A New Old Fave Folk-Prog-Rock Act: Renaissance

 Regular readers of  this blog know how much I love gothic vocal act OCTOBER PROJECT and in particular its lead Singer MARY FAHL. It was while watching one of her classic performances on youtube that some kind soul commented that anyone who liked Mary Fahl should check out Annie Haslam and Renaissance.  

Renaissance? While I pride myself on having a wide general knowledge of music, especially that of the 60's and 70's, this was a group I had not heard of! Looking into them, I found their origins began from members of the Yardbirds (a group I DID I know and really liked!) but by the time of their best-known (and most loved) line-up with Annie , all those original members had long since departed!

I left it to youtube to "recommend" songs from Renaissance to check out, and the ones that kept coming up were tracks from albums "Ashes are Burning" and "Turn of the Cards". I wasted no time digging in, and HOLY TOLEDO, was that youtube commenter RIGHT!

The first song I heard from them was the awesome "Carpet of the Sun" with lead vocalist Annie Haslam's heavenly voice soaring above...DAMN, I fell in LOVE right away and had to hear MORE! As I clicked on track after track, I became more in awe of this group- they were simply AMAZING! Every song blew me away with its magical sound, wonderful vocals and a deep, driving bass that reminded me of YES' bassist Chris Squire-  VERY bottom heavy! 

I next got into another one of their albums, "Scheherazade And Other Stories" and WOW, this was great as well! Soon enough, I had to purchase CD copies of Ashes and Burning, Sheherazade,  and Turn of The Cards for my own! 

Falling in love with the songs, I was further stunned to find a collection of fine live performances of the band in their prime on youtube- complete sets to fully IMMERSE myself in the experience! The band sounding so great and Annie a mesmerizing as she did on record! 

It has now been about half a year and I now own a small handful of well played and well loved albums from them; besides Ashes, Sheherazade, and Turn of The Cards, I got "A Song For All Seasons" (with their song "Northern Lights"), Prologue (first Renaissance album with Annie) and Novella! When even THOSE turned out to be AWESOME, I even ventured further with their latter "Azure D'or" album, another instant classic!

The only Renaissance output I've yet to check out are the 80's releases which saw the band moving into a more contemporary sound, but you know, with the way my fandom is blowing out of control, it seems it won't be long til I've got to get THOSE as well!!!

Sometimes I'll listen to my Renaissance discs and marvel at how a simple comment in a Mary Fahl video made me such an ardent fan of the group, and one day I saw a match made in heaven with Mary Fahl DUETTING with Annie Haslam!!! SIMPLY WONDERFUL!! Seems I was DESTINED to love BOTH these lovely ladies!

PS: Since her departure from the band, Mary has kept active releasing wonderful new albums annually, as you may recall I adored her Christmas Release a few years back, and her most recent album "Can't Get it Out of My Head" is yet another modern masterpiece!

This is a covers album with Mary doing tribute to some of her fave tunes, like Tuesday Afternoon, Nick Drake's "River Man" and the title track, ELO's "Can't Get It Out Of My Head', and OOOH,  a HAUNTING cover of Neil Young's "Don't Let it Get you Down"!

Mary Fahl: Can't Get It Out of My Head

 Mary Fahl album of classics performed with her own special brand of magic! Wonderful renditions of songs I already know and love- and quite a few songs I'm hearing for the first time, like  the Judy Collins song "Since You Asked" and the haunting Richard Thompson song "The Great Valerio"!

The cover of Neil Young's "Don't let It Bring You Down" is a particular favorite, heartfelt and haunting!

Mary Fahl's "Winter Songs and Carols" Sets The Christmas Mood

Been a huge, huge fan of chanteuse Mary Fahls' mesmerizing vocals since first hearing her as the lead singer of October Project in their awesome 1993 debut album, and have faithfully purchased each and every one of her albums since then!

Every release of Mary's is as wonderful as could be, and this year we got a special treat as Mary released her very first Christmas themed album, the succinctly titled "Winter Songs and Carols"!


In this collection Mary has chosen some of her favorite seasonal songs, and along with some well known songs (like O Holy Night, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas and Silent Night, all of which get the fantastic Mary vocal treatment) are quite a few songs that I'm being introduced to for the first time, like the moody "Wexford Carol","Winter Lady","No End" and the haunting"Walking In The Air"...

Even songs like Joni Mitchell's "Urge for Going" and the song "In the Bleak Midwinter" have bene crafter into pure Mary Fahl works of art, throw in Mary's takes on classics like "What Child Is This"(another HUGE favorite), the Charlie Brown "Christmastime Is Here" , and the awesome "Ave Maria" and you've got a STELLAR Christmas album that will be one of my top GO-TO records in Christmases to come!

