Please forgive the brevity of this review.  Maybe we could call it a micro-review.  I’ve been a huge Tim Bowness fan ever since first encountering him through his extraordinary work in No-Man.  Indeed, it was about 23 years ago that I first encountered him, finding him because of his association with Steven Wilson.  Again, I’ve been a huge fan ever since.  If anyone inherited the mantle of Mark Hollis, it’s either Tim Bowness or Kevin McCormick.  Everything Bowness touches is just achingly beautiful.  Gifted with a very handsome voice, he brings a certain longing to all his vocals.  I should also note, like Hollis (Bowness has a better voice than Hollis, but I will never fault Hollis for that—he gave everything he had), Bowness understands the sheer importance of meaningful lyrics to music.  Writing all of this right now, reminds me that I would love to write a long article on the many excellences of Tim Bowness.  He deserves so much more than this micro-review.  Sadly (or brilliantly actually), I’m in between big writing projects on the Declaration of Independence as well as on sociologist Robert Nisbet and on writer Ray Bradbury.  That stated, my afternoon sound track has been Bowness’ s first album, My Hotel Year, originally released in 2004.  I was surprised to find Bowness’s own negative recollection and assessment of the album on his personal website.  “Along with Wild Opera, My Hotel Year is the least loved album I’ve ever made and, in some ways, it’s the album of mine I love least as well,” Bowness confesses. “Although 2003-2004 wasn’t a particularly bad time for me, the resulting album seemed lyrically sad and musically monochromatic. No matter what was done to sonically soften the blows, the album had an innate bleakness that seemed to dictate itself.”  There’s no doubt that the album is lyrically sad, but it’s incredibly and movingly authentic.  And, I would never call the music monochromatic.  Rather, I would say that the music is presented in a rather cohesive fashion.  That is, it’s an album rather than a collection of eleven songs.  Every song bleeds into every other song, regardless of the silence between thetracks.  While I like Bowness’s other albums better, I would encourage anyone and everyone to go back to this foundational album, My Hotel Year.  For what it’s worth, I think it’s glorious, and it certainly inspired my other writing this afternoon.  For that, I’m deeply grateful.

To order My Hotel Year, always buy from my favorite on-line retailer, The Burning Shed.