Magnum - Sacred Blood, Divine...chart position?

All sales figures in the below ramble are sourced from www.buzzjack.com.

Yesterday saw the official release of Magnum’s umpteenth album Sacred Blood, “Divine” Lies. As it’s mysteriously absent from Amazon’s Auto-rip service, and the physical CD has yet to deign to pop through the door I’m left not to wonder how great it will be (that’s a given, it will be amazing – certainly all the reviews point to this, as if there was any doubt), but…where will it end up in the charts? Their last effort, 2014’s superb Escape From the Shadow Garden, entered at #38, seeing them back in the UK top 40 for the first time since 1992’s Sleepwalking reached #27, and continued their well-deserved upward trajectory of recent years.  Indeed, in an era of declining album sales Magnum are bucking the trend. Looking at their efforts so far this decade, 2011’s The Visitation reached #55, with the following years On the 13^th Day bettering it by a margin and reaching #43. The interesting bit to me is that 12-spot jump was based on only 25 extra first week sales (3098 vs 3073), while Shadow Garden’s extra 5-spot climb required a much larger increase – 3683 sales, to be precise. So while that top 40 placement was cause for celebration, subsequent weeks have suggested they were a little unlucky not to do even better, a fact which has had me confidently predicting a top 30 entry for the new album. Then I saw this week’s charts sales figures…

Goodness, what a slow week. Buzzjack doesn’t provide the individual sales figures for all albums, but in at #25 is Australian band Wolfmother’s 4^th album Victorious with sales of…3089 – yep, a full 30 places higher than The Visitation managed 5 years ago with almost identical sales. On that basis, top 30 seems assured…but let’s go crazy and ask…how about top 20? I wouldn’t have previously thought that a possibility, but this week Sia only needed to shift 4139 copies (of her previous album, not her latest effort that’s residing in the top 10) to sit at #19 and that is not an impossible target for Magnum to reach, especially when you consider that Shadow Garden almost managed a second week in the top 100, with second week sales of 943 consigning it to #105 (a fact I only discovered last night - I’d always assumed the second week drop-off would be far more pronounced).

Now, I have to stress again that this week is unusually slow – last week Taylor Swift was at #20 with sales of around 5100, while a few weeks earlier Steven Wilson’s 4 ½ made #21 with over 6000 sales – though he did have to contend with the major revival in the Bowie back-catalogue spurred by his shock passing – so it really will need to be a ‘perfect storm’ scenario comprised of a further week of slow sales, no further sudden deaths of rock icons, and mothers across the land waking up next Sunday to receive copies of current top 5-perennials Adele, Coldplay or the Best of Bowie, alongside their flowers and chocolates.

A common view I see expressed these days is that the charts don’t matter anymore, but as long as there is a chart anyone will want to be as high up it as possible (if there’s a chart you might as well be at the top of it, as Noel Gallagher said), and a good chart position can be the difference between a promoter booking extra dates on a tour (bread and butter to a touring band of Magnum’s vintage) so I’d say, yes, it does matter – and that’s where the fans come in. Obviously 95% of the dedicated fanbase will have pre-ordered anyway, but assuming you’ve done so…were you planning to buy in multiple formats? If so, don’t wait to add that vinyl edition to your collection, buy it this week alongside your special edition CD/DVD package. Similarly, what do you mean you’ve bought a copy for yourself, but not a spare for a friend or close family member (the ideal – if alternative -  gift for Mother’s day? Erm, yeah, go on then!) who may have been missing out all these years? Literally every sale achieved this week counts.

With a bit of effort, and a lot of luck maybe, just maybe, we could help see Magnum land only their 4^th top 20 album. Got to admit that would be nice, wouldn’t it?

Gig Review: Magnum, Neonfly at the Islington Assembly Hall, 04 May 2014

Barring a cameo appearance from Lord Robert of Catley at Firefest, 2013 was my first Magnum-less year since arriving in the UK - and it's strange how quickly withdrawal symptoms can kick in! Thankfully 2014 has seen them back with yet another brand-new (and brilliant) album in the form of Escape from the Shadow Garden,  and an obligatory accompanying tour. The UK leg concluded with last night's gig at London's Islington Assembly Hall - fast becoming one of my favourite venues, especially when downstairs is left (as downstairs should always be if you ask me!) as a standing area and the best possible use can be made of the somewhat bouncy floor.

