keyboards and violin accompanying Ohme’s vocals, it sounds downright baroque to my ears – like something Vivaldi or Thomas Tallis might have composed. I swear, I can even hear a harpsichord in the background! Anyway, that’s just an example of the many musical delights I’m enjoying on this album.
While I share your love for their concept albums, I think Magic 8 Ball is one of their strongest collection of tunes. They sound really energized and confident on every track, and I am impressed with how they keep pushing the envelope after twelve albums. Here’s to hoping they record many more!
I read Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe when I was in high school back in the 1970s. Was it required reading? Nope, I just picked it up in my local bookstore because the cover looked interesting and it was $0.95. With a 5% sales tax, it cost me a dollar even, which was a bargain. I soon got caught up in Scott’s fast-paced tale of a valiant and honorable knight who was treated wrongly. I’ve been rereading literary classics that I first read when I was much younger to see how much more meaning I get from them now, and I decided to dive into Ivanhoe.
The Paperback version I bought fifty years ago.
Scott published it in 1820, and it was a big hit. It is set in the late 1100s, in Britain, after the Normans had established their conquest of it. There remain a few Saxon nobles, but almost all power resides in the Norman landowners. Richard the Lionhearted is king, but he hasn’t been seen for years, since he left for a Crusade, and it’s rumored he is being held prisoner in Europe. His brother, John, sits on the throne, and he is doing everything he can to consolidate his power.
You can read the rest of this review by clicking here.
Tad: Hello, Brad! Brad recently pointed out that Kate Bush’s album, Aerial, has turned 20 which is a good excuse to have a conversation about it. I have enjoyed seeing all the new fans Ms. Bush has acquired thanks to the inclusion of “Running Up That Hill” in the soundtrack of Stranger Things. That song is off my favorite album of hers, The Hounds of Love, but Aerial is a close second, in my estimation.
The two discs have different titles: Aerial: A Sea of Honey, and Aerial: A Sky of Honey. Listening to them recently rekindled my love for this sprawling set of songs. As a math teacher, I have to express my love for the track, “Pi”, in which Kate recites the digits of that ineffable irrational number and makes it sound seductive.
Brad: Hello, Tad! So great to be talking with you. A pleasure and an honor. I’m writing this on the Feast of All Souls, the weather is gorgeous, and I got to sleep in an extra hour this morning. It all seems so appropriate as I praise Kate Bush.
I have fond memories of first hearing about Bush in 1985. I had missed her earlier albums, but I very well remember the release of Hounds of Love in the early fall of 1985. It was my senior year of high school, and I was utterly blown away not only by side one–especially “Running Up That Hill,” “Hounds of Love,” “Big Sky,” and “Cloud Bursting.” It was side two, “The Ninth Wave,” however, that completely gobsmacked me. Here was pure unadulterated prog, all from an incredibly talented pop mistress. I was in love (it didn’t hurt that Bush is incredibly attractive and possesses an angelic voice).
A year later, during my first semester at the University of Notre Dame, the compilation, The Whole Story, came out. It, too, was excellent, and it made me start looking through Bush’s previous albums.
Then, my very close friend, Greg Scheckler, now a renowned professional artist in New England, made for me a mixed tape of everything prior to Hounds of Love, complete with Greg’s own doodles. It was glorious, and I wore that tape out! Too bad–given Greg’s subsequent fame, his doodles might very well be worth something.
Two years later, in the spring of 1988, one of my favorite movie directors, John Hughes, came out with one of his best films, She’s Having a Baby, and during the most emotional moment of the movie, Hughes used (and commissioned, I assume) Bush’s “This Woman’s Work.” As much as I had loved Bush prior to this, this song and scene solidified my permanent loyalty to Bush. Yes, at that point, I became obsessed with her as an artist. And, I remain so to this day.
