2023 has been a real milestone year for the band. 2022 had been a turbulent year and we left last year and entered this one uncertain of our future with the line-up no longer working, pared down to our original trio and to add to that, Charles wanting to take more of a back seat due to his impending fatherhood and the life adjustments that entails. Back in February things were looking quite bleak indeed.

However with an album in the works and a couple of gigs in the calendar, the one thing we were sure of is that it wasn’t time to hang the towel up just yet. We approached our friends Nige Mason and Gordon Wilkinson and asked if they’d be interested in helping out, primarily for the scheduled appearance at the Manorfest metal festival. 

However, after a number of meetings and rehearsals, it became apparent that this would become a more permanent arrangement much to our delight. There was a renewed energy and vitality in the band and very quickly we bonded into a very tight unit both personally and musically.

In the early spring we worked hard to get our set together. In order that we populate YouTube with footage which is representative of the new unit, we did some live video work in mid May with our friends Andy Barker and Mark Brookes recording video and audio respectively. Unfortunately, this has yet to see the light of day for a variety of reasons. We also embarked on an ambitious sci-fi movie short to accompany one of our new songs in partnership with Daryl Parson from Heathenstorm Productions. The complexity of the project and his other commitments throughout the year have led to delays in its progress. We have seen some of the work in progress and we can promise you it will be worth the wait! At the time of writing, there is various mobile phone gig footage on YouTube but nothing we’ve recorded to a professional standard as yet. We’re aiming to rectify this in early 2024.

The first gig was in May and rather fittingly the event was called “ReVamped”, which was part of a Dracula weekend programme of events organised by Goth City Promotions. To date this has been our only appearance as the full 5-piece. Sadly the Manorfest event did not take place but further events started being added to the calendar. Throughout the year we played a number of gigs and they have been some of our most strongest sets ever. There has been a real buzz. Since the early summer gigs, we have learned a lot and really streamlined what was quite a complex stage setup into something more manageable as well as refining our parts.

The “The Mandela Effect” album was given a full overhaul with Gordon and Nige recording their own parts, myself reworking and re-recording all of the vocals (sometimes many times) as I found my voice. My studio has seen some significant upgrades and I’m really getting into a groove with the mixing side of things. It’s a steep learning curve and I’ve much to learn but I have had some very helpful advisors along the way. The whole thing has been completely transformed into something we feel is really special and we hope to deliver it to you in March 2024. It will have been 4 years in the making and by far our biggest project yet.

The beginning of 2024 will be a very busy one as we finish the recording and mixing of the album. Although great progress has been made, there is still a lot to complete in a short amount of time. We’ve been in discussions with the legendary Gordon Young about the mastering of it and we’re very much looking forward to hearing what magic he can work.

Our first gig date sees us return to Carpe Noctum on 2nd March after what will be 5 years and we’re hoping this will be the album launch event. In preparation, we’ll be bolstering our live set accordingly, some of which we’ve never played live before.

We’re also planning to embark on another video project which should hopefully come with a much faster turnaround. The finer details have yet to be discussed and ironed out but we have an idea of what we want.

Once the album and videos are ready, we’ll be increasing the effort to promote them and play more live dates.

After the album is out, we’ll also be beginning the journey of writing some brand new material together which we’re all very much looking forward to.

From all of us, we like to thank all of the venues, promoters, awesome sound engineers and most importantly all of the people who have been along to the gigs in 2023, without whom we couldn’t do our thing. Also massive thanks to Kurt Wood at Cornerhouse Studios and Brian and Tracey Leach at Jam on Top Studios for helping us to create our thing. We love you guys 🙂

Happy new year to all of you and all the best for 2024!

See you at the next gig 🙂