Monday, November 05, 2007

Manning ~ Songs From The Bilston House


Slightly delayed by the postal strike, the new album by Manning has been spinning for the last week or so. Guy Manning is one of my favourite artists, through the simple fact he writes wonderfully evocative, literate and highly musical songs. This new album is up to his usual high standards. If anything I think he has set the bar much higher than ever before. The intricacies and layers of instrumentation on this album are quite overwhelming. One minute a flute solo, then sax, then synth all effortlessly weaving in and out of the mix. This is intoxicating stuff and wonderfully played by all involved. Guy has let each song breath to allow room for some beautifully inspired soloing. I don’t think I have heard a Guy Manning album sound so full on and this might be his proggiest album too!

I always expect to enjoy a Manning album, but I was really taken aback by how especially good this album really is. Even with the limited number of plays I have been able to give this, it will definitely be in my top 5 best albums of the year. Maybe even the top spot!

2 Comments:

Blogger greatGrandson said...

I've never heard any Manning albums but I've seen his name a few times.

I found that he has one album on emusic:
http://www.emusic.com/album/Manning-A-Matter-Of-Life-And-Death-MP3-Download/11060723.html

I look forward to hearing about your top 5 albums of the year.

7:15 AM  
Blogger Barrie Sillars said...

Guy is a highly prolific (one album per year) but highly gifted singer/songwriter with a prog rock background. He is very literate, a great story teller and musically very strong. All his albums are highly recommended.

11:48 AM  

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