Hawkwind - Stories From Time and Space Space 2 x vinyl lps (due to size and weight, this price for the USA only. Outside of the USA, the price will be adjusted as needed)
SKU
23-BRED2LP 901
"Well, here we are again. With the dust only really just settling on the band’s 2023 release, The Future Never Waits, Captain Dave Brock is firing up the engines on the SS Hawkwind for another trans-dimensional bout of exploration…
And, I have to say, it’s another good ‘un, maybe even better than last year’s effort. It’s certainly more direct – you get the feeling our hero has still got a lot to get off his chest as he approaches his nineties and doesn’t want to fanny around if he can possibly help it – which makes for a refreshing listen. Don’t get me wrong, there are still plenty of woozy, free-form wigouts if that’s where you get your Hawkjollies, but tracks like The Tracker and Frozen In Time could easily sit on modern radio formatting (ulp!) without really raising an eyebrow. As I said, this is kinda refreshing, and it certainly makes for some varied listening.
Can’t Last Forever opens the album with a hint of sadness at the realisation that no, it can’t, and we won’t get many more of these to savour, but the jaunty The Starship (One Love One Life) wipes that particular tear from the eye with it’s upbeat feels and is bound to become a festival staple when the band hits the road later this year. What Are We Going To Do While We’re Here is darker and heavier in mood, but shot through with a shard of mordant, very British humour to keep things on an even keel. The Tracker also ends with a twinkle in Brock’s eye and is a fabulous mashup of the fantastical and the mundane, as great work so often is; Throughout the album, whatever Brock’s band of acolytes serve up musically – and it’s all, very accomplished, and very impressive, possibly some of the most consistently impressive music we’ve heard from the band in a long, long time actually – it’s his mercurial presence that gives everything the strength and personality that only a true legend can bring to proceedings.
But talking of the rest of the band, has there ever been a collective gathered together in all of Hawkwind’s history that pulls together in a such a spectacular way in support of the main man? I’m not saying their music necessarily eclipses the glory days – how could it? but Richard Chadwick, Magnus Martin, Doug MacKinnon and Tim “Thighpaulsandra” Lewis all meld their talents in such a supportive way that it can’t be anything other than a spectacularly fertile bed in which Brock can germinate his theories and ideas without the constant push-me-pull-you tensions of band politics. And hats off to them all for that. The proof of the pudding is, as they say, in the eating and I personally can’t stop myself from gorging on Stories From Time and Space over and over again!
At the end of the day, if you’ve enjoyed the last couple of Hawkwind releases, you’ll love the way SFTAStakes the best of both of them and refines their ideas into something that manages to sound like the Hawkwind you love whilst adding new and fresh moods to the pot. At this stage in the game I really don’t think we could ask for anything more, but the fact that that’s just what we get is still a matter for some celebration. Thanks guys!" - Sentinel Daily
- LabelEsoteric
- UPC5013929190115