Though I very much liked The Sensual World and The Red Shoes, it was 2005’s Aerial that, once again, gobsmacked me. Disk one was truly clever prog-pop, artistic to the nth degree, but it was disk two that blew me away. 42 minutes of pure prog, akin to what Bush had done with “The Ninth Wave,” but perhaps even better. I loved side two, “A Sky of Honey,” that I played it on my iPod night after night as I fell asleep. At the time, I was working on my biography of Christopher Dawson, and I was having a heck of a time shutting down my brain and sleeping. Aerial: A Sky of Honey worked wonders on me–calming me down and serving as a potent but non-addictive Ambien!
Tad: Well, Brad, I didn’t immerse myself in Kate Bush’s music as much as you did – I think I was negatively influenced by that infamous Rolling Stone Record Guide that panned her work and compared her voice to a vacuum cleaner! Needless to say, I’ve revised my opinion of practically every artist those small-minded critics at RS dismissed.
Anyway, my thoughts on disc one of Aerial are all positive (with the exception of “Mrs. Bartolozzi”, which is a little too maudlin for me). “King of the Mountain” starts off sounding like a Windham Hill album with its synthesized/indigenous rhythms, and I absolutely love the way it transforms into a straight-ahead rocker. It’s a fantastic opener! I’ve already mentioned how much I like “Pi”, and the other highlight of the first disc is “How To Be Invisible”, another great rock song with a snaky, bluesy guitar hook that is wonderful. Her vocals dance over, under, and around the other instruments and demand I pay attention to her. It’s a wonderful song that I can listen to over and over again. “Joanni” and “A Coral Room” lower the temperature a bit and are a nice way to close out the disc.
I wonder if Ms. Bush would say she’s been influenced by Joni Mitchell? “A Coral Room” in particular sounds like late-70s Mitchell to my ears.
Brad, give us your thoughts on disc one of Aerial, and start the discussion of disc two!
Brad: It’s worth remembering that when Aerial came out in November 2005, Bush hadn’t released anything since 1993’s The Red Shoes. That’s a huge gap. Beautifully, Bush spent those years raising her family rather than pursuing her career.
Still, that was a long, long time for her fans to wait. To be sure, though, it was worth waiting for.
I really don’t know which album is better, Hounds of Love or Aerial. When I list my all-time favorite albums (and I always list them without letting any artist/band have more than one entry), I always list Hounds of Love. Most recently, I listed it as my 12th favorite album of all time. I could just’ve as easily named Aerial. I guess, in the long run, they’re pretty interchangeable in the grand scheme of excellence.
Like you, Tad, I thoroughly love disk one. The Elvis-like confident sway of “King of the Mountain,” the quirky intensity of “Pi”, the Renaissance sound of “Bertie,” the insistence of the washing machine of “Mrs. Bartolozzi,” the truly clever pop of “How to be Invisible” with its incredible basslines, the profound and fetching tribute to St. Joan of Arc in “Joanni,” and the deep despair mixed with hope in the melancholic “A Coral Room” all contribute to this masterpiece of a release.
I think that what impresses me most about Bush is that she is always her own person, her own artist. She sounds only, gloriously, like Kate Bush, even when she’s playfully imitating Elvis on the first track of the album.
But, for me, it’s disk two that makes this album truly extraordinary. At 42 minutes, “A Sky of Honey” is simply perfection itself. When folks talk about albums that demand headphones for a full appreciation, this is that album!
From the child whispers and bird sounds of the opening moments to the anticipatory keyboards and string to Bush’s lush vocals with meaningful lyrics to the spoken expositions, this is a complete and total celebration of life in all its varied mysteries and profound wonders.
Tad, as you and I have talked about, it’s often the bass that makes a great album a great album. The bass work on “A Sky of Honey” is spectacular. Combined with Bush’s vocal lilt, everything builds and builds until the music itself is ready to explode–the tension as thick as can be–in the last 15 or so minutes of the album. Stunning. Just simply stunning.
If Bush had released “A Sky of Honey” as a stand-alone album, I have no doubt that it would rank up there with Close to the Edge or The Colour of Spring.
