Alex Ligertwood, the Scottish musician best known for a number of stints as the lead singer of Santana, has passed away. As TMZ points out, Ligertwood’s daughter announced his passing in a social media post. Ligertwood died in his sleep at home in Santa Monica on Saturday. No cause of death has been reported. He was 79.
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Of course, the centerpiece of these three nights was 1996’s ‘Black Fingernails, Red Wine’ was played in its entirety. An album that clearly held a lifetime of memories for so many of us in the room, each song landing with the full weight of nostalgia but still hitting with the same immediacy it always had. You could feel it in every chorus, every knowing glance between band and crowd. Tonight it was something special: a shared history being relived in real time.
There’s something different about seeing a band like this on home soil. Fremantle has always been part of Eskimo Joe’s DNA, and nights like this prove that connection hasn’t faded an inch. From the first notes, the crowd was fully focused and locked in. We were loud, loyal, and fully aware they were witnessing a band that simply does not miss a beat in their own backyard. The greatest band to come out of Freo? On nights like this, it’s not even a debate.
What made this run particularly special was the effort to keep things fresh. Changing the setlist each night is no small ask, but it paid off in a big way. For this final show, the encore alone felt like a reward for those who’d stuck it out across the trilogy—’Foreign Land,’ ‘The First Time,’ ‘I’m So Tired,’ ‘Love Is a Drug,’ and ‘From the Sea’ all landing like a perfectly curated greatest hits moments without ever feeling predictable.
Between songs, the band harnessed the intimacy of the room. There was plenty of onstage banter, stories behind the tracks, and that easy, self-aware humour that’s always been part of their charm. It never felt rehearsed or forced – just five musicians (including the legendary Timothy Nelson on keys) genuinely enjoying the moment, sharing it with a crowd that’s grown up right with them.
Support came from Alex Lloyd, who delivered a set full of warmth and familiarity, even if it wasn’t without its hiccups. A few early guitar issues crept in, leading to some impromptu comedy (that he dismissed as totally scripted ‘acting’) as he reassured the audience he had in fact done a soundcheck. If anything, it added to the night’s character – raw, human, and refreshingly unpolished in all the right ways. Man that guy can sing, and when you can hear his guitar man can he play guitar…
As the final notes rang out and the house lights came up, there was a shared understanding in the room: this was something special. Three sold-out nights, three different setlists, one of the greatest albums of the 90’s, and a band that continues to deliver with heart and precision. If this is the shape of things to come for the anniversary tour, the rest of the country is in for something huge – but they’ll have to work hard to match what Fremantle just witnessed and we all played a part in. Fremantle’s greatest band? You betcha. Best Australian album of the 90’s? Quite possibly…
GALLERY
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ESPN has provided an updated on timeline on when they believe Luka Doncic will return for the Los Angeles Lakers.
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On April 24th, Denver six-piece The Hip Snacks released their second album, Out on a Limb. At just under 45 minutes divided between 10 tracks, the record is short and sweet, and avoids overstaying its welcome (which can sometimes happen with bands on the jammier side). This ain’t no sophomore slump, friends. But it might not exactly be blues rock, either.
Out on a Limb is the most progressive-feeling album I’ve yet covered here at Blues Rock Review. The Hip Snacks are a skilled, cohesive soul-jam band with blues, pop, jazz, and rock sounds in the DNA of their structure. It’s the most ninth chords I think I’ve heard on an album for a while, refreshing and tonally compelling. The band is made up of singer Kara Durante, bassist Ben Suarez, guitarists Felipe Cantuaria and Ricky Feria, drummer Dylan French, and keyboardist Adam Schini.
You might expect a six-piece to sound a bit busy or crowded, but they don’t at all! The soundscape is blended here very well, cohesion and groove prioritized, while every player gets a moment or two to really shine. I especially noted on several occasions the stellar keys work from Schini and the smooth soulful bluesy tones of Durante. In fact, it’s the keys and vocals that keep the album rooted in blues tones.
The Hip Snacks’ particular style on Out on a Limb lends them a proggy feeling, even if they don’t use the complex trappings of progressive rock (rare time signatures and the like). So if they aren’t exactly blues rockers on this record (though they are adjacent and clearly have those chops when they want them), what are they here? Out on a Limb sounds like a blending of the epic scale and hopeful harmonies of chill prog acts like Moon Safari, married to Emma Bunton (Baby Spice)’s solo work. It’s low intensity (until it isn’t), fun, interesting, and simply good.
The record is never so good as it is in the opening two tracks, “Feels Like (Blue Sky)” and “Dessert Love.” The first track is funk-infused poppy fun that deftly shows off the hooking vocal harmonies and briefly dips into harder edge blues rock in the middle. Perfect opener. The second track feels more ‘70s psychedelic, groovy like a Marvin Gaye tune.
