Ashbury Heights - The Looking Glass Society (2015)

Posted By: BlondStyle

Date: Oct. 13, 2018

"The Looking Glass Society" is a wecome 2015' return from Ashbury Heights. Anders and Tea have created an album that is every bit as good as AH's previous albums. It has somewhat of a less intense delivery, and is a little reseved on the electro sounds; there are no songs reminiscent of the likes of "World Coming Down", which is a shame, but the slight change in direction (began with the previous album, "Take Cair Paramour") doesn't lessen the enjoyment of TLGS one bit. There are a few reserved-tempo pieces here, like "Glow" and "Hollow", with their refined intros that give something of a Renaissance feel. The album opens with "Masque", which is a fantastic opening song, sporting Anders' sublime lyrics and great vocals from the new pair. "Heart of Darkness" and "Phantasmagoria" are solid and as enjoyable as "Masque". "Piano" continues the upbeat delivery, giving even more focus on Tea's vocals, which are utterly enjoyable to hear. "Left Off at Seven" is another good tune, but the album really explodes with "The Number 22" with its anthemic chorus that puts it right next to songs like "Eternity At An End", followed by "Gravitational Man" which, while very enjoyable, bridges "TN22" with the song which, for me, is the absolute pinnacle of the album - "Ghost Spirit Mother" is right up there as one of the best Ashbury Heights songs yet, with the likes of "Anti Ordinary", "Dark Clouds Gather Over Vanity Fair" and "I Can KIll You So Easily"; it's a crashing, anthemic, upbeat tune, with exceptionally strong lyrics and vocals from Anders. The next song is the single, "Starlight" which is right on par with "Masque", "Phantasmagoria", "TN22" and "GSM". The chorus of "Starlight" is reminiscent of something from the 80s which, back then, would have seen it as a high-charting single. The album concludes with "November Corrosion", which gives us more of Tea's dreamy vocals in the verses, but as a final song it doesn't stand anywhere near Take Cair Paramour's "Invisible Man" (which is one of AH's strongest songs. In summary, The Looking Glass Society is a fantastic and solid offering, with many rememberable and highly enjoyable tracks, and will (like the prevous albums) stand up easily to frequent listens. I could listen to Ashbury Heights every single day of the rest of my life, and I'm greatly looking forward to the next release, albeit with the hope for a "World Coming Down"-type tune in the mix! I'm also hoping that some "electro remixes" of songs from TLGS will soon appear.

~Review by Scott Kaelen

Release of this album/CD: 2015, August, 7 [CD Out Of Line (Germany), Cat.# OUT 718 / UPC: 4260158837187]
℗© 2015 Out Of Line Music GmbH
Distributed by Rough Trade
Made/Printed in Germany

Tracklist:

01. Masque (04:09)
02. Heart Of Darkness (04:13)
03. Glow (04:02)
04. Hollow (05:29)
05. Phantasmagoria (05:34)
06. Piano (05:29)
07. Left Off At Seven (04:07)
08. The Number 22 (04:33)
09. Gravitational Man (03:29)
10. Ghost Spirit Mother (04:28)
11. Starlight (04:05)
12. November Corrosion (05:14)

EAC log

Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 6 from 9. April 2015

EAC extraction logfile from 8. November 2015, 8:52

Ashbury Heights / The Looking Glass Society

Used drive : PIONEER BD-RW BDR-206M Adapter: 1 ID: 0

Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction : 667
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000

Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 1024 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files (x86)\Exact Audio Copy\Flac\flac.exe
Additional command line options : -V -8 -T "Genre=%genre%" -T "Artist=%artist%" -T "Title=%title%" -T "Album=%albumtitle%" -T "Date=%year%" -T "Tracknumber=%tracknr%" -T "Comment=%comment%" %source%

TOC of the extracted CD

Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.00 | 4:09.15 | 0 | 18689
2 | 4:09.15 | 4:13.32 | 18690 | 37696
3 | 8:22.47 | 4:02.29 | 37697 | 55875
4 | 12:25.01 | 5:29.36 | 55876 | 80586
5 | 17:54.37 | 5:34.53 | 80587 | 105689
6 | 23:29.15 | 5:29.31 | 105690 | 130395
7 | 28:58.46 | 4:07.48 | 130396 | 148968
8 | 33:06.19 | 4:33.58 | 148969 | 169501
9 | 37:40.02 | 3:29.14 | 169502 | 185190
10 | 41:09.16 | 4:28.28 | 185191 | 205318
11 | 45:37.44 | 4:05.57 | 205319 | 223750
12 | 49:43.26 | 5:14.04 | 223751 | 247304

Range status and errors

Selected range

Filename F:\Ashbury Heights\Ashbury Heights - The Looking Glass Society (2015)\Image\Ashbury Heights - The Looking Glass Society.wav

Peak level 98.9 %
Extraction speed 4.8 X
Range quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 7E91F011
Copy CRC 7E91F011
Copy OK

No errors occurred

AccurateRip summary

Track 1 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [6D18CD31] (AR v2)
Track 2 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [51980F43] (AR v2)
Track 3 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [F89A3673] (AR v2)
Track 4 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [7A36F42C] (AR v2)
Track 5 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [2E7D5352] (AR v2)
Track 6 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [E40B1436] (AR v2)
Track 7 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [B4DADF1D] (AR v2)
Track 8 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [A35B7187] (AR v2)
Track 9 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [F73023EA] (AR v2)
Track 10 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [B21EFA96] (AR v2)
Track 11 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [4E1CC12B] (AR v2)
Track 12 accurately ripped (confidence 3) [571FE7D6] (AR v2)

All tracks accurately ripped

End of status report

–– CUETools DB Plugin V2.1.6

[CTDB TOCID: EHfrOjcJeU8kKuIyveT2099lgiQ-] found
Submit result: already submitted
Track | CTDB Status
1 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
2 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
3 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
4 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
5 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
6 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
7 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
8 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
9 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
10 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
11 | (18/18) Accurately ripped
12 | (18/18) Accurately ripped

==== Log checksum 0531DD3796AA38D70CB2F68AC7685E3FB7ECC5CA1896A5EA40DE8B25654C8EE4 ====

Dynamic Range Meter log

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Analyzed: Ashbury Heights / The Looking Glass Society
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

DR Peak RMS Duration Track
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
DR6 -0.09 dB -7.69 dB 4:09 01-Masque
DR6 -0.09 dB -6.96 dB 4:13 02-Heart Of Darkness
DR7 -0.09 dB -8.69 dB 4:02 03-Glow
DR5 -0.09 dB -7.86 dB 5:29 04-Hollow
DR6 -0.09 dB -8.06 dB 5:35 05-Phantasmagoria
DR6 -0.09 dB -7.64 dB 5:29 06-Piano
DR6 -0.09 dB -8.06 dB 4:08 07-Leave Off At Seven
DR5 -0.09 dB -7.18 dB 4:34 08-The Number 22
DR6 -0.09 dB -6.96 dB 3:29 09-Gravitational Man
DR6 -0.09 dB -7.55 dB 4:28 10-Ghost Spirit Mother
DR6 -0.09 dB -8.30 dB 4:06 11-Starlight
DR8 -0.09 dB -9.26 dB 5:14 12-November Corrosion
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Number of tracks: 12
Official DR value: DR6

Samplerate: 44100 Hz
Channels: 2
Bits per sample: 16
Bitrate: 960 kbps
Codec: FLAC
================================================================================

Thanks to Empath

password: BlondStyle

Flac
Artwork