LIFE ON EARTH

Being new here I choose to review Alien Planetscapes' only album as my first review. Not because it is the best prog album, or even the best space prog album, but because it is truly an overlooked masterpiece of progressive rock. Doug Walker had been playing progressive music for about twenty years, in jazz/rock fusion, progressive electronic and avant-rock formats. Previously Alien Planetscapes had only released cassette tapes, which are an extremely varied output; everything from Crimson esq classic prog to synth only progressive electronic. In 1997 however Gregg Walker went about putting together a proper album and what an album it is! This album is an exciting, trippy, in your face and challenging piece of space prog. With free jazz saxophone squeaks, aggressive bass lines reminiscent of Magma and spacey keyboard effects that we expect from Hawkwind and Gong this album is a delight to any fan of psychedelic music. Unfortunately, this album went under the radar and was ignored by the prog community at large. Sad because in the 90s when this album was released, Dream Theater, Spocks Beard and The Flower Kings were all coming to prominence. Alien Planetscapes could have been part of the mini prog renaissance happening. If you are even a little into Hawkwind or Gong then you should definitely track this hard to find album down!