Tad: Brad, you hit on something crucial when it comes to understanding Kate Bush; you said “she is always her own person, her own artist”. I remember reading an article about the recording of Hounds Of Love, and her record label was worried about marketing it, because it was so different from her earlier work. I believe she recorded it in her home studio, and she completely disregarded her label’s suggestions (to our benefit, I would add!). She is an artist who is fearless and blazes her own trail, not giving any thought to current musical fashions. Will people be listening to Taylor Swift’s music 50 years from now? I doubt it. Will people be listening to Kate Bush’s? Absolutely!
As far as my thoughts on “A Sky Of Honey”, I am in complete agreement with you. I think of it as a musical suite that chronicles a day – the chirping birds in the intro are greeting the dawn, and it closes with “Nocturn”. However, I’m not sure how the title track, “Aerial”, fits in with my theory! It’s a fairly raucous track that, as you so aptly describe it, is ready to explode.
Also, thank you for pointing out that “Joanni” is referring to St. Joan of Arc. Once I understood that, it clicked into place.
And so, dear readers, if you aren’t familiar with Aerial, we recommend you check it out. It is timeless and beautiful music!
Way back in the fall of 1985, I was working part time as a D.J. for our local AM radio station–KWHK–in my hometown of Hutchinson, Kansas. Though the format of the station was Adult Contemporary Rock, KWHK had flirted for a bit with New Wave/College Rock. As such, we still received all the possible New Wave and College Rock promos. No body at the station wanted them, so I inherited a truly glorious set of vinyl. My prized possession was XTC’S Skylarking.
I very much remember when Wang Chung’s To Live and Die in L.A arrived. At the time, I didn’t think much of Wang Chung. Being somewhat of a snob and privileging anything that even smacked of progressive rock, I didn’t really take dance music too seriously. Thus, I didn’t think too much of Wang Chung.
Then, I previewed To Live and Die in L.A. Immediately I was taken with it–how complex, how driving, how smart, how utterly cinematic the music was. This wasn’t dance music–which is what I expected from Wang Chung–but something much close to, say, Yes’s Drama, Rush’s Power Windows, or The Fixx’s Reach the Beach. This was the real deal. The transition from track three, “Wake Up Stop Dreaming,” to track four, “Wait,” was especially proggy, something worthy of “Trees” and “Xanadu” on Exit Stage Left. The whole first side of the album brilliantly builds and climaxes with “Wait.”
True to form, side one of the album contains all the songs with lyrics, while side two is purely instrumental. Both sides are excellent.
For forty years now, I have thoroughly enjoyed this soundtrack. Once I switched to CDs–away from vinyl–To Live and Die in L.A. was one of the first CDs I purchased. I return to it several times a year and remember fondly that period of the first half of the 1980s when Prog and New Wave so beautifully blended into one.
What about the movie? When it first arrived in Hutchinson, 40 years ago this week, my closest friend and debate colleague, Ron Strayer, and I went to an early showing. We were suitably blown away from it. It was one of the most intense and violent movies I’d seen up to that point in my life, and I was rather taken with it. Watching it now, I see its flaws, and it doesn’t grab me like it used to.
Still, nostalgia grips me when I think of the movie, and I very much remember the glory of the 1980s.
Mariusz Duda, or as we call him around these parts, The Duda, never stays still for very long. From various solo projects and his band Riverside, it seems that he always has something going on. The fruits of his most recent labor, The World Under Unsun by Lunatic Soul, can be found in your trick-or-treat bag upon its release tomorrow, Halloween 2025.
Ahead of The Duda’s latest release, we were fortunate once again to catch up with him and talk for a while. We spent plenty of time discussion the new album, but also delved into the fate of Lunatic Soul itself, the creative process, and some of the other future possibilities for The Duda’s artistic output.
I can tell you it was a great conversation, but you would be better served to just read on and see for yourself as you dig into your Halloween candy. So let’s get on with it.
SoC:In a recent Facebook post, you said the current album is somewhat of a prequel to Walking on a Flashlight Beam. Can you elaborate on both albums and the connection between the two?
