2025 Number 6: Karmakanic

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025

 

Number 6: Karmakanic - Transmutation

Have Jonas Reingold and John Mitchell never crossed paths before? It was only a matter of time before the two men with the longest resumés in prog this side of Steven Wilson would team up. The man from The Flower Kings, the Steve Hackett band, Kaipa, The Tangent and The Fringe asked the man from Arena, It Bites, Lonely Robot, Kino, Frost and the John Wetton band to sing on his new Karmakanic record, and the result is quite curious. Curious to hear this quintessentialy English voice work his way through lyrics written by a Viennese Swede, for whom English is perhaps his third language. 

 

Nevertheless, it largely works, and Jonas opens a full can of tasty prog for us. Pointy tracks and proggy tracks galore, always with a great ear for melody and hooks. It doesn’t break with tradition much; we’re firmly in celebratory, indulgent Third Wave Prog territory here, even with a second-wave vocalist. Mostly melodic and upbeat, in the style of Yes but always just a tad more rocking.

The guest list is a veritable Who’s Who of prog rock superstars, featuring Simon Phillips, Craig Blundell, the omnipresent Randy McStine, Luke Machin, Uncle Tom Cobley and all. The fact that Jonas himself is one of the greatest living bassist is certainly a great added value.

One great thing about 2025 is this: the epics are back! There were a few years there when the big names in prog seemed to eschew the side-filling rock symphonies, but everyone’s back doing twenty minute pieces, and Karmakanic’s title track Transmutation is a very fine example of the form. Jonas Reingold learned the art from Roine Stolt at The Flower Kings, and this is the year he has matched and perhaps surpassed the master. Long live the King.

2025 Number 7: Spock's Beard

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025

Number 7: Spock's Beard - The Archaeoptimist

I have to be honest, I was very surprised to hear from Ryo Okumoto that Spock’s Beard was still an ongoing concern. Nobody wants to admit it 25 years into their Post-Neal period, but the harsh truth is that the band have always struggled without their most talented member. And after that one time they did make a bona fide Post-Neal masterpiece in X, another big lineup change threw everything into disarray all over again. The fact is, I’ve never vibed with any of their albums in their Ted Leonard line-up, and so many years after the underwhelming Noise Floor I expected we’d seen the last of the once-mighty Beard. All its members are happily working on solo albums and other projects such as Pattern-Seeking Animals, so is there anyone who was really clamouring for a return of the Beard?

Well, not only are they back, they’re back with a fantasitc album, surely their best one post-Neal along with X. Whereas the MVPs on previous albums were Dave Meros and his writing buddy John Boegehold, this time around it’s Ryo who pulls most of the compository weight along with new “shadow member” Michael Whiteman, of I Am The Manic Whale fame. Ryo was always the band’s jester, mostly writing instrumental novelty tracks, and I wasn’t a huge fan of his latest solo album, but he’s really pulled it out of the bag with this one.

The album is full of nods to classic Beard, but it feels earned. The anarchy, unexcpected twists and pure joy of playing that so characterized the band in their heyday is back again, stronger than it’s ever been before. There’s the tunes to carry it all, too, with the titular epic a very strong centerpiece that gives an otherwise lightweight album some needed gravitas. The influence of Whiteman also gives this very American band a certain sense of British thoughtfulness that works unexpecteldy well for them.

There are still questions around the future of the Beard. Especially listening to the last song, which speaks about bowing out with grace and moving on, sort of alluding to the possibility that the end of Spock’s Beard might be near after all. Damn, now I don’t want them to stop anymore. But if this is it, they picked a high note to go out on. Ryo is Rock ‘n Roll!

2025 Number 8: Gazpacho

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025

Number 8: Gazpacho - Magic 8-Ball 

 

 

Rating a new Gazpacho album is always a tricky one. Their albums need months, years, to percolate and mature. Their best one remains 2007’s Night, and that’s an album that took me years to appreciate.

This one strikes me as a more song-based and immediate album… by Gazpacho standards, so not very immediate at all. Nevertheless, a song like We Are Strangers nestles itself in your brain. Gazpacho were always a warm, organic sounding band, but even with electronics, vocoders and synthesizers they manage to conjure up their signature otherworldly beauty.

After a cluster of strong opening songs, the album downshifts a bit into some slower songs that don’t really seem to have as much going on on the surface, but don’t let it lull you into a false sense of security. The title track has a surprising bite to it, and then the closing salvo of “Immerwahr” and “Unrisen” go straight for the throat, reminding us all why Gazpacho is a band that inspires so much devotion around the world. 