The bluesiest tracks on the record are in the middle: track five, “If Only,” track seven, “Out on a Limb,” with track nine, “Footsteps,” also doing some blues lifting. As mentioned above, it’s Durante’s soul singing and Schini’s keys work (organ tones) that really mark these tunes as blues. A key note: only once of the record does Durante’s voice really get intense and belt-y, for one section of “Out on a Limb.” She’s very restrained for the rest of the record, and if I had one gripe, it’d be that I’d love to hear her get a little louder and more intense more often on the record.
The final track, “Counting on You,” also stands out. After a slower building intro that feels grand and epic and hopeful (listening felt a bit like seeing an aerial shot of Middle-Earth), the song grooves the album out on an especially sweet note.
Out on a Limb is great. There are moments I wish the vocals were a little higher in the mix or more aggressive, but it’s at best a tertiary note. The album isn’t exactly blues rock, but there’s enough blues rock in the soup to make it well worth a listen for our readership. I look forward to hearing more from The Hip Snacks, and I plan to see them live the first chance I get.
The Review: 8/10
Can’t Miss Tracks
– Dessert Love
– Counting on You
– Feels Like (Blue Sky)
The Big Hit
– Feels Like (Blue Sky)
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by Prog Nick
Progressive rock from Canada is certainly having a moment in 2026, with the return of Geddy, Alex and Rush, the rise of masked duo Angine de Poitrine, and the return of another Canadian duo, Crown Lands. I had known about the band for some time, but they were for me something of an enigma, until I recently saw them perform live. Perhaps this was because their recorded output seemed so varied as to be almost mysterious. They had clear Rush and Zeppelin influences in their earlier work, but their most recent releases, Ritual I and II, ventured into world music territory (including the use of such instruments as pan flutes and more). Of course, this was very removed from the Prog and rock thrashings of a Rush or a Zeppelin. Then I saw them on Cruise to the Edge in March 2026, and everything changed. To say that I was astounded by this band’s performance would be an understatement. There was no meandering vacillation there, and even the ‘imitation’ element spoken about by so many seemed to be natural, balanced and indeed necessary. In my review of the Cruise, I declared that I had never seen Zeppelin or Rush live (due to reasons of proximity), but after seeing Crown Lands, I walked away feeling as if I had seen them both, and then some.
Comprising two members, Cody Bowles and Kevin Comeau, Crown Lands are a versatile group indeed. Bowles handles lead vocals, drums/percussion and other ancillary instruments such as flutes and didgeridoo, and Comeau handles everything else including guitars, bass, bass pedals, keyboards and backing vocals. With this stable line-up, Crown Lands have previously released two studio albums and a double, namely ‘Crown Lands’, ‘Fearless’ and ‘ Ritual I and II’. The band has also released various EP’s and singles, some of which were also quite often varied in their approach. In general, the band’s past releases definitely made an impression, but they also revealed a certain inconsistency – almost as if Crown Lands were keeping the full extent of their accomplishment, polish and direction up their sleeves – until now.
One thing that ‘Ritual’ did achieve for the band was to give them the confidence to manage their own production process in their own studio. That confidence has continued into the band’s latest studio album, ‘Apocalypse’, with much of the album written and recorded in that room – their base since 2020. The assistance of producers Nick Raskulinecz and David Bottrill was sought at key moments in the process. The result is Crown Lands’ most challenging and accomplished production yet, and it most certainly is the ‘real deal’ in terms of genre, scope, sheer breadth of musicality, adventure and, yes, originality.
At the core of the Apocalypse album is the closing 19-minute title that made an immediate impact upon its release in March 2026. This massive epic could be the most polished and ambitious Prog anthem of the year, and it certainly interrupted the slumber of an otherwise average month on the internet. The track is the musical and thematic nucleus of the album, featuring central character ‘Blackstar’, and it is a clear statement that these Canadians intend to scale the highest peaks of fantasy-themed Progressive Rock. It is mythical and mystical, grand and grandiose and it goes everywhere with quite dizzying composition, performance, variation and dynamics. The video that accompanied the release of this epic was just as notable as the music itself, being a live performance of the song in a special session that included additional players, interspersed with mythical dramatic scenes, imagery and costumes, all of which would settle the aching heart of any Dungeons and Dragons-obsessed Progger. Highly impressive, this epic track is a game-changer for Crown Lands and any doubt created by the Ritual albums has now been firmly and irrevocably displaced by this one song. It is, quite simply, a magnificent Prog epic of definitive standard.