MD: Oh my goodness. I’m not sure if they have time for that, but long story short. The whole concept, it’s called The Circle of Life and Death. That have six main albums, and we have two additional ones. Their albums are put on the circle, are in the circle, and three of them are on the side of death, and three of them are on the side of life. Okay, it’s kind of definitely side of life, because this story is about the journey, about the hero who dies. He travels to the afterlife, then he revives, going back to life. And then he dies again, and then going back to life and stuff like that. He is just in a loop. Okay. That is why on The World Under Unsun, there is a song which is called Loop of Fate. Anyway, I wanted something about the loop. And there’s the thing, that he wants to escape from this loop, and that’s the main plot of the whole album.
In general, if you listen in a proper order, it’s like: the main character dies at the beginning of Lunatic Soul I, then Lunatic Soul II, then Through Shaded Woods, and then he goes on the side of life. We have Fractured, we have Under the Fragmented Sky, and some of the most depressing ones. In work on the plot, the main character, you know, jumps off the cliff into the waves, as you can see on the prophecy. He dies in the water. It’s basically a story about reviving and changing.
The thing is The World Under Unsun is post‑Fractured why the first song sounds like Fractured and is a prequel to Walking on a Flashlight Beam. That why the waves you hear at the start of this album are the same waves you hear at the beginning of Walking the Flashlight Beam. Everything is connected. We don’t have to go into all the details, but the main character is an artist who always has a choice: does he want to remember his previous life or not? He always chooses to lose his memories, which is why he is forgotten in the whole world.
On the Impressions album, there is the song “Gravestone Hill” which reveals the main character’s choice. Imagine you’re an artist: you don’t want to lose your memories because you want to remember the best things you created and develop them across lives. However, you always remember how you die—that’s the problem. He asks himself, should I be afraid of the waves this time again? Long story short, he’s in a circle. One time, when he’s on the side of life, he realizes the sun doesn’t look like the sun anymore; something has changed and the world becomes darker and darker. It’s like Back to the Future II when Marty doesn’t belong in the place he knows. The album reflects that feeling. The title The World Under Unsun reflects the hero’s mental state: he doesn’t feel well, he’s in a toxic relationship and wants to leave it. The whole process of trying to get out of this place is on the album.
SoC: Is that kind of a metaphor for something in your life as an artist?
MD: I guess there is always something connecting the fiction with the truth.I usually use music as a form of therapy, and the fiction is always mixed with fragments of my personal life. I don’t keep an exact ratio, you don’t need to know the exact percentage of that mixture. That’s only my own thing.
SoC: Do you even know it?
MD: I know it (laughs). It’s like, in one song, there is 16% of my personal life and 84% fiction – I’m just joking. No, but I try to balance it in a proper way.
SoC: Shifting gears, when you come up with a concept, how do you decide on the style of music that is the foundation? For example, on the previous Lunatic Soul, Through Shaded Wood, it was very folky. This one is more electronic. So what is it that drives you that says “I’m going to go this way with the music”?
MD: I guess I started this project mostly to fill it with my favorite genres. If you, uh, think about it, it’s always connected with ambient cinematic kind of stuff, a bit of electronic music, folk oriental things, and rock, maybe a bit of metal type of thing. So that’s it. So this is the whole Lunatic Soul. And, I think the new album shows the entire range of genres because you can find all these elements in the music. And then there were the albums that were more oriental than the others, like Lunatic Soul 1 and 2 more like that condensed. Then there was Fractured, which was more electronic. And Through Shaded Would was more folky, more organic.
Yeah. I just wanted to, you know, this is just like, some albums should have their own identities., I was really close to one border on another album. I was really close to another border. But it’s more about this connection between electronic music, folk oriental stuff and rock.
I believe that the new album is more um, rock oriented or even alternative oriented. I don’t know. There’s more distortion. With some exceptions, of course. And it’s dark.
