Is that a touch of the Beatles? No, hang on, that sounded like Deep Purple. Or was it Trapeze? There again, maybe it’s Jethro Tull. Or David Bowie? Yes, that is the problem here. While you have to applaud the vision and insight of Tuval Cain mainman David Lawrence Kuhn, there are simply too many ideas interwoven, the result being a mishmash that never flows properly.
It’s as if each song changes direction as the musicians involved suddenly come up with a new approach in the middle of the recording. So, everything is a disjointed amalgam of some brilliant music, but lacking the discipline that a strong producer would have brought to the project.
A Distant Well and No More Need are perhaps the finest tracks here. The former catches the more progressive notions investigated by early Purple, while the latter is imbued with the spirit of imbued with the spirit of Tull circa Songs From The Wood. And Retrobate sounds like the sort of thing Bowie might have come up with in the Low era.
There’s no doubting the talent here – the musicianship is quite superb – but Forging The Future ultimately lacks focus, and comes across like a collection of songs in desperate need of a stronger guiding hand.