Despite being in the middle of a Bank Holiday weekend the venue was almost full to capacity - as full as I've seen it, in fact - and with the exception of poor old (yet mercifully ejected - twice) WAT-FORD!!!! (you had to be there...) up for it in the way that you can always rely on a Magnum audience to be.

Of course it never hurts to be touring in support of an instant classic and Shadow Garden, which saw the band earn their first UK top 40 album in two decades and,  for me, ranks alongside Princess Alice and The Visitation as the very best of their post-reformation albums (and indeed sits comfortably alongside those, Chase the Dragon, Storyteller and Wings of Heaven as one of the best albums in their entire discography), has certainly been embraced as such by the fanbase.

The fact that the catalogue is stuffed with such an embarrassment of riches meant that, despite being weighted very slightly towards recent material over the old favourites, there was only room in the set for 4 songs from the new album (so no Crying in the Rain  - boo!), kicking off with album and show opener Live 'Til You Die, with Unwritten Sacrifice and Falling for the Big Plan also featuring in the main set. Elsewhere, the early part of the show saw a welcome return to the set of two of the best Visitation tracks - Black Skies and Freedom Day -  and a couple from previous album On the 13th Day. This included the fabulous Dance of the Black Tattoo, which has now had an extra layer of grit applied to it that has seen it come into its own on stage, after being the mildest of mild disappointments last tour.

As the evening went on the old favourites (The Spirit, All England's Eyes and Vigilante amongst them) started to appear with increasing regularity, beginning with an even more extended than usual How Far Jerusalem, as Bob used his usual mid-set loo/tea break to sort out the problems he was having with his battery pack. Being the pro he is whatever the issue was it didn't affect his performance, which was as powerful and imbued with emotion as ever, but he did look a touch happier and more relaxed once it was sorted.

Also appearing, as it has in every Magnum gig I've been to, was possibly the greatest song ever written - Les Morts Dansant. This song, which deals with the policy of executing first World War deserters and other 'cowards', should be on the national curriculum as far as I'm concerned. Certainly nothing the BBC can or will come up with in their in-depth WWI commemoration programming will match this 6-minute song for emotion, depth or craft and I will never ever tire of hearing it (or manage to get through it with both eyes remaining dry, for that matter!).

The encores brought us back to the new album with the rocking Too Many Clowns (with red noses appearing in bulk down the front, and not due to an excess of alcohol consumption during the show!) before setting off some air-keyboarding in the crowd as Mark Stanway began the majestic intro to Sacred Hour, another of the all-time Magnum classics, but one I hadn't heard live before this tour. And well worth the wait it was too - an absolutely perfect end to a perfect gig.

The band never seem to have an off-night and they were firing on all cylinders throughout. A special mention for Tony Clarkin who's playing was the best I've heard from him. He's never been  the rock posturing guitar hero sort, he just gets on with the job and does it beautifully. Sometimes I think he's even more underrated as a guitarist than he is as a songwriter, and that's saying something!

I'll leave it to those who were lucky enough to see the 85-95 line-up to decide whether the band as we have it now are, as claimed by some, the best they've ever been, though that's got to be a close call. To be honest it doesn't even matter; they're certainly as good as the current incarnation of any other band you'd care to name - of any vintage - and should be more widely heralded as one of Britain's greatest bands.

In support were the best opening act I've seen with Magnum - Neonfly. Their brand of catchy, yet substantial,  melodic rock swiftly had an appreciative crowd in party mode. Lead vocalist Willy Norton particularly impressed with his powerful tenor voice and stage presence. The rest of the band were also very tight, as you might expect given that they've been playing these songs for years, but they also previewed two songs from their (hopefully) forthcoming second album and these sounded just as polished.