When I start doing an album, I always start from the story, the cover, the title, but it’s just like writing the script of the movie that you want to direct or just preparing a concept for book that you want to write. And this is what I do. I don’t think about, I don’t keep coming up with the ideas first and then I, oh, maybe I should do something with that. No, I just, I’m telling stories. I’m just creating the stories. And then I always, I want to make them a bit different than the others. So I said, okay, so this one should be more electronic because it’s about fractured. Uh, it’s a world, uh, so if it’s fractured, there’s a, there’s lots of sharp objects. So I see this more like electronic stuff.
And if it comes from the green color connected with woods, trees, organic stuff, let’s make it more organic or folky. So everything starts with the, you know, the title, the main vibe. And I’m just following this and that’s it.
SoC: So you did say that, you know, out of the 8 Lunatic Soul albums, 6 of them are telling the story. Which ones are not part of the story?
All albums are the part of the story, but the Impressions album that was released after Lunatic Soul 1 and 2 and Under the Fragmented Sky, they are sort of like the bonus material for the albums, the main albums. Impressions is like something connected with Lunatic Soul 1 and 2. And the three of them are kind of connected. And Under the Fragmented Sky, these are the leftovers from Fractured. And the bonus for Through Shaded Woods was already on the album. I didn’t do the separate release because I have it ready already on the album at that time. Yeah. The leftovers for Impressions or Under the Fragmented Sky were not ready yet. So that’s why I just released that later on.
And this time, I didn’t want to do another bonus material. I wanted to create the classic double album, for people who have time to listen to music these days.
SoC: So you set out to create the double album?
MD: Yes, from the very beginning. Okay. It was very important for me because I first wanted to fill the gaps with all these, you know, answers for the questions. Speaking of the plot, the story. And also I wanted to show all the genres, and I just thought that if I do, you know, the 50 minutes long album with all these, you know, electronic, folky mental stuff, it would be too intense, too much for it to be a pleasure to listen to. So I just said that maybe if I do more space here, do more space there, and extend this, it will be more natural. We don’t have to be in a rush. You know, we can create something longer.
So tell me, someone can tell me, these days, it’s really hard to play to record that kind of long because people don’t have time to listen to them. Then don’t listen to them!
The album for the people who have time to listen to music. So I don’t care if this is 40 minutes or 90. But on the other hand, the previous album, 3 Shade Woods, had 39 minutes, so come on, I know what, how to do short albums as well.
SoC: Well, also, Riverside ADHD was only what, 47?
MD: 44
SoC: Getting back to the concept of the present album, I know part of it’s the story, but do you think some of it is kind of informed by what is going on in the world? There’s a lot of turmoil going on. Is that affecting your character or affecting how you’re writing these things?
Um, actually, I always have 3 layers in terms of writing lyrics. The 1st layer is actual, the fiction, the story that I’m coming up with. The 2nd phase, it’s my personal life, my personal experience. The 3rd is, uh, what’s going on all over the world. You know, the outside world. It has to be important sometimes because, you know, I don’t know. Let’s say, if there is a war, I don’t want to record the album that doesn’t fit to this whole situation. Yeah. Well, um, all these layers are blended sort of the way. I try to avoid political subjects. However, from time to time, I do this. ID Entity [the most recent Riverside album] was full of that. But it was also very direct. Yeah. Whereas between Riverside and Lunatic Soul is that Lunatic Soul is more metaphysical, more like, you know, inner journey. And um, uh, that is why I didn’t want to write about, like, on social media, for instance. It’s more about live, death, love, loneliness, solid, some mystical things.
And, there’s one song, uh, which is called Torn in Two. I have to admit, I wrote the lyrics after, um, the results of the presidential election in Poland. So, yeah, the thing, like, and it was inspired by, let’s say, something that was outside than inside.
SoC: Ok, I’ve seen some things online – word is that this is the last Lunatic Soul album – is that true? If so, what drove the decision to make this the last album?
