Van Der Graaf Generator – A Grounding In Numbers – Esoteric Recordings – EVDGCD 1001 - ***

A friend fled a Peter Hammill performance, horrified at “the least musical music” he'd ever heard, but Van Der Graaf Generator were progressive rock's Tractarian renegades, lacing the movement's musical orthodoxies with liturgical ceremonialism, rather than the usual elfin splatterings.

On their new album, the pellucid and beautiful Your Time Starts Now rubs up against the dictatorial annunciations, fractal guitar and churning rhythms of Highly Strung; Splink scuffs straightforward blues licks with bent barroom piano and percussive clatter; Embarrassing Kid jabs rabbit punch riffs.
Forty-four years after forming, VDGG remain obstinately obtuse, A Grounding In Numbers ranking amongst their best recordings.

(13/3/11)