Buta few months after the release of second studio album Sonic Rebirth, The Progressive Souls Collective – led by guitarist and producer Florian Zepf- is back with a new, poignant version of the Massive Attack classic ‘Teardrop’. The song is the first single from a covers album Encore Vol. 1: Sonic Tributes, that will be released by Metalville Records on 18th October.
Available digitally, you can check out the video for the single here at RAMzine.
Encore Vol. 1: Sonic Tributes consists exclusively of cover songs, all hand-picked and, as expected, located in the extended prog area. The first recordings began sometime after the release of TPSC’s debut album Sonic Birth, continued through the corona pandemic and was continued during the sessions for the album Sonic Rebirth. The songs selected were personal favourites of Florian Zepf, creative head, producer and guitarist of the collective. The aim was to pay musical tribute to bands and musicians from Yes, Genesis, Pink Floyd and Toto, among others, who had a great influence on him.
From a conceptual point of view, Encore Vol. 1: Sonic Tributes fits seamlessly into the sequence of previous TPSC albums. Both concept albums with a thematic reference to the interplay between human development and technology, musically, some of those previous motifs can be found in some of the cover songs now presented, so that the creative and musical connection between the TPSC albums is maintained.
The production of the entire album is considered “very organic and equally powerful”. Engineer legend Elliot Scheiner, 8-time Grammy winner and known from his collaboration with legends such as Toto, Steely Dan and Eric Clapton, was responsible for what’s been described as a “very soulful mix”. Mastering was handled by Reuben Cohen from the Grammy-winning Lurssen Mastering Studio (Metallica etc).
Tracks featured are: ‘The Old Medley’ originally recorded by Genesis, ‘Teardrop’ originally recorded by Massive Attack, ‘Endless Dream’ originally recorded by Yes, ‘Jake To The Bone’ an instrumental, originally recorded by Toto, and ‘High Hopes’ originally recorded by Pink Floyd.
Aside from Florian Zepf on guitars, backing vocals, keyboards, the line-up includes Vladimir Lalic (Vocals tracks 1-3, 5), Zsolt Kaltenecker (Keyboards tracks 1, 3), Gerald Peter (Keyboard-solo track 4), Simen Daniel Lindstad Børven (Bass (racks 1, 2, 5), Jacob Umansky (Bass on track 3), Jamie Powell (Bass track 4), Adam Marko (Drums tracks 1-3), Daniel Petri (Drums track 5), Alex Landenburg (Drums track 4), Isaac Alderson (Flutes & pipes track 3) and Maria Grigoryeva (Strings tracks 3, 5).