MD: There’s a beauty of PR, you know, beauty of public relations. This is the chapter of the story, right? Yeah. So sometimes I don’t have to add that this is the word chapter. This is the last look. So it sounds much more powerful in the news. I believe that this is the, but I agree. This is the last Lunatic Soul in that form. Okay. And if I will bring Lunatic Soul back to life, it will be different kind of form. If I can just, you know, it’s like, for instance, King Crimson. That’s a good example of the lineups, the vibes, the moods, the approach to music. So maybe he will not be so. And next life he will have electric guitar because, uh, that’s very important information for many people that they don’t know Lunatic Soul. This is the project without the electric guitar. I wanted to distinguish this from Riverside. I didn’t want to have those, you know, David Gilmour kind of solos. In music, I made these limits mostly to trying to be try to make myself innovative and creative in different areas. So that’s a reason for that.
SoC: So what you’re saying then is we might see something else that has the title of Lunatic Soul, but it’s not necessarily going to be within this story.
MD: Maybe this is story of life and death is done. So, uh, I’m not sure if, for instance, if Lunatic Soul will exist somewhere else, if I would change everything: “Now I will talk about social media.” No, no. The thing is that this kind of music from different kind of dimensions, I like it very much. I would like to continue this vibe, but definitely it will be different kind of story.
SoC: So that leads me to: What’s next? Might there be another Lunatic Soul album, but outside this story, might there by another Mariusz Duda solo album or something like that?
MD: I don’t know that yet. Now it is completed the cycle. The last song of the last, let’s say, Lunatic Soul of this cycle is The New End. It’s a reference to the first song on the first album, which was The New Beginning. Yeah. Can you begin with the new end? So this is something that I always use, for instance, in Riverside, we had After, Before, Lost and Found, The Night Before, now we have The New Beginning and The New End. The circle is closed. What’s next? We will see what the future brings.
SoC: Do you think you’ll do more cycles? You did that with the first three Riverside albums and then the second three could be kind of a cycle as well. And then Lunatic Soul here has been a cycle. So you really want people to listen for a long time!
MD: I also did in the pandemic, I did some kind of like very initial electronic project and I did like something just called the Lockdown Trilogy. Oh, yeah, that’s right. That was another trilogy. That’s some weird experimental music instrumental. Probably, yes. It’s always nice. It’s just like, you know, when you, I like series. Yeah. I’m a huge movie fan and I’m inspired by the cinema. I’m always cherish, you know, if the director or the creator on the scriptwriter, they have something like, you know, five parts of something, four parts of something, Rocky, Rambo, Back to the Future, Star Wars, whatever. Harry Potter. It’s cool. It’s simply cool because on the shelf it looks nice and it’s a part of something bigger, right?
SoC: I remember when I talked to you another time after Wasteland [the Riverside album of the same name], you were, you’d been kind of inspired by the spaghetti westerns and the music had a lot of the spaciousness of the sound.
MD: We had the trilogy, right? It’s yeah. So probably, yes! All right. Probably yes.
SoC: Okay, well, looking forward to it how you record something when you’re like the only player? You’re the only guy doing an instrument. So how do you manage to have all those tracks playing in your head and then get them down on tape or recorded somehow?
MD: I have I have guests on this album, on drums, on saxophone, and to the guitar. So I didn’t play everything by myself. But most of the things I did by myself, yeah. It started with my love for electronic music when I was a kid. And my love to keyboards with sequencer. It’s the fact that I started to compose the songs by myself, having the sequencer at home.
So I just, you know, started from drums [vocalizes drum sounds]. Okay. And now it’s at bass [vocalizes bass sounds]. Okay, we’ve got it. Now keyboards [vocalizes keyboard sounds]. And I did always the same, and my sequencer is in my brain. And when I create that, I always put some layers, you know. I don’t have use keyboards anymore. I’m going to the studio and see those layers and if there’s something that I can play by myself, I do this by myself. If I want to achieve something else, then I ask someone to make it.
So that’s the thing, you know, that’s the problem with me. Sometimes I find it like a virtue, sometimes it’s a flaw. Because I’m not that kind of guy who’s just taking an instrument and let’s play for fun. I always had to create something, you know, like something bigger. But I liked it. I got used to this and of course, it’s cool stuff. During the stories, this is just like writing books, you know, when I see that Stephen King wrote another book and I said, my goodness, I need to record another album. That is why I don’t like this system that’s going on in the music business. Like, you’re listening an album, and then you have to go for two years for playing live shows because you need to earn money. What about the art of creation? What happened? Why in the 70s, for Christ’s sake, people were releasing the albums every year or why the Beatles released two albums every year? What’s going on? Why? Why can’t I be in the studio all the time? Because I have to play shows.
