Cosmic collaboration

The Fateful Symmetry MUTE 7/10

Eleven years after his first ambitious homage to Mike Oldfield, Robert Reed is back with the long-awaited fourth instalment in his Sanctuary series. With a little help from Oldfield collaborators Les Penning, Tom Newman and drummer Simon Phillips, the Magenta and Cyan mastermind tells Prog about his mission to keep long-form music alive.

Few guitarists are loved as equally for their acoustic work as their electric playing but such is the unique talent of Richard Thompson . We meet him to find out how he’s preparing to go head-to-head with Tommy Emmanuel, chat about the end of his touring days, and talk alternative tunings

The John Hackett Band are celebrating a decade of making music together with their second album, the recently released Red Institution . The four-piece talk about their easy chemistry, songwriting inspiration and those pinch-me moments of performing material originally by King Crimson and the other Hackett.

Hergest Ridge (50th Anniversary) UMC

Close harmonies, smooth grooves, infighting and ‘the bag’: making an album on stage