Will this turn out to be another timeless Gazpacho classic in the long run, or is this to be one of their less essential releases? We may not know until another few years have passed. But I like what I’m hearing, so a place in the lower regions of the top ten seems my safest bet. Putting an album called "Magic 8-Ball" at number 8 is too good not to. Expect more Norwegians on my list.

 

 

2025 Number 9: Dream Theater

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025

Number 9: Dream Theater - Parasomnia

 

Something weird happened to me this year, something I thought would never happen... I became a Dream Theater fan. I’d never been a Dream Theater fan before. I don’t know exactly why but the biggest prog metal band in the world always kinda passed me by, with their oversinging vocalist, solos-before-tunes approach, paper-thin lyrics and certain less-than-mature elements to the fanbase. You know who you are!

But hey. I’ve matured, at least. Someone has to. Good old Mike P returned to his stool, competently kept warm by Other Mike, and I thought I might as well give them another shot. And, you know what? Turns out I do like Dream Theater after all. James LaBrie, the worst vocalist in prog? Actually, he sounds fine. The tunes are fine. The lyrics are fine. And the solos are, indeed, awesome. I think I just like heavy metal more than I used to. You can probably thank Haken for that.

I went back and checked out some of their classic albums, and this new one can stand among them comfortably. It isn’t a world-shattering masterpiece, but as a consolidation for the prog metal giant that just got their most legendary line-up back together, it doesn’t have to be. It just needs to re-establish why Dream Theater are probably the best band at being Dream Theater, and it does a great job of that. A tad safe, perhaps, but warm and comfortable.

On the scale of Heavy Metal Loudness, this one ends up on the “very loud” end, and, considering how much I’m enjoying Train of Thought, that’s apparently how I like my Dream Theater. Tasty stuff. I may have missed out on their heyday, bu I’m glad I still get to enjoy the biggest prog metal band in their second youth.

 

 

2025 Number 10: Yungblud

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025

Number 10: Yungblud - Idols 

 

Is Yungblud prog? I don’t know. He looks a lot better with his shirt off than most prog rockers do, that’s for sure. 

Every generation needs a young upstart who will try to bring rock back to the masses, and if we must have one of those I’d much rather have someone like preening, posing, sentimental Yungblud than whitebread bores like Imagine Dragons. This guy at least has some passion to him, and some genuinely queer vibes that so many artists forget is part of the makeup (in all senses of the word) of rock ‘n roll.

I haven’t heard much from him from before this album, but from what I understand he used to be more playful and swaggering and lighthearted. This one is big and grand, talking of love and passion and death with utterly wild abandon, every moment more important than the last.
Of course, it’s the lengthy opener “Hello Heaven Hello” and the proggy “Ghosts” that draw me in the most. I want more than just verses and choruses.

While the Cool Britannia swagger and irony will be the thing that catches the eye of the magazines and tastemakers, it’s the genuine passion that will build up a real fandom, and our boy here is well on his way with this album. Apparently a second part is coming later. I’ll be listening.

Yungblud, like so many before and after him, is destined to fail gloriously in bringing rock back to the mainstream, but he will look damn good while doing it. Especially with his shirt off.

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025: Honourable Mentions

Gemma's Top Ten Albums of 2025: Honourable Mentions 

 My name is Gemma, and this is what I do.

Foto Rene Secreve

Foto Rene Secreve

Foto Rene Secreve

Currently, my own musical endeavours mostly concern covering the prog rock classics of the 70s and 80s. As a singer, I always try to bring some exuberance and flamboyance to the table. Prog rock is big, showy music, after all.

My fiancée is a classical musician, and increasingly I'm beginning to see myself as someone who does something similar. The same way a chamber choir or a symphony orchestra would bring the compositions of baroque musicians or classical auteurs to the stage, bring it back to life, keep this older music circulating in live settings for people to enjoy and experience live in the room, so too does a rock covers band keep the music of past composers alive and circulating on the stages of the world. Someone has to.

Consider Genesis. When those boys from Charterhouse started out, they never intended to be a live band at all. They considered themselves a collective of composers, writing songs perhaps for other people to perform. Destiny had other plans and Genesis ended up legendary rock stars, but now that they are older and (maybe?) retired we can begin to view them as the composers they always intended to be. We treat their body of work the same way a philharmonic orchestra might treat the symphonies of Beethoven.

