Label: Cyclops

Line-up:

• Andy Tillison. Vocals, organ, synthesizer and additional guitars
• Sam Baine. Synthesizer and piano
• Ken Señor. Bass
• Gareth Harwood. Guitars
• Alex King. Electric and acoustic drums.

Guest musicians:

• Martin Orford. Flute.

We might call Andy Tillison the Peter Hammill of the 2000. It's the brain and absolute leader of Parallel or 90 Degrees, a band that has Van der Graaf Generator as one of his maximum influences, and the singing style of Tillison owes enough to Hammill.

Parallel or 90 Degrees (or Po90, as themselves like to say), is a band fully of progressive rock, so the tracks have progressive structures. Nevertheless, the sound is very contemporary, which makes this band one of the more personal of the current scene.

What can we find into the sound of Po90? Well, stormy and depressive progressive, Van der Graaf Generator kind, space rock atmospheres, connections with bands type Porcupine Tree and Lands End, and even influences of the tecno-dance kind The Prodigy or Chemical Brothers. I must clarify that I don't like bands as The Prodigy, but I admit that this kind of rhythms, which Po90 use in some moments, fit very well into the music and look like to me one of the points of major interest of the sound of this band.

Unbranded is the third "normal" album of Po90, after "Afterlifecycle" and "The Time Capsule". In addition, they also have an album with old tracks, and other one with covers of Peter Hammill and VDGG. The disc consists of 5 tracks: "Gods of Convenience", "Migraine", "Unbranded", "Shoulder to Shoulder", and "Space Junk", all between 8 and 11 minutes. Besides a suite of 25 minutes, "An Autopsy in Artificial Light (Afterlifecycle part2)", that here is qualified as bonus track, but that it's necessary to consider the suite to be an integral part of the work, because the trascendency of this suite.

All the tracks are of great level, but I would emphasize the powerful "Migrane", the varied "Space Junk" with a great sense of rhythm, and the suite "An Autopsy in Artificial Light", the greatest and surprising track with all the ingredients of a great piece of progressive rock.

To conclude, a great album of one of the distinctive bands of the current progressive rock.

Rating: 8/10

Ferran Lizana