This release is available via The Tangent’s website, and features five previously unreleased tracks recorded during sessions for the elegant Le Sacre Du Travail, as well as five ‘revisitations’ of older Tangent material.
There’s little of the usual hit-and-miss effect such non-official releases can sometimes have. Even with the two distinct parts of the CD, L’Etagère Du Travail (‘The Work Shelf’) is a strong release in its own right. Standing out among the new material the raging Monsanto (a brutal attack on the arrogant multinational) and The Iron Crow, based on Debussy’s La Mer, allow the effusive Tillison free range to come on like a contemporary Keith Emerson.
The excellent Supper’s Off sees Tillison directing his well-aimed ire at the laziness of the middle-aged punter. The band revisit The Ethernet, originally from Not As Good As The Book, with Jakko Jakszyk on vocals and a searing guitar. A live version of The Canterbury Sequence evokes that scene’s wonderful sound and shows just what a skilled interpreter Tillison can be.
But these are merely highlights of a body of work of which Tillison, and indeed all prog fans, can be immensely proud.
