The Muffins are Canterbury influenced quartet formed in Washington D.C. in the year of 1973 by Dave Newhouse (keyboards, reeds), Billy Swan (bass) and Michael Zenterner (guitar, violin). Their sound is strongly influenced by the Jazz-Rock tendencies of Soft Machine, the improvisational techniques of Henry Cow and the quirky song structures of Hatfield and the North and The Mothers of Invention.
The new group remains nameless until one day, while the trio are discussing upon potential names, a friend of there's enters the house and shouts "The muffins are hear!" and conveying a tray of blueberry muffins, thus the band is born! A number of drummers are recruited off and on during the next few months…

Fans of King Crimson, Univers Zero and Magma, pay attention: Happy Family is one of the best bands currently happening in Japan right now. Furious riffing, noisy angular drumming, intense energy and top-notch musicianship is what they're about. Their guitar work is in the vein or Robert Fripp; the keyboards recall either Univers Zero or Magma (depending on what passages you're hearing); the fretless bass work will no doubt remind you of the Magma/Zeuhl fusion sound; and the drumming will instantly recall Bill Bruford or Daniel Denis of Univers Zero. Throw in a bit of heavy metal, some Japanese goofiness and you're in for quite a sonic ride.

Despite it’s title, This is NOT the end, is, indeed, the final release by the legendary Rock In Opposition band Present, as founder and composer Roger Trigaux died during its recording. Present's music is a striking blend of heavy rock with classical and zeuhl influences. The compositions, all penned by Trigaux, utilize repetition, complex counterpoint, intricate interplay between the instruments, rapidly shifting time signatures, and a strong instrumental attack. The final result is blindingly precise works of syncopated instruments, all seemingly coming from different angles but ultimately working together as a cohesive whole.

According to classic 1970s dictums, 1975's Are(A)zione is a "live" record by Italian vanguard progressive rock group Area. Taking one song from each of its four previous albums (recorded at as many festivals) and adding a complete freakout on the title track for over 15 minutes, the band nonetheless gives the impression that this is from a single performance. Area's energy and intensity were unequaled by anyone on either side of the Atlantic - rumor has it that Emerson, Lake & Palmer, who headlined a gig in Italy, wouldn't come onto the stage for a full two hours because they didn't want to follow the band that had driven ELP's crowd intro a frenzy…

Area's second album takes its cues from the most serious side of early-'70s British progressive rock, particularly Soft Machine and King Crimson. There's a high-voltage, at times furious energy to the quasi-jazz-rock fusion, with keyboards showing some influence from Miles Davis fusion records, and the guitars wheeling off lines with a busy anxiety. This is the first album that contains the better known line up, with Ares Tavolazzi replacing Patrick Djivas on bass.
This album is notable also for being the first one in which experimental music is introduced. For example "MIRage? Mirage!" contains a part in which the whole band can be heard whispering readings (for example a negative review of "Arbeit Macht Frei", a TV guide…), and "Lobotomia" is constructed using loud synth noise, with the clear intention to disturb the listener…

Joe's Garage was originally released in 1979 in two separate parts; Act I came first, followed by a two-record set containing Acts II & III. Joe's Garage is generally regarded as one of Zappa's finest post-'60s conceptual works, a sprawling, satirical rock opera about a totalitarian future in which music is outlawed to control the population. The narrative is long, winding, and occasionally loses focus; it was improvised in a weekend, some of it around previously existing songs, but Zappa manages to make most of it hang together. Acts II & III give off much the same feel, as Zappa relies heavily on what he termed "xenochrony" - previously recorded guitar solos transferred onto new, rhythmically different backing tracks to produce random musical coincidences…

Undoubtedly one of the more adventurous, Area were also a very important band on the seventies Italian prog scene, their first four albums in particular come highly recommended and essential listening to anyone discovering the RPI genre.
In 1978 Area left the independent label Cramps and released their first album for a major, CGD, "1978 Gli Dei Se Ne Vanno, Gli Arrabbiati Restano!" (1978, the gods are going away, the angry people remain). In that year Italian post '68 protest movements were losing strength after ten years of hopes and contradictions and the members of the band, one of the most committed on the Italian scene, went through a period of personal crises too…

Debut for a band whose members are well-known on the avant-prog and RIO music scene in France and abroad. Volapük and Metamorphosis are the projects from which come Takumi Fukushima (violin, vocals), Guillaume Saurel (cello, vocals), Christoph Pajer (violin, vocals), Jan Kavan (cello), Richard Deutsch (guitar, vocals, mixing), Martin Alacam (guitar) and Guigou Chenevier (drums). Chenevier was founder not only of Volapük but also of Etron Fou Leloublan and Les Batterries. The "General Dream" including through 2 violins, 2 guitars and 2 cellos opens onto vast and uncharted musical horizons, ranging from chamber-rock to Rock In Opposition. In September 2015, Reve General's debut album was released by the Milano (IT) based label Altrock. The album was recorded live on stage during a 3-day residency at Le Brise Glace in Annecy. Each member delivered at least one composition for the current repertoire presented on the album.