Mary Fahl Live at Mauch Chunk Opera House

My autographed Mary Fahl CD!!!

 As you all may know, I am a HUGE fan of Singer/Songwriter Mary Fahl- from the first moment I heard her mesmerizing voice back in 1993 with October Project, I have loved every thing she’s ever done, from October Project and on towards her solo ventures! They’re pretty good about keeping her webpage up to date, so I make sure visit frequently so I always know when there is a new exciting Mary Fahl release out!

 Going onto her webpage a few weeks ago, I was thrilled to see that she had a new release out: Mary Fahl Live at Mauch Chunk Opera House –YES!!! This was a new double CD LIVE album featuring selections from the very best of Mary’s impressive career- both October Project and Solo favorites are ALL here, songs from October Project’s first album, their second album “Falling Further In,  her Epic Records solo album “The Other Side of Time”as well as tracks off of her excellent “Dark Side Of The Moon” and Love and Gravity” albums! I’ve got ALL of Mary’s releases on CD and have been dying to hear how some of these songs might sound performed live… and now I finally would!!!!

 So I was already pretty excited about it when I realized that Rimar Records was having a very special promotion…If I ordered through them, not only could I get my copy AUTOGRAPHED by Mary, I could even get it PERSONALIZED!!! WHOA!!! This had to be one of the most AMAZING specials EVER and I wasted NO TIME plunking down those greenbacks and sending my order in!

Well, just today, my package arrived and OH MY GOSH… it is BEAUTIFUL!!! No illegible scrawlings here, just perfect penmanship whose signature actually ADDS to the beauty of the cover!!!! Holy COW, this is surely one of the GREATEST things to go into my Mary Fahl Collection!

And the songs? Mary’s voice is a haunting and powerful as ever, and she’s assembled a stellar band to accompany her, the music swirling and throbbing around Mary’s vocals…MAN! When she began the concert with the October Project classic “Deep as You Go”, I just broke out in goosebumps,  I knew this was gonna be just as AWESOME as I expected!

So many highlights stand out for me- getting to hear all the songs from Love and gravity pefromanced live for the first time, and emotional and heartfelt renditions of classic Mary Fahl songs like  "Ben Aindi Habibi and the aching "Going Home"...And for October Project fans, Mary even closed the concert with “Be My Hero”, that rocking anthem that used to end the best October Project concerts of old! Just an excellent album all around!

Mary Fahl Live at Mauch Chunk Opera House:

Deep As You Go

Like Johnny Loved June

Gravity: Move Mountains Turns Rivers Around

Return To Me

Ben Aindi Habibi

Siren

Falling Farther In

Wild Is The Wind

Us And Them

Brain Damage/Eclipse

Going Home

Bury My Lovely

The Station

Both Sides Now

Take Me As I Am

Dream Of You

Exiles (The Wolves Of Midwinter)

Nessun Dorma

Dawning Of The Day  

Meant To Be  

Everything's Gonna Be Alright  

La Vie En Rose

Be My Hero

Order your own copy at Maryfahl.com!

Artists I Love: October Project

One of the most cherished artists in my collection.

   I’m writing about them because I feel even now they’ve gone severely unnoticed in music, even though the sound, style and arrangements October Project was honing back in 1993 can be heard in a lot of current artists out now who are enjoying great respect and success today. It’s time to give October Project props for being the musical visionaries they are! ☺

October Project never got a lot of airtime on the radio or MTV / VH-1 style shows. Their live TV performances were few and far between, and there really weren’t a lot of places October Project could connect with people who might dig their style of music. In fact, if not for a chance listen to their debut CD, I might never have discovered them myself!

    Ironically enough, the first time I ever heard October Project WAS in October. I’d walked down to my local Tower Records store, and the brisk weather really had me in the Halloween mood. After perusing the singles and latest video releases, I moseyed on to the Tower Records Listening Station. This was back when there were only four or five stations unlike the scan and listen machines record stores have now. Anyway, on one of the listening stations, there was a CD with a vintage-looking Halloween cover on it. The artists proclaimed themselves “October Project”. This piqued my curiosity! What WAS this group about? Did they sing Halloween songs? So I put on the earphones and gave a listen to the first song…

The song was “Bury My Lovely”. Even today I can’t fully describe what it was like hearing them for the first time. The haunting piano opening and that mysterious operatic voice just hit me at once. Then the band kicked in with drums, keyboards and a swelling vocal chorus…! It was the most haunting, lonesome song I had ever heard! I listened to a few other songs, wondering just who these people were. I guessed they must be chamber music vocalists like CLANNAD. The back cover gave no clue as to who they were, and I surmised they were a Classical group compromised of opera singers or something!

