MANCUNIAN CANDIDATE

Mancunian Candidate is a new prog band in the scene but conducted and formed by a veteran of the scene, no one else then Matthew Swindells, also known from the excellent prog band Moth Vellum (sadly disbanded with only one album released).

What Mancunian Candidate offering on their debut self titled from 2017 is a nice combination of old school prog with pastoral passages, cinematic lanscapes, all done with taste, imagine you have Alan Parsons Project with Rush, 10CC, It Bites even Yes, with vocal arrangements remind me of Jon Anderson, Paul McCartney and even Sting. Swindells provides all the drums, keyboards and vocals with helping hand from Matt Bissonette and a handful of other guest that I parcticulary do not know well.

Even the synths and mellotron are present, the overall sound is towards popier fileds with nods to Steve Wilson here and there. Overall good album, but nothing more, 3 stars for sure. Fav trach, divided in smaller parts is the 10 min pieces Operation Bright Star.