So I’m being a rebel and sometimes I prefer to be more in the studio. I know that some people says, yeah, but what about the money? If you do lots of stuff in the studio, you can have the money as well. I don’t want to have the house with the pool. in the suburbs. I’m pretty happy with my average life. It’s just the fact that I don’t have these urges inside of me that they’re crazy. So that’s the thing that I truly love doing stuff and recording. And as I said before, this is like my therapy. So it helps me. To not take pills. So I have to do this.
SoC: Well, that’s a good therapy. I’m glad you’re doing that because we can enjoy that much more than we would enjoy you taking pills!
MD: Thank you!
SoC: I guess we’ll wrap it up. Do you have any other projects lined up or anything you’re thinking about doing after this?
MD: And you know, I was thinking you’ll maybe go back to my electronic world, but this time after this album, I feel that I have an urge with me that it’s, I want to go back to songs. I want to go back to something organic, especially in the AI days. I’m not sure if I want to continue this, you know, instrumental projects because AI can make it. But I think it still struggles with the basic classic normal songs that comes from your heart. So I want to focus on the classic structures of the songs and, well, we’ll see, which name it would be.
But with Riverside I wanted to take a break now, especially from the live shows, which is really important for me. I turned 50 this year, so I kind of deserve to make a time to rethink something. Always have to be this way. Like, I don’t know, lockdown or COVID forces us to stop. Yeah. So I did force myself to just stop. Yeah, but I probably want to create something new, but maybe, as we said, the new shape of Lunatic Soul will appear. Okay.
In Poland, I do some kind of promotional meetings, meet and greet kind of stuff. I should do that in more countries. But, you know, this is another limit. And I’m going to play, I talk about the album. I’m going to play like a few tracks acoustically as well. So maybe that will be like the transition to something new. We’ll see.
SoC: Thanks again for talking to us and I hope I hope to hear from you again someday very soon.
MD: Thank you so much, Erik, for your time. Wish you all the best. Thank you very much. Bye bye.
Jonas Lindberg & The Other Side’s 2022 album, Miles From Nowhere, burst onto the prog scene and made a lot of “Best of” lists. They are about to release the follow-up, Time Frames, and it does not disappoint. Lindberg was kind enough to take a few minutes and chat with me via Zoom.
Hi Jonas, thanks for taking the time to talk with me about your new album. Miles from Nowhere was my favorite album of 2022, and I am liking Time Frames just as much. Was the recording process for Time Frames the same as for Miles From Nowhere?
Pretty much – the recording process is the same, which means I do a full production demo, and then remove the drums. So Jonathan [Lundberg] records the drums, and he sends them to me, and I record almost everything, and then I go around and record vocals and lead guitars with the others.
So, the difference this time is that I actually have a studio to work in! I actually have recorded this one entirely in the studio. With Miles From Nowhere, most of my overdubs were recorded in my living room. So that’s the difference!
Well, Miles From Nowhere still sounds good, for being recorded in your living room!
Yes, it’s about where to put the mikes, and to understand that the room sounds weird.
I came of age in the ’70s, and I loved artists like Todd Rundgren, Boston, and Styx, and I’m hearing a lot of that style of rock in your music. Am I off-base with that?
Probably not. I haven’t listened to a lot of that, really. My influences are more – in the progressive genre – more Spock’s Beard. But they have probably listened to those bands, you know. I got that question earlier – it’s like it’s a new generation of influences. Of course, Pink Floyd has always been a big influence for me.
Yes, I can definitely hear early Spock’s Beard in your music.
So, what are some of the lyrical topics in Time Frames?