How do we play these songs? What do the sounds and words mean to us, in the modern day? How do we keep old music sounding fresh and exciting? What do you put on a live setlist, and what do you leave off? Why is that keyboard solo in Firth of Fifth so damn difficult? How can a musician mediate between the audience and some tricky music?

And can we turn it into more than just a nostalgia trip?

I understand the need for nostaligia in a scary world. I also understand the desire to see and hear older music performed - I don't know if you've seen the pop charts lately, but it's a wasteland! The slow burning death of rock music has been foreseen for ages, the sudden onset death of pop music took even me by surprise. No wonder nostaliga is booming. What else is there? But I also see our nostalgia being used against us. Our warmest memories reheated, repackaged and sold back to us, for profit, and for our sedation.

As a rock covers singer, am I complicit in this? I see the problems with nostalgia, but I am not immune. Is it better to retreat into the past, endlessly looping our familiar tunes, spiraling out of the present day while all that we hold dear is grinded down and regurgitated by the slop machine?

Maybe that's why I am more excited than ever to present to you my Top Ten Albums of the year. As always, we will count down to the new year and share my number one on new years' eve. 

For all that I celebrate the music of days gone by, I still get very excited about new releases every year, and I even get a little indignant when people tell me "they don't make music like they used to". Pardon me? They very much do! You just aren't listening!

Well, I did. I always try to to pay attention and listen to the newest releases, and here's what I found. Nothing could be more wothwhile than to celebrate those artists still standing, still believing that there is a place for new music, new progressive music, in the age of Slop.

After all, no one really wants to listen to music made by AI.

 

Here are some albums I liked this year that just about didn't make it to the actual top ten. That should tell you it's been another year full of strong releases. Give it up for: Magic Pie, The Flower Kings, Sleep Token, Flor de Loto, Nuova Era, Phase Transition, Dim Gray, Smalltape and Cardiacs.

Tomorrow I will share my number 10 favourite album of the year. 

2024 Number 1: Big Big Train

Gemma's Top 10 Albums of 2024: Number 1
Big Big Train - The Likes of Us

Yes, Big Big Train. Again.

When we lost David Longdon three years ago, it hit me hard. Big Big Train had been my favourite band of the 2010s and played an important role in me rediscovering my love for music. And, needless to say, his voice was a big, big part of it. I never got to see Big Big Train live – I still haven’t. I was going to and then Covid came. And then fate took him away.

I’ve not been able to face listening to Big Big Train, until another twist of fate took me to Winchester, the city that’s been such a source of inspiration to the band’s tales of history and folklore. I took the path to the top of the hill, followed the trail and looked to the West. I played the song, heard that voice again, and found a way to mourn.

I was still pretty agnostic towards the current line up of BBT, until I finally caved and gave this years album – the first of new material featuring Alberto Bravin – a shot. Damn. From the moment thirty seconds in the famous horn section started playing, I knew the album would be at the top of my list.

The Likes Of Us. I wonder if it's a nod to "Driving The Last Spike", off the last Genesis album with Phil, sometimes called "the first Big Big Train song". They'll never see the likes of us again. And we never did. But their heirs are still here, and they're going to give it a damn good go.

So, it turns out this Bravin fellow can sing a bit. He shines beautifully in these songs that were written for his voice. His dynamic and emotional range is really impressive. He also turns out to be a more than capable songwriting companion to Greg Spawton.

The songs are once again indescribably beautiful, led by Spawton. Expertly crafted and full of warmth, many sonic nods to Genesis with the 12-strings and lush melodies, but also a bit of Crimson and ELP in the wilder moments. The origanic sounds of the violins and horn section give it that BBT flair.

The spectre of loss inevitably hangs over the album. Even the traditional whimsical song of childhood fun - "Skates On" - is imbued with the bittersweet taste of mortality. We're only here for so long.

Rikard Sjöblom hasn't written any music for this one - he left his best stuff for Beardfish this year - but his guitar work is always on point. Add the wondrous talents of Oskar Holldorff and singing drummer Nick D'Virgilio, and it's obvious Big Big Train are still Big Big Train.

It's not the most difficult album they ever made. As their grand opening statement of a new era, one of bittersweet retrospection mixed with careful optimism, they cast a wide net and made a celebratory, jubilant and accessible record that touched me emotionally in a way that I really didn't know they still could.

So the most British band in the world (even though they are a British-Italian-Swedish-Norwegian-American collaboration) continue to be the standard bearers for the music I like best. I'm sure David would have been pleased.