It is nice to review a band hailing from my old county of Shropshire, namely Thought Bubble, who describe themselves as an “alt electronic group”. I will be playing a track from their sixth album, Mostly True, on my radio show this coming Saturday (9th August), so make sure you catch that (also available as a podcast immediately after the end of the show at progzilla.com/podcasts).

They are a trio, namely Chris Cordwell on synths, Nick Raybould on percussion, and vocalist Peter Gelf.

There are some interesting themes on this album, and it is released via Moolaki Club Audio Interface at https://bubble.bandcamp.com/album/mostly-true

Seven pieces of music to discuss and play. Let’s take off.

We open with It’s Best Not to Look at the Sun, my track of choice on this week’s radio show in the “new music” slot. It is a song about madness, and the opening notes are doom-laden, Gelf perfect in his vocal description of the condition, the lyrics quite clever in their inclusion of the banal in much of life, including insanity. Raybould impresses with his hand work, the whole piece increasing in atmosphere as it progresses, an impressive start to proceedings, harmonies striking, minimalistic keys deceptively powerful. It is embedded below, a contender for an “atmospheric track” award on this website’s annual awards.

It is followed by Rattlepool, “chaos and order”. If you are a fan of percussion driven psych, then this one’s nirvana for you, the relentless beats hypnotic, the keys creating a sense of electronic improvisation, the voices drawing you in. Stunning, the forces competing against each other for dominance, and neither side quite winning.

I’d Give Up All This is a sentiment I have expressed many a time in my professional career, and, yet, after 41 years, I’m still at it. I must be mad. It strikes me as being a commentary on much of modern society as exemplified by the technology we use, and it is a fascinating piece of music, stuck in a loop, trancey, wanting to escape, but not allowed to. It is embedded below, a very clever track.

Three Apples has as its subject matter that archetypal example of how technology is changing modern warfare in the drones used to huge effect in the Russia/Ukraine theatre of war now. My impression from the opening passage is to regard these deadly machines also being works of mechanical beauty, in the same way as I used to love looking at aircraft capable of annihilating us when I was young. As the track progresses, the power is stepped up, the riffs creating that sense of warfare, the chaos, the plunder of life, very deep and dark, the lyrics so good in describing the “pilot” of the drones drinking his coffee a thousand miles away whilst unleashing his deadly force, an act of destruction so cold and unemotional, which I find far more sinister than the act of a murder seen and known to both victim and perpetrator.

Clicks, Rumbles, and Wordless Shouts follows. Modern minimalist electronic art rock, the bass synth creating a rumbling foundation, the percussion then joining in with the synths and voice to look down on this, another loop which entrances and hypnotises with its live improvisation in the finest tradition of progressive rock music.

Cut Out Within is the penultimate piece. From the start, this track brings me to mind the stark album cover. I don’t know whether that was the intent here, but it’s that structure in the middle of nowhere, serving a purpose unknown, but working there meaning you are exposed to the harshest of elements, this track getting as close here as possible to the cold darkness of classic Kraut electronica.

We close with Anna, the trio saving the longest until last, not far short of the epic length. The voice actress admonishing and praising, not entirely attractive to these ears. When the main piece kicks in, we get more of that very cleverly crafted percussion leading the charge against the voice and pulsing synths, so atmospheric, lyrically inviting us to participate, because “spectators never win the game”, which is so true. The mood created here, even with the coldness of the Su voice, is warmer than that which preceded it, and there is, as we get to the five minute mark, an almost discotheque feel to the sound created, swirling and whirling under the lights which flash on and off, the throng of the crowd wanting to keep it going forever, the trio trying to oblige, the trance of the notes waving you on and on until it simply has to fade and end, the eponymous word announcing its closure, the best example of this type of music I have heard since alighting on Orbital a fair few years ago now.

The progressive music world has a spectrum so wide these days. I am very grateful to Thought Bubble reaching out to me via the website with a work which has added huge value to the diversity of music covered here. This is my first enclosure in this bubble. It won’t be the last.