THE RETURN OF KARNATAKA WITH WHAT CAN ONLY BE DESCRIBED AS AN ESSENTIAL RELEASE FOR OUR TIMES
I was quite struck preparing thoughts for this review of Requiem For A Dream, the sixth studio album by Karnataka (a band formerly of the parish where this reviewer resides) that they have been extant for 26 years now. Blimey, how time passes. The only survivor, and the mainstay throughout, is Ian Jones. A quick personal note, in that at the weekend, I had the very great pleasure of meeting and sharing a couple of drinkies with Ian’s brother-in-law, Caron.
They get better and this despite a revolving door of band members that could give the Boris & Truss governments a run for their money. The CD has Ian & his new co-writer and vocalist, Sertari, as the permanent band members, alongside incredible musicians Luke Machin on guitars, Chris Allan on drums, keyboardist Gonzalo Carrera, and the evergreen and almost ever-present Troy Donockley on his distinctive uilleann pipes. Sertari (you can see her website at https://www.sertari.com/) is a singer with Cypriot family background, and shines not only vocally, but also in the songwriting department, and I get the sense that Jones & her have really hit it off creatively. Let’s be honest, she has some difficult acts to follow in Rachel Jones, Lisa Fury, Anne-Marie Helder, and Hayley Griffiths. That Sertari manages to imprint her own stamp on matters so forcefully is a credit to her talent. Below, I have embedded the video to Forever, the first collaboration released during lockdown in 2020 together with a trailer for this album.
This isn’t a concept album, but there is an overarching theme about the disastrous impact humanity is having on the planet’s natural resources with the clock ticking away, but also finding the inner strength and freedom to do something about it. The opener, All Around The World, has an extract from Greta Thunberg’s historic UN address to the world’s “great and good” rightly condemning the entire body politics’ obsession with economic growth to the exclusion of all else. Actually, the clots running our UK gaff can’t even get that right, so we end up with the worst of all worlds in that exploitation and ruinous policies for the environment & social equality continue apace without even the ”benefits” an expanding economy can bring to ordinary people, and I hope that the clocks in the impressive artwork of the album speak of the dawn of an urgently required new political & economic model as opposed to the present narrative of impending doom and the glib bollocks you hear about “priorities”, “missions”, and “tough choices”. Glass half full……….
We have 100 minutes of music on this album, with two eleven minutes plus epics and, to finish, a massive slice of music at over twenty-five minutes. Not once do you lose attention. Not once do you think anything other than you are in the company of a band who not only can play but bring a warmth and symphonic sonic delight to the senses. Indeed, this author fell for the concept of a “wall of sound” in the late 1970’s listening to the three superb Genesis albums Wind & Wuthering through to Duke which exemplified that sense of having huge music all around you, swallowing you up in its majesty and beauty. Of all modern progressive bands to follow, Karnataka and Ian’s side projects are the ones who best recreate that sense.
So, to All Around The World. Having listened several times since the CD landed, in parts, specifically the “new dawn rising” chorus, I regard this excellent track as being a direct younger musical sibling to 2021’s Dark Horizons, the release by Jones’ superb side-project, Illuminae, especially the wonderful The Lighthouse and the title track. The sense of the dramatic is there from the off with Sertari counting the clock down “tick, tock” amidst a disturbing array of effects creating by Jones’ programming before Machin introduces himself with a lovely short riff and we get our first burst of her rich and passionate voice. Jones provides his trademark rich bass melody throughout and when Sertari hits the high notes all around the world you are transported to another place indeed. The beauty of this collaboration is that she never tries to be anything other than herself, and the album is a richer one because of it. I particularly like the keyboard passage which introduces Thunberg and her monologue, and the palpable anger in her voice has a profound impact on the track and this is followed by a whirling guitar riff. The final passage of a fine song addresses the final seconds which remain for us to save ourselves and Sertari delivers the obligatory hair standing up on the back of the neck moment with the operatic delivery of the main lyrical theme, quite stunning against the symphonic noise and Chris Allan coming to the fore with some thumping skin work. What a start to proceedings.
Sacrifice follows, one of three (including the title track) co-written by Carrera with Jones & Sertari. A lovely piano introduces the song which as it develops with a lush soundscape strikes me as a paeon to the need to tap into the millennia of shared human experience to save ourselves (from ourselves, more is the pity). The chorus is especially pretty, and this is another one of those tracks which would sound fantastic on more mainstream media such as radio if only they had the guts to break free of their corporate playlists, although I shan’t be holding my breath.
Look to the East is up next, very much awash with the spirit of the near east from the moment it has the waves hitting the vessel and Sertari’s mysterious voice. This is a very well-produced piece of music with some especially good vocal effects, sumptuous synths, and programming, and quite commercial in its impact upon the ears. I also think this is an interesting track lyrically, my interpretation on it being that that part of the world is the birthplace of modern monotheistic religions, and we perhaps need to revisit and look towards the stated peaceful intentions of these faiths in a sense of togetherness as opposed to the shocking events unfolding across the planet, so looking to the light and running away from the dark.