The album is tied together by a conceptual narrative about change and transformation unfolding in a sci-fi universe similar to that in 2023’s ‘Fearless’, with Blackstar and ‘The Syndicate’ fighting a dystopian war of rebellion. Aside from the title track, the other songs on the album are relatively short. Opening track ‘Proclamation’ is a panoramic soundscape that acts as a suitable intro to ‘Foot Soldiers of The Syndicate’ – an adventurous 5-minute rocker that does the job of introducing Bowles’ voice to the album in a tasteful but fairly stark way. He presents his style with confidence and forthrightness, apologizing for nothing. Intentionally jarring at first, I predict that by the third or fourth listen, his voice will sound as natural to you as birds at the break of dawn. The album settles beautifully with third track ‘Through The Looking Glass’, a ballad that is highly reminiscent of Led Zeppelin in their heyday. You will love this song. The chorus alone, where Bowles wails ‘Above the dragon’s wings we fly’ is worth the price of admission. I do love the epic closing track, but ‘Through The Looking Glass’ stands out as my favorite track on the album. It is superior rock that will remove just some of the pain you might have felt if you missed out on Led Zeppelin during their deeper periods.
‘Blackstar’, at four minutes, continues the story of the main protagonist in an intricate arrangement that is less Prog than rock, but it features such detailed bass-lines from Comeau that it may as well be. It is excellent. ‘The Fall’, also at less than 5 minutes, is somewhat less successful. Its verse has a somewhat provocative disco beat from which the rock stylings of the later parts of the song never really recover. Whilst an important part of the thematic narrative, my feeling is that the song could have done with a little less predictability. ‘The Revenants’, on the other hand, will completely draw you back in with its more than competent Zeppelin stylings. Bowles outdoes himself with the lead vocal on this acoustic track, and firmly puts all naysayers at peace with a vocal performance that is simply pristine. The song is a perfect 5-minute interlude that leads, of course, into the 19-minute epic title track which ends the album.
‘Apocalypse’ is, by 2026 standards, quite a short album at 42 minutes. But we should not forget that this is a band that thrives on the retro-revival of the styles of the greatest bands of the 1970’s, where 42 minutes of music was exactly what the vinyl doctor ordered. The only downside of this brevity is that the listener is definitely left wanting more – and one gets the feeling that this is precisely what Comeau and Bowles intended.
Like many Prog vocalists, Bowles’ high tenor voice might not immediately please everyone, and it most certainly is an acquired taste – just like Geddy Lee’s was when Rush first started making their own (permanent) waves. Like Lee (and indeed like Robert Plant before him) Bowles has absolutely no problem hitting astronomically high notes His squeal is extremely powerful, melodic, laser-like in its precision and yes, sometimes startling. But it cannot be ignored, and once patience is exercised and the courting period comes to an end, so begins the musical honeymoon with his vocal style. Ultimately, you will not be able to imagine a Crown Lands with a less penetrative lead vocal, or indeed with any other voice at all.
As far as production is concerned, the band should feel very proud. The album sounds excellent in spite of its often challenging layered complexity. The instruments are clear, powerful and well-separated and the overall mix is very pleasing. One does feel that the band has somewhat defiantly put the vocals to the fore, and in some places may have stretched the upper spectrum of Bowles’ voice more than was absolutely necessary. Perhaps this was a statement of intent, but whatever the psychology, the net result works well, especially after repeated listens. The instrumentation, of course, is outstanding. Special mention must be made of Bowles’ drumming, the excellence of which is at risk of being overlooked due to his other talents, and Comeau’s patent technical wizardry deserves similar high praise. All in all, this is an exceptionally well-balanced album, and while it may be that the lead vocal will be an acquired taste for some, the grooves behind the voice can never be denied. The result is a complete production that gels perfectly once that taste is inevitably acquired.
With Apocalypse, Crown Lands deliver a cohesive statement that positions them as one of the new-generation bands poised to carry progressive rock into the next decade and beyond. Do they wear their influences on their sleeves? Certainly, but the unapologetic manner in which Crown Lands present and deliver these influences is just so defiant, refreshing and enthusiastic, that this process is completely original of itself. The point is that while they may channel those 1970’s bands, the way they do so makes them sound uniquely like Crown Lands. I love Zeppelin. I love Rush. I love Queen. I also now love Crown Lands, and if you listen to this album, I have no doubt, you will too.
Order here:
https://crownlandsmusic.lnk.to/Apocalypse-Bio
1. Proclamation I 1:22
2. Foot Soldiers of the Syndicate 4:20
3. Through the Looking Glass 3:45
4. Blackstar 4:00
5. The Fall 4:31
6. The Revenants I 5:29
7. Apocalypse. 19:01
Cody Bowles / vocals, drums, percussion, Ney flute, Pentatonic flute
Kevin Comeau / 6 & 12 string electric & acoustic guitars, bass, minimoog, Oberheim OB6 synthesizer, Taurus pedals, mellotron
The post Crown Lands – Apocalypse (Album Review) appeared first on The Prog Report.
Blinded is taken from Parker Barrow’s forthcoming album Hold The Mash, and you’d be forgiven for thinking you were listening to a new Stones single with the opening riff, as guitarist Alex Bender says the riff was given life as … Continue reading
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