STEVE HACKETT: "The Circus And The Nightwhale" (16 February 2024) - review online

Quote from Thelawnmower

I have to say the cover has grown on me

I'm still trying to comprehend that statement...

Quote from HomeByTheSea

While there were some really bad Genesis album covers, I think it's a stretch to say they never had a good album cover (see A Trick Of The Tail & Wind & Wuthering). As far as the Yes album covers go, the first word that comes to my mind is repetitive...

The two you mention are widely liked. I think they're okay, I like the overall colour palettes of them more than the actual imagery. I agree re the sameyness of Yes covers. I thought the two late 70s Hipgnosis ones, while not brilliant, were something of a relief in at least being a welcome change.

Quote from Ben

I lIke a lot The Lamb cover (very cinematic).

Me too, probably my favourite of theirs along with Abacab - they also happen to be my favourite Genesis albums. Lamb and Trick are back-to-back albums different in every way, but both have 'cinema' style graphics depicting various aspects of the content.

This new Hackett one isn't improving for me, it's terrible.

See also threads for album covers by Genesis, solo and other acts.

Steve is on the cover of the new issue of Prog.

He is quoted as saying 'I've tried to make a film for the ear'.

He said almost exactly the same thing back on the cover of Prog 31 when discussing Foxtrot. Back then he said 'we were creating a film for the ear rather than the eye'.

I thought I would finally be able to post the images, but they still show up as blocked once I've posted.

Quote from Christian

This is the cover of PROG

Thanks. Would be nice to read some comments about this issue - if it's worth buying etc

I have subscribed to Prog for several years and it's always worth buying. It will be interesting to see what Steve talks about this time.

It was probably a wise decision NOT to put that awful cover artwork on any of those mags

Album Review: Steve Hackett - The Circus and The Nightwhale (2024, InsideOut Music)

Although now in his early seventies, Steve Hackett remains one of the most prolific artists in the hallowed halls of progressive rock (or indeed any genre)…

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Here is a review, which reads as if Steve wrote it himself (i.e. it gushes all over the place).

I was intrigued by the description of one track, Enter The Ring, which makes it sound (lyrically) somewhat similar to the masterpiece that is Tunnel Of Love by Dire Straits.

'Magic mountain band tunes in / Kaleidoscopic thrills and spins / Carousel waltz, don’t touch the ground / Faster turns the merry go round / Sleep by day, fly by night / Pleasure gardens of delight / Changing horses, musical chairs / Wildfire burning through the fair'.

Quote from FeelItComing

Here is a review, which reads as if Steve wrote it himself (i.e. it gushes all over the place).

Well, I don't see a writer's name given anywhere... so, who knows?

The review does make me somewhat curious to hear the album, although its overall high praise for Steve's recent work leads me question the judgment of the writer. I'd be hoping to hear something like "this is better than most of Steve's other recent work" instead.

Latest track to be released.....Circo Inferno

Quote from Henry Hamilton-Smythe

Latest track to be released.....Circo Inferno

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Not a very good track... again. It looks like it's going to be a bad album...

Hmm, it has some good parts. It just doesn't add up to very much.

Quote from DecomposingMan

Hmm, it has some good parts. It just doesn't add up to very much.

That is so unfortunately true about most of his recent output.

Quote from DecomposingMan

Hmm, it has some good parts. It just doesn't add up to very much.

Couldn't agree more. Lack of structure and flow in the arrangement again make it a hard and unfulfilling listen.

Quote from Trick of the Wuthering

Couldn't agree more. Lack of structure and flow in the arrangement again make it a hard and unfulfilling listen.

So far I'm not really convinced by the 3 tracks on the album. It's even worse than the last albums. What a mess!

STEVE HACKETT - Circo Inferno.

As part of a suite, it can work!

For me it's the best of the 3 so far. The first 30 seconds are pretty good. Overall though it's still not great but sadly that's what I expect from this work these days.

Again, why does everything sound so unsubtle, so full-on, like he's throwing in everything he can lay his hands on? It all sounds as preposterous and overheated as his hysterical descriptions of the material.

It sounds like Innuendo by Queen, sped up to twice or three times the normal speed, leading to a cartoonish effect.

I’ve listened to this a few times and, like Backdrifter, thought it started really well and when the song returns to that little refrain it’s good. But then the kitchen sink had to brace itself again as it was chucked in the mix and it all became what my mum and dad would have referred to as - in this case reasonably so - a racket. Maybe it will fit the terms of the concept well, as did The Waiting Room on the Lamb, or the bubbly and then wild volcano section on DOAV, but, taken along with the other two tracks, it doesn’t bode too well. Is there no-one who could suggest he sits down and tries to write something straightforward and undercooked, or a Virgin and the Gypsy type of track? At this rate Decomposing Man is looking like a bit of a career high.