  I went home that night but couldn’t get Bury My Lovely out of my head. The next night I went back to listen to the tracks again, and made up my mind to purchase the CD that night! Even though I believed the songs were recorded by a bunch of 60-year-old singers... I DIDN”T CARE!  I went home and I remember sitting in my room, listening to the CD, and feeling like I was in another time. I felt like I was listening to vintage fairy-tale music- (albeit vintage fairy tale music with rocking drums and guitar!) and those haunting vocals sounded both bohemian and gothic all at the same time!…OK, OK…I know all of this sound ridiculously sappy and corny and a bit Foo-Foo… but like I said, It is impossible for me to describe the effect October Project had for me. I’m trying to put feelings into words, and they’re coming out quite corny indeed!

Another thing… When I finally got the CD, the booklet inside wasn’t any help shedding light upon the mystery that was October Project. The pictures of the members were all blurry, and taken in that same vintage style. So even then I couldn’t tell what kind of people they were. Even worse, they seemed to have different credits for the performing musicians onstage and on the album! I was utterly baffled. This was before anyone heard of Google or Wikipedia - there just wasn’t any way to get info about them.

 I found out later that I wasn’t alone in this confusion. Reviewers actually say that this could be the reason October Project never made it big…they were uncategorizable: They sounded like a mix of Gothic, Chamber Music, New Age and Rock all together, and their anonymity made it even harder for fans to associate with them. Remember, even I thought I was listening to a bunch of Older People!

Anyway, so the CD got put into my collection, and every time I felt like relaxing with dreamy atmospheric music, I would put it on. And every time I would listen to the music, I would fall in love with them all over again.

 A few years later, I was now WORKING at Tower, and one night I happened to see buried in the stack of new releases a NEW October Project CD, a nicely packaged album titled “Falling Farther In”.

    I remember being quite surprised to see a new release from them because since I hadn’t heard anything about them, I had convinced myself that the first CD was a one-shot album made up of session vocalists.

 So I bought the CD and after a few listens, promptly got right back into being obsessed with October Project. What a terrific album!  Then of Coure I had to break out my first album...just great! Every time I would listen to the CDs, I would remember how much I loved them.

  One great thing about "Falling Farther In" was that they finally got around to shooting proper pictures of the band in the CD booklet… I was pleasantly surprised to find out they were ALL young, hip, and extremely cool artists! Like their music, the look of the band reflected Folk, San Francisco rock, Goth, Vocals and World music all at once! And this time, hunting on the Internet brought some success, and I was able to find a few bits of information out there about my beloved group. I was even able to read reviews of concerts and the current events surrounding the band...(Special mention to Alan, a true OP guru) I was totally hooked on them again!

   Sadly, this would be the last album that October Project released. Soon after the release of Falling Farther In, Sony/ Epic would drop the group, right in the midst of a tour!

  Mary Fahl would go on to enjoy a solo career, and the remaining members of October Project would forge ahead with groups like November Project, OP3 and the newly revamped October Project featuring Emil Adler, Marina Belica and Julie Flanders!

Enjoy the beautiful PV for "Bury My Lovely". I love this video, as it captures the spirit of October Project. All gothic, mysterious and shrouded in shadows....

 October Project

Mary Fahl: Vocals

Marina Belica: Vocals/Keyboards

Emil Adler: Vocals/Keyboards

David Sabatino: Guitar/Vocals

Urbano Sanchez: Drums/Percussion

 Julie Flanders: Lyrics

Favorite Songs: "Funeral In His Heart" by October Project

I fell in love with October Project from the first time I heard the strains of their first single “Bury My Lovely” all the way back in 1993, and have been a rabid, manic fan ever since! The vocals, the music, the lyrics… all of it blended together so well to create a whole canvas of dreamlike music that defied categorizing!

In 1995, the group released their second album Falling Further In, and to promote it, they appeared on a few radio programs and talk shows, and one fo the songs they chose to sing at these events was the awesome Funeral in His Heart. It was an “unplugged” version of  that really caught my ear and made me really start appreciating the song- Mary’s powerful voice, Marina’s crystal harmonies, Emil’s piano and harmony vocal…throw in David’s guitarwork and Urbano’s toms, and you had a tight-knit combo that really kicked butt!

   Later I was to acquire a performance they did for a Sony Records expo while promoting their first album, and was surprised to find they’d done “Funeral In His Heart” even back then…I guess the song wasn’t as new as I thougth It was! This live version, however, had a different ending to it than the album version- at the last chorus, the music ceased, and all four vocallists (Mary, Emil, Marina and David) all harmonized accapella:

“The World is falling apart…

He’s getting older

and there’s a funeral in his heart”

 They repeat the lines as Mary adlibs around the refrain, and the song comes crashing to its end- to the overwhelming applause of the audience! Awesome!