Flight (Peter Hammill, 1980)

This is a prog suite I love so much... and for many reasons. First things first: the music is excellent. Good melodies (the opening theme, for example) and clever, still rather plain arrangements, well done tempo changes and so on. Then, another strong point is, of course, Peter Hammill's vocals, with all their sad, heartbreaking, even weird appeal we all know so well. This voice shines brighter than ever when a bare piano supports it, like in the "Flying Blind" section.

 

A bare, dark cover, perfeclty matching with the music inside.

By the way, we need some data now: the suite comes from the album "A Black Box" and is divided into seven movements for more than 19 minutes of total running time. In addiction to the above notes, I'll add that this is the most intimate epic I've ever listened to and also the darkest one, except VDGG's ones, obviously. Some "noisy" sections exist here, but they're sharp and sour, so that this track can be considered as a long, intriguing confession, an inner struggle put down in music. Good music, IMHO.