Well, I tend to write about things that have happened to me. If I don’t have a clear idea what I want to write about, I take something that is evident or around me at the time. Some of the lyrics ended up being about parenting, you know, or my daughter, because I was on parental leave when I wrote the lyrics. A lot of the lyrics come from thoughts or things that happened during that time. So that might be a kind of overarching topic. But then you also have something like “Galactic Velvet”, for example, that’s completely different – it’s about space! [Chuckle]
I’m glad you brought that up; that’s one of my favorite songs. I love Jenny Storm’s singing on that.
Yeah, she’s awesome. She’s really easy to work with, and she’s also incredibly fast at getting the right takes. For example, she sings a part in “The Wind” – the epic – her performance there was done in three takes.
What other musicians besides Jenny are on the new album?
Well, mostly friends of mine from university days. Jonas [Sundqvist], who is the other lead vocalist, we’ve known each other going back twenty years ago. We’re always writing music together, and we hang out together. We found each other through a Sting project that he had, doing Sting covers. And we went to school with Nicklas Thelin, who plays guitars; we went to the same classes at university. There’s Jonathan on drums, who I got to know better when I moved down to Stockholm and we ended up playing in a few different projects. Around the same period I met Calle [Schönning], the other guitar player who plays most of the lead guitar on the album. He’s just an incredible guitar player. Everything he plays, you know, everything is great! And then, also of course, my brother, [Joel Lindberg] plays guitar on a couple of songs. And my girlfriend Maria Olsson plays percussion.
Do you guys have any plans to tour?
I hope so, but it’s hard to tour, because I don’t really have a booking agent to make that happen. So I’m kind of doing everything myself! Right now, I’m more focusing on releasing the album, and then I’m planning on doing at least one or a couple of release concerts, somewhere in Sweden some time next year – I’m aiming for springtime. Then we’ll have to take it from there and see what happens. – how the album is received, you know.
Maybe you could do a pay-per-view streaming concert, or something like that.
Yeah, some kind of live film I’ve had in my head. Just an idea, but I haven’t anything set in stone – I’m just sketching at this point.
What are you listening to right now, besides your own music?
Right now, I’m in a little Steven Wilson period. I’ve been listening back through his catalog. When I was mixing this album, The Overview came out. And, being a fan of Pink Floyd, I was like, “Oh! Yes! That’s perfect for me.” Then I started going back, and I found all these albums that I had never listened to. That’s what I’ve been doing, mostly.
I’ve been a Steven Wilson fan since his Porcupine Tree days. I think my favorite solo album of his is his first, Insurgentes.
I haven’t gotten that far back yet!
Anything else you’d like to share, Jonas?
Go check out the album at my website, and I hope you like it!
Many thanks to Jonas for taking the time to talk with me, and we wish him lots of success with this new album – it’s really good! If you love progressive rock with a classic rock feel, you will not be disappointed with Time Frames. It is already one of my favorite albums of the year.
Photo credit: Cécile LopesBig Big Train, the award-winning, international progressive rock band, will issue their 16th studio album via InsideOutMusic on February 6th, 2026. Woodcut is a landmark release for the international group, whose line-up draws together members from England, Scotland, Italy, the USA, Sweden and Norway, in that it marks their first ever full-length conceptual piece – quite a statement given the musical depth and storytelling qualities of a band formed in Bournemouth way back in 1990. Woodcut is a continuous narrative exploring creativity, sacrifice and the thin line between inspiration and madness.
Bassist Gregory Spawton comments: “Woodcut tells the story of a character we call The Artist, who is struggling with his creativity and with life. One day he is able to fashion a woodcut which he considers to be beautiful and different. Maybe it’s a dream or maybe it’s real life, but he finds himself stepping into the woodcut scene and into an alternative world.”
Woodcut feels like a Big Big Train record quite unlike any that came before—an assured union of music, storytelling and visual invention. The album is graced with a striking cover design from Dorset (England) based artist Robin Mackenzie – a black and white woodcut print, of course, derived from a woodcut which the band commissioned from him specifically for the album.
Spirit of Cecilia 
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