French TV's newest CD, A Ghastly State Of Affairs is their 15th in their long history. It is also their first album not to be self-released. Headed up by charter member bassist/composer Mike Sary, he is joined again by guitarist Kasumi Yoneda (also from the Japanese band TEE), keyboardist Patrick Strawser (best known for his work in the 90's band Volare), and now by the original drummer from FTV's first three abums, Fenner Castner.

Studio Tan is one of four albums culled from the ill-fated 1976 box set Läther and released by Warner Bros. without Frank Zappa having a word to say about the final product (including the horrible artwork). The 21-minute opener, "The Adventures of Greggery Peccary," is the culmination of Zappa's art of storytelling. A complex piece painstakingly assembled in the studio over three years, it allies the comedy rock of the Flo & Eddie era with the jazzy feel of The Grand Wazoo and the twisted prog rock of the 1973-1974 band. Yet, it is greater than the sum of its parts, proposing an unmatched musical narrative that makes "Billy the Mountain" the work of a child and amounts to a stunning synthesis of the man's influences, stylistic range, and studio techniques…

The Italian AltrOck label has extremely high musical standards, and Humble Grumble, one of their latest signings as of early 2011, display this in spades. On the evidence of their label debut, Flanders Fields, Humble Grumble can do practically anything. The question is whether doing quite so much is a good idea. First, make no mistake, although wacky, this is a group of astoundingly accomplished musicians. Theoretically at least, some portion of the public should enjoy listening to what such musicians can do when operating at the peak of their powers, as they are here. And in the rock music world, wackiness shouldn’t count against them either.

This album is something of an anomaly in Frank Zappa's catalog. On all but two of the songs, Frank plays guitar, bass and keyboards. Terry Bozzio plays drums, and other favorites add tracks (Ruth Underwood, Roy Estrada and "Donnie" (van) Vliet, among others) to fill out the music. So among his seventies albums, this is more of a solo album than any.
Zappa proves himself to be a fair keyboardist. Although none of the keyboards stand out as great, they don't detract from the music either. And he tends to stay somewhat low key on the bass as well. The one place his bass stands out is on Friendly Little Finger, where Zappa is soloing on bass and guitar at the same time, with spectacular results.
The two guitar solo pieces are also outstanding. Black Napkins became one of Frank's signature guitar solos, and Zoot Allures is beautiful as well…

Bondage Fruit, led by the genius guitarist Natsuki Kido, one of the leading figures in the Japanese avant-rock scene, boasts their latest album, the best work of their career, 19 years after their last album 'VI'! This energetic work, featuring expressive electric and acoustic guitar work, each member's superhuman technique and versatile expressiveness, is the band's best work ever, by their own admission and that of others!
Zeuhl, and particularly good Zeuhl, isn't an exclusively French phenomenon if we are to judge by this excellent Japanese outfit who have built themselves a strong reputation in the Japanese underground. Their material, which borrows more from the European school (Magma, Mahavishnu Orchestra) than the Japanese new music scene…

The material on this album was originally was intended to be part of a four-record set called Läther, prepared for release in 1977. Then Frank Zappa got into a disagreement with his record company, Warner Bros., and Läther was split up into several different releases as part of a contractual agreement. The results were dumped on the market in 1978 and 1979, while Zappa moved on to his own record label. Sleep Dirt consists of miscellaneous tracks recorded between 1974 and 1976, including "Flambay," "Spider of Destiny," and "Time Is Money," songs that wre apparently part of an unissued Zappa musical/rock opera from 1972 called Hunchentoot. They are sung by soprano Thana Harris.

Spanish composer and musician Ángel Ontalva is perhaps best known as a central member of the Spanish band October Equus, but he has been involved in multiple side projects and collaborative productions in the last few years as well, in addition to establishing a solo career. Land of Rain and Steel is a solo guitar album recorded by Angel Ontalva in 2007 during the recording sessions for the album 'Charybdis' October Equus. These improvisations in real time, without overdubs or editing of any kind: what you hear is what was recorded at the time, with the exception of rhythmic loop at the end of The Border, which itself was published in the mix.