They fit in nicely stylistically with the headliners and there were more (if superficial!) comparisons you could easily draw between the two, not least having a guitarist (Frederick Thunder in this case) writing the bulk of the material or an image 'problem' (which I've always taken to be media speak for 'they don't all wear the same clothes and have fancy haircuts'). Whatever, it's the music that matters and I've had The Enemy buzzing incessantly inside my head all day. Definitely a band to watch (starting with the below 'musical video' - Norton's suggested use of any downtime at work...for those who have such a thing!) and a nice bunch of guys, only too happy to sign the healthy number of CDs they were shifting after the gig.

‘Best’ albums of the past 50 years

A lot of things happened fifty years ago. 1963, for example. No, wait, hang on a minute, something’s gone wrong there…

Okay, what I meant to say was that 2013 is a big year for 50^th anniversaries. Last weekend alone gave us the assassination of JFK and the launch of Doctor Who (Most agree that one of these was a good thing and one bad, but I’ll leave it up to you to decide which is which), but while I could discuss pop delights from I’m Glad I’m Not a Kennedy to Doctor in Distress, probably the most relevant anniversary to mention in the context of a music blog came earlier in the year, namely the release of The Beatles debut long-playing record (as such things used to be called), Please Please Me.

It’s the oldest album I own, and in thinking about its great age I realised that my collection boasts at least one album for every year since. So I thought I’d see if I could pick my favourite album from each of the past fifty years. As it turned out, some years were easier than others, so for the purposes of what follows, if I couldn’t narrow it down to a single (or a double!) album for any given year I’d choose 3. And if I couldn’t narrow it down to 3 I’d chose 5! And if…okay, I stopped there, but there are some years where I could have listed 10 quite easily (1970 and 1988 spring to mind).  

I should mention that to be a contender these albums have to be in my collection (and by that I basically mean ‘on me iPod’) now, so albums once owned that have died, and somehow not been replaced (Here’s looking at you, Ziggy Stardust) or I only ‘own’ in the sense that I have a copy on vinyl languishing in a box back in New Zealand (The Hollies criminally overlooked A Crazy Steal fits this category) were not considered. Nor were live albums, compilations, or talking books.

Now, it goes without saying that you won’t agree with some/many/any of my choices, and that is absolutely fine (by all means post your own lists in response!). But whether they’re obvious ‘influential/important’ works (Not many of those will appear, to the great shock of nobody. But that’s what AMG’s dull as dishwater ‘Allmusic loves XX Year’ features are for. I find it disturbing enough that I’ve listed as many as two albums that made it into NMEs ‘Top 25 albums of all time’ list!) or obscure AOR releases, heard by precisely nobody who doesn’t visit melodicrock.com on a daily basis, what all of the below  albums have in common is that they continue to delight with every listen, in many cases years after I first heard them. To me that constitutes ‘greatness’ enough and the critics can go hang!

1963:     The Beatles – Please Please Me

1964:     The Beatles – A Hard Day’s Night

1965:     Paul Simon – The Paul Simon Songbook

1966:     The Beatles – Revolver

1967:     The Beatles – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

1968:     Simon and Garfunkel – Bookends

                Gordon Lightfoot - Did She Mention My Name?

                Blood, Sweat and Tears – Child is Father to the Man

1969:     Chicago – Chicago Transit Authority

1970:     Stephen Stills – Stephen Stills

                Dave Mason – Alone Together

                Chicago – Chicago II

                Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young – Déjà vu

                James Taylor – Sweet Baby James

1971:     Gerry Rafferty – Can I Have My Money Back?

