Various - Labour Of Love...like a diamond in the sky

Hand me down my shooting iron. I smell hippy. If you're a poet and you know the answer to the question, "Do you want to be someone who writes poetry, or do you want to be someone whose life is a poem?", then surely you wouldn't be a poet? Ah, poets, can't live with them, can't hang their entrails out to dry.

Thankfully, this ceedee starts off with a song, and a rather good, straight down the middle, midwestdavematthewsbywayoftrain, kinda thang from Soulmotor. UK readers may recall a televisual programme called "Play School". Well prepare to go immediately through the round window with the musings of Nik Beat. Lynn Kastner is utterly fantastic and we demand a full length CD now! "Lighten Up" is tremendous and needs to be made compulsory listening.

"Bubbles" is a step up, a poem with music, um, which makes it a song. All in all, an intersting concept which works 60% of the time, enough to make it worth checking out, especially if you're into investigating the imagery of language. Hell, we liked it, and there's nothing we like better round Z Towers than freshly roasted poet.

Labour Of Love, 47 Marcia Avenue, Toronto, Canada M6B 2Y6
www.coffehouse.ca (oh, sweet god, the humanity! bastarding coffee house inhabiting poets!)
cristofoli@coffeehouse.tv

SOUL & SPIRIT (Fortune & Glory)

Well, this is a depoarture for us at Castle Z. Because Soul & Spirit are a gospel group, and this is a gospel CD. Yes, you read that right, gospel.

I mulled over reviewing this for quite some time, bearing in mind my antipathy towards religion. However, that would have made me a bigot, and remembering the Z mantra that good music is good music, plunged on in. Whisch is good, because by concentrating on the music, performance and conviction of the artists, I opened myself up to some remarkably good music.

Soul & Spirit are Carol Troupe, Joanne Smith and Sam Wilkinson, and when their voices meld, the harmony on display is a thing of rare beauty. Harmony vocals are one of my secret passions, and I promise you, these are good. Some of the backing on the up tempo numbers is a bit 'So 80's', but when they slow it down and just sing, some of this material is pure, classic soul.

I'd love to hear more acapella tracks, but this was an interesting and worthwhile sidestep for Z, and one we greatly enjoyed.

Fortune & Glory Gospel Connection, Osmond House, 78 Alcester Road, Birmingham B13 8BB, UK
soulandspirit@virgin.net
www.soulandspirit.co.uk

CENSUS OF HALLUCINATIONS - 5 (Stone Premonitions)

Hurrah! A new Census of Hallucinations ceedee. And nelieve it or not, it's their fifth. Which may or may not explain the title.

For those yet to experience the wonder of CoH in full flight, this is the Stone Premonitions outlet for experimental, psychedelic, whimsy. Fortunately, it's underpinned by the magesterial, musical backing of the SP house band. Imagine, if you will, a hippy funk brothers. Tight but loose.

Veering between political attacks and somnabulent nursery rhymes, CoH 5 is a step back up the psychotronic love commando ladder, and is an essential item. Looking for a highlight? The sturm and drang of "The Gremlin Song". Stop messing about and go buy it at http://www.the-rocker.co.uk

Stone Premonitions, 271 Park Road, South Moor, Stanley. Co Durham DH9 7AP, UK
terrib@stoneprem.freeserve.co.uk