Forgiven is the second epic on the album. Sertari is the centrepiece of this journey of personal redemption with the initial story being sung alongside some more lovely keyboards and when the track accelerates, these keyboards are joined by a thunderous rhythm section before the tempo rises to the first extraordinary Latin chanting of “Sanctus dominus et spiritus requiem” (Holy Lord and Spirit rest) – a requiem being a Latin mass for the dead, offered for the repose of their souls. It is stunning with the English words of being haunted delicately sung beneath this amidst a cathedral of noise, and this is followed by a particularly delicate piano when the singer sings of holding her breath alongside Gregorian chants with the subject forever lost in time heralding the second phase of the mass. The guitar solo is quite exquisite and the whole band joins together in a wall of sound which, frankly, deserves to be played in a place of worship because it takes your breath away. The final couple of minutes bring us all back to earth reprising the opening passage with some gorgeous keyboard notes and underneath the bass of Jones leading the melody. A work of genius and worth the entrance price alone.
The Night’s Dance is the second of the tracks Carrera had a hand in writing. The booklet has an evocative picture of a ghostly female figure standing before a Celtic Cross high in the hills with dark and foreboding clouds above. It is the shortest piece on the album at just under five and a half minutes in length and is the type of music which I am genetically programmed to adore. Lush, beautifully sung, yearning, a bass melody to close your eyes to, very clever understated drumming, alongside orchestration which lifts the soul and will almost certainly win The Lazland 2023 “Should Have Been Number One” Award. In fact, its only real rival for this is Say Goodbye Tomorrow, which has a bleak, war torn, landscape in the album booklet and this track is a cry for keeping our dreams and hopes alive and finding a better future. I am one of life’s optimists at heart, and I do truly believe that the sun can, indeed, bring life to a new day not standing in our way – what lovely words and despite the desolate beginning of bells and bleak strings, it is a song for hope and positivity, expressed forcefully via strong voice, stunning chorus which just takes your breath away at the end, a crunching bass and drum in harmony overlaid by sumptuous keys and some great fretwork.
The penultimate track is Don’t Forget My Name. The wistful keyboard is joined by intricate drum & percussion work before Sertari paints a picture of eternal love before the moment when, in all honesty, I simply melt into a goo of vocal love as the chorus “you can walk in my shadow” hits you for the first time. This emotion comes back many times over, especially when she sings the song title over and over. Emotion wrought large and once heard, never forgotten, this ear candy has been playing in my head since the cd was delivered and will join Feels Like Home on my very personal playlist of emotional tracks only to be played after about eight pints of extremely strong ale. Karnataka is the only band with more than one track on this. An emotional release, ladies, and gentlemen, which brings tears to your eyes.
And so, to an epic to end all epics, twenty-five minutes of progressive heaven, the title track. There is always a danger in pieces this length. They can meander. They can be so pretentious as to basically endorse every critic’s word of denunciation of progressive rock over the years. They can, in all honesty, disappear up their own arse. Requiem for a Dream does not do any of this. It is, quite simply, the natural conclusion to a superb album. It is an act of remembrance for the mistakes we have made, but equally looking for a second chance in the certainty we will live again on this earth. It brings together all the elements in this iteration of Karnataka I have described in detail above, and, let me tell you, I will be shattered if this lineup does not produce many more works of art such as this. The orchestration is again so well done, there is a palpable sense of the operatic as Sertari builds the vocal intensity, and you smile a knowing musical smile when Donockley enters the frame with his lush pipes. Thomas Szirmay (Prog Rogue) described this as the most mature production in Ian Jones’ canon of releases, and I can put it no better. There are some heavy passages, there is a guitar solo which cries out, there is some more of the pop/prog fusion the band have always done so well, there are synth bursts which take one back to days of yore, we have that utterly lovely Celtic infusion, parts which almost whisper to us but are stronger because of the understatement giving way to a massive denouement with a beautiful lady singing beautifully, but I think the best way of describing this piece of music is to state that I would love to hear it played at a venue such as The Wales Millenium Centre in Cardiff Bay, because it would be nigh on perfect there, and this would do that venue justice, not the other way around.
A lonely planet hurting
The price we pay for yesterday
So fragile in our hands
This review has been brooding for a few days as I wanted to do justice to a work I regard as being about as essential a release you will hear all year and, indeed, moving forward, and I say this as one so lucky to be able to write about so much good music on this website.
I do not merely recommend this album. I would state to my readers that the only thing that can possibly be done is to click over to https://www.karnataka.org.uk/shop/ and support one of the finest bands in this progressive universe. This album is the sound of a ridiculously confident act in 2023 and I think it is their finest work.
A second chance to breathe again…………………….
Tick……... Tock………………………………….