THROUGH THESE VEINS

If you go to Tom's website at www.tomslatter.co.uk you will be greeted with "Hello! My name is Tom Slatter and I write the sort of music you'd get if Genesis started writing songs with Nick Cave after watching too much Dr. Who." So there you have it. As if that isn't enough, what about this? "What could be more prog rock than a concept album? 'Two concept EPs and a concept album,' is Tom Slatter's answer. In his continuing effort to jump on the prog rock bandwagon, Tom has made the commercially savvy decision to dedicate the next twelve months to composing and recording two EPs and one album about the same story, including a twenty minute epic to crown the whole project off sometime in the Autumn. The first step in this cynical, conceptual sell out is Through These Veins, an EP that tells the story of a rogue surgeon who starts turning her patients into macabre living sculptures. 'My songs are usually driven by narrative, and this is no exception. In particular I was thinking about albums like Outside by David Bowie, or Operation Mindcrime by Queensryche. 'Plus, I saw all these English prog rock guys coining it in with their long songs and concept albums and I thought ? I need a piece of that. Matt Stevens drives a limousine you know. Alan Reed takes a private jet to the studio every single day,' said Tom."

Okay, so the last time I looked Alan was working at the BBC, so I think that some of the above statements are a little tongue in cheek, but it does give an idea of the sort of thinking that goes on inside the very strange world that is Tom's brain. This music should be very carefully labeled, as take it from me this is not something that will immediately make the listener think that it is essential, and will more likely elicit the "this is awful, what are you doing playing this?" response. Luckily for me my brain is used to me ignoring my ears and playing music more than once, and the more I played this the more I got inside Tom's twisted, dark and surreal world.

As I kept playing it, the more I realized the great depth there was inside, and apart from the insidious and annoying drum machine I found that I was actually enjoying this a great deal. It is definitely music from left field, and Tom's vocals definitely fit with the overall feel. I realize that all things included, this is a rather lengthy review for a four-track EP that is only eighteen minutes long, but hopefully this will entice you to give this a chance, as music as out there as this deserves to be heard.

Tom Slatter is a British musician that has been producing lots of material since his first album, Spinning The Compass (2009) which was released five years ago. Basically almost every year Tom had something new released.

Last year I got to know his music with the great album Three Rows Of Teeth (2013) (review HERE: progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=999743). This year he's releasing a series of EPs and the first one is called Through These Veins (2014) which I'll be reviewing in the next lines.

Through These Veins (2014) has four tracks and the EP is connected to his next EP and a full album, all releases for this year, telling a story about a rogue surgeon who starts to make his experiments with living beings and starts to transform them into living sculptures? macabre? Yes, Tom's music is not your everyday topic thing, his Steampunk background makes him very unique in the Prog world.

So the story starts with 'I Am Not Your Heart' that is a treat for the ear, the track is a little pearl full of weird and interesting guitars. In the next one, 'Segue ? I Am An Artist' we have a small dark tale, almost as a little movie. Although the ideas of the songs are fantastic and the instrumental is rich Tom's vocals in the EP are not really up with the music, for me they don't match with the high quality of the compositions. And this is weird cause his vocals on Three Rows Of Teeth (2013) were very good!

The third track on Through These Veins (2014) 'Without My Medicine', though interesting, is an alien in this EP with its electronic Pop sound. It's a weak track and there's not much to say about it, really. The title-track closes Through These Veins (2014) very well. Initially, it starts with a little piano and it follows with a weird sounding guitar in a waltz rhythm. A really good and different track!

Through These Veins (2014) besides being short (it's an EP after all) is a great presentation of Tom Slatter's music. Despite the weak vocals in some moments the four tracks presented here are very interesting and very well recorded and produced.

His second EP of the mad scientist series, Black Water (2014) is already out and will be interesting to follow his strange tale step by step. I'll be waiting to know the ending!

(Originally posted on progshine.net)