It's now been a little over seven years since the English from 'This Winter Machine' began their progressive rock project and the albums continue to be released at regular intervals with this latest baby 'The Clockwork Man' which is now available for streaming since early December. I discovered them with their second album 'A Tower of Clocks' in 2019 and 2021 saw the release of 'Kites'. The line-up waltz continues and it is now 'John Cook' on guitar and 'Leigh Perkins' on keyboards alongside the leader and singer 'Al Winter', the rhythm section being unchanged with 'Dave Close' on bass and 'Alan Wilson' on drums. In the form of a concept album, 'The Clockwork Man' takes us into the science fiction comic book by writer and artist 'Andrew Richmond' whose subject is a world in which females do not exist and where humans have implemented human cloning at accelerated speed, the clones nicknamed "mechanical men" being "made" only for low and dangerous tasks, fueled by pills to make them into very docile sort of robots.
On the menu of this opus, eight compositions for 50 minutes of listening and, from the start, we are welcomed by the long development 'The River' which is made up of two parts, the first with an instrumental introduction to the sounds electronics and dynamic rhythm allowing you to immerse yourself little by little in this dystopian world to arrive at the sung part in which 'Al Winter' introduces this science fiction world in a very expressive way and which is followed by a very beautiful guitar solo of 'John Cook', the second sung part adding layers of keyboards bringing a beautiful breadth of sound and the second guitar solo being also remarkable. Total break for the second part which is a magnificent ballad which can recall the atmosphere of a 'High Hopes' of the 'Floyds' but more refined, the singing of Al Winter' becoming more serious and resembling that of 'David Gilmour'. Follows 'Solitude, Silence And Steam' which, at a slow tempo, unfolds melancholic melodic lines on which 'John Cook' is still highlighted with his guitar in the long introduction, then, 'Al Winter' takes over for a section sung at a swaying tempo until a semi-acoustic break bringing a nice variety to this title, 'John Cook' then doing wonders again in a 'Gilmourian' final guitar solo. 'Final Goodbye' is a fairly short track which highlights the rhythm section with above all a stirring and original bass line from 'Dave Close' on a catchy melody, then, 'Change' slightly hardens the tone in an atmosphere flirting with hard rock, 'André Saint' being invited to share the microphone with 'Al Winter' and the instrumental part at the start of the second part being quite remarkable with several rhythmic changes. The instrumental 'Reflections' continues our progressive journey with an imaginative and researched composition, highlighting the new keyboardist 'Leigh Perkins' who gives us a beautiful demonstration on the piano, then, 'Nothing Lasts Forever' is a very beautiful title which us offers a first part in the form of a magnificent semi-acoustic ballad in which 'Al Winter' shows all his vocal talent to bring a beautiful emotion, the Irish flute of 'Laigh Perkins' bringing a folk side in a second part then the title then becomes more symphonic with a beautiful amplitude of sound, the finale returning to the stripped-down atmosphere of the beginning. New moment of serenity with 'The Light' which once again sees 'Al Winter' move us with a magnificent piano accompaniment, then, 'Falling through a Hole in the Sky' ends the album in a very beautiful way with a gem of progressive to make the best progressive rock groups jealous (it looks like a fusion between 'Arena', 'RPWL' and 'Mystery'): each artist brings his stone to the building on a gripping melody in a slight crescendo which ends in apotheosis with a final guitar solo from 'John Cook'.
In summary, hoping that the line up will now stabilize, we can say that Al Winter' has drawn the right cards with the guitarist 'John Cook' and the keyboardist 'Leigh Perkins' to which we can add the remarkable rhythm section that we knew with 'Dave Close' and 'Alan Wilson' and 'The Clockwork Man', in addition to being a very original concept album, offers us very beautiful progressive rock compositions and shows that 'This Winter Machine' has just risen to the same level as the best groups of this style... | |