                David Bowie – Hunky Dory

                Caravan – In the Land of Grey and Pink

1972:     America – Homecoming

                Gordon Lightfoot – Don Quixote

                Jethro Tull – Thick as a Brick

1973:     Paul Simon – There Goes Rhymin’ Simon

                Steely Dan – Countdown to Ecstasy

                The Doobie Brothers – The Captain and Me

1974:     Gordon Lightfoot – Sundown

                Stealers Wheel – Ferguslie Park

                Boz Scaggs – Slow Dancer

                Poco – Cantamos

                Kansas – Kansas

1975:     Seals and Crofts – I’ll Play For You

                The Band – Northern Lights – Southern Cross

                Kansas – Song for America

1976:     Kansas – Leftoverture

                Eagles – Hotel California

                Boz Scaggs – Silk Degrees

                Neil Diamond – Beautiful Noise

                Jackson Browne – The Pretender

1977:     Billy Joel – The Stranger

                Chicago – Chicago XI

                Harry Chapin – Dance Band on the Titanic

1978:     Toto – Toto

                Gerry Rafferty – City to City

                Magnum – Kingdom of Madness

                Burton Cummings – Dream of a Child

                Billy Joel – 52^nd Street

1979:     Pink Floyd – The Wall

                Toto – Hydra

                The Alan Parsons Project – Eve

1980:     Boz Scaggs – Middle Man

                Burton Cummings – Woman Love

                Dire Straits – Making Movies

1981:     Rush – Moving Pictures

1982:     Magnum – Chase the Dragon

                Gordon Lightfoot – Shadows

                Gerry Rafferty – Sleepwalking

                Asia – Asia

                Billy Joel – The Nylon Curtain

1983:     Journey – Frontiers

                Magnum – The Eleventh Hour!

                Le Roux – So Fired Up

                Paul Simon – Hearts and Bones

                Kansas – Drastic Measures

1984:     Toto – Isolation

                Survivor – Vital Signs

                Chicago – Chicago 17

1985:     Magnum – On a Storyteller’s Night

                Mr. Mister – Welcome to the Real World

                Rush – Power Windows

1986:     Jackson Browne – Lives in the Balance

                Billy Joel – The Bridge

                Journey – Raised on Radio

                Eddie Money – Can’t Hold Back

                Bruce Hornsby and the Range – The Way it Is

1987:     Marillion – Clutching at Straws

1988:     Gerry Rafferty – North and South

                Magnum – Wings of Heaven

                Toto – The Seventh One

                Kansas – In the Spirit of Things

                Survivor – Too Hot to Sleep

1989:     Marillion – Seasons End

                Starship – Love Among the Cannibals

                Steve Lukather – Lukather

1990:     Paul Simon – The Rhythm of the Saints

1991:     Marc Cohn – Marc Cohn

                Marillion – Holidays in Eden

                Shadow King – Shadow King

1992:     R.E.M. – Automatic for the People

                Toto – Kingdom of Desire

                Magnum – Sleepwalking

1993:     Billy Joel – River of Dreams

                Al Stewart – Famous Last Words

                Jackson Browne – I’m Alive

1994:     Marillion – Brave

                Martin Page – In the House of Stone and Light

                Steve Lukather – Candyman

1995:     Marillion – Afraid of Sunlight

                John Wetton – Battle Lines

                Bruce Hornsby – Hot House

1996:     Asia – Arena

1997:     Marillion – This Strange Engine

1998:     Bob Catley – The Tower

1999:     Toto – Mindfields

                Robert Lamm – In My Head

                Marillion – Marillion.com

2000:     Kansas – Somewhere to Elsewhere

                Beckley-Lamm-Wilson – Like a Brother

                Porcupine Tree – Lightbulb Sun

2001:     Marillion – Anoraknophobia

                Radioactive – Ceremony of Innocence

                Journey – Arrival

2002:     Porcupine Tree – In Absentia

2003:     Gary Hughes – Once and Future King

2004:     Marillion – Marbles

                Asia – Silent Nation

                Seventh Key – The Raging Fire

2005:     Porcupine Tree – Deadwing

2006:     Toto – Falling in Between

2007:     Magnum – Princess Alice and the Broken Arrow

                Danny Vaughn – Traveller

                Rush – Snakes and Arrows

2008:     Martin Page – In the Temple of the Muse

                Marillion – Happiness is the Road Vol. II: The Hard Shoulder

                Jackson Browne – Time the Conqueror

2009:     Transatlantic – The Whirlwind

                Magnum – Into the Valley of the Moonking

                Native Window – Native Window

2010:     Steve Lukather – All’s Well That Ends Well

2011:     Magnum – The Visitation

                Yes – Fly From Here

                Fergie Frederiksen – Happiness is the Road

                Edison’s Children – In the Last Waking Moments...

                Serpentine – Living and Dying in High Definition

2012:     Marillion – Sounds That Can’t Be Made

                Rush – Clockwork Angels

                Magnum – On the 13^th Day

                (For the rest of my 2012 top 10 see HERE)

2013:     TBA!