The Prog Rogue https://www.facebook.com/progrogue/ is always worthy of your strict attention. Thomas is perhaps my oldest friend in the progressive music world, and the most reliable in terms of assessing what I will, or won’t, like. So, recently, he reviewed Heli1025, the debut album released by Belgian outfit, Phonya. I had made a note to cop a hold of the album when, l was contacted by one of the two co-founders, Bernard Piette who, essentially, told me that dear Thomas had recommended my wee little website as another review outlet which would extol the virtues of intelligent, quality music.

Bernard formed Phonya alongside Eric Vanderbemden, and the pair then recruited Gautier Delco.

Vanderbemden is a classically trained guitarist who also plays keyboards and bass. His past exploits are a mixture of pop and rock projects, and he is the primary composer of this project.

Keyboardist Piette is a self-taught musician who worked with Vanderbemden in the 1990’s.

Gautier Delco is a classically trained pianist and plays keyboards and bass on this album. Interestingly, he presently plays in an Aerosmith tribute band. Delco is the creator of the artwork on the album.

The story behind the album title is an interesting one. It refers to an old radio that Eric found in his aunt’s house. After remaining still for years, once turned on, the radio worked perfectly and produced a warm and powerful sound. The band was fascinated by the sound and the design of the radio. The band state that it brought them back to a time where the world was not flooded with images and when sound helped to create emotions; a time where the listener was able to create his own images. Now, given that I am creating these words on a Microsoft document and HP laptop, it would be somewhat hypocritical of me to eschew all technology as some kind of prog Luddite, but it is the case that there is so much noise in the 2020’s, and that noise, a lot of which is created deliberately by rampant corporates, drowns out thoughts, feelings, and positive emotions.

So, six pieces of music across two sides of traditional vinyl. Let’s discuss and play some.

We open with Evolution, and suitably for an instrumental progressive rock band, Phonya are not short of ambition in opening with a ten-minute epic. I have embedded this delight below, immediately the synchronicity between lush, cinematic keys and a nice guitar groove hits the listener. There is, from the start, an impressive scope in this music, and I find the combination of modern synths, Hammond, and other classic keys of interest. As this song develops, I really like the catchiness inherent within it, more than a touch of classic Marillion in the pacier parts, guitar solos from the Gilmour playbook, and moodiness of the likes of Porcupine Tree and, I think, some of the better bands which emerged out of Eastern Europe in the 1990’s. It is all wonderfully expansive.

Let Me Out is shorter, and darker with dystopian electronica notes competing against a spellbinding set of beats, the music more than adequately describing the need to escape from, perhaps, a nightmare or argument, and the guitars when they enter assist in bringing a large noise to the room, which is then cleverly contrasted with a dark guitar solo competing with effects, before we get a rather pretty passage just short of halfway in which segues into something more industrial, that beat ever present, so we have the full range of subconscious emotions at play here. Interesting and captivating music.

Breathless is shorter still, the immediate underpinning notes very much panting. This is a dark piece of music, and very impressive as a standout contribution is the electric double bass played by Seb Mentior. Chaotic in parts, almost a race against time in the four minutes it hits you in. I have embedded it below.

Trans-HUMAN-ce is one hell of a title, and there is, in fact, a word transhumance which refers to annual migration patterns between winter and summer months. Never say you don’t learn something new on this website. It is the final track of side one (this album is available on vinyl) and there is a nice symphonic cutting edge to the strings and glockenspiel effects heard. The human in capital letters refers, I believe, to the impact of movements of our fellow humans in the waves of people fleeing war, persecution, poverty in recent times, something that has given rise to a very unfortunate increase in racist sentiment. The track is quite trancey in parts and an interesting journey, more introspective, I believe, than scared.

Lunar Sun is a cracking track, and I will be playing this on a forthcoming radio show of mine on Progzilla Radio. It kicks off two epic-length tracks on side two and is a prog fan’s delight. Some of the guitar solo work is simply breathtaking, soaring above a simple beat and understated soundscapes created, in combination filling the room with a delightful noise. It doesn’t try to be too loud, and therein lies its impact, and I picture myself gazing up at the sky in wonder at an eclipse, the music portraying perfectly the sense of serenity and that you are in the presence of something greater than yourself, especially when the choral voices join in alongside a synth soundscape which is as grand as anything a certain Mr Vangelis put together in the day. Superb music.

We close with The Infinite Game, a fourteen-minute piece broken into two parts. Part One starts off thoughtfully with a tinkling piano against a broody backdrop moving into a synth-led passage which could easily accompany a film soundtrack following a large spaceship moving slowly across the screen ether. Part Two expands the sound significantly, a nice pulsing bass beneath the bank of keyboards and piano leading the charge into something more palpable, an assortment of chords and sounds filling the room, dreamy in its execution, especially when a guitar enters very reminiscent of some of the classic work Oldfield has provided us with over the years before the noises become dystopian, heavy riffs at the core in a short passage giving way to some more dextrous guitar work against the core soundscapes before the sound is ratcheted up in this never-ending journey.

Hugely impressive album, this, something which lingers long in the mind after the final notes fade. You can see how to order it at https://phonya.bandcamp.com/album/heli1025

Mr Rogue delivers in spades again!