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The last few years have been a whirlwind for Epica. From celebrating their 20-year anniversary to putting in a stint on Metallica’s M72 tour and making the collaborative, experimental The Alchemy Project EP with the likes of Fleshgod Apocalypse and Shining (NO), the Dutch symphonic metal outfit have been on quite the journey. Aspiral feels like a natural response – a return to their roots with a renewed focus on the core of who Epica are.

Everyone knows they can deliver a grandiose metal album with their eyes closed, and Aspiral is, like most Epica records, a sumptuous aural feast. Cross The Divide comes straight out of the gate with high intensity and an instantly memorable chorus melody, sung powerfully by the divinely talented Simone Simons.

The sheer power and depth of emotion she manages to convey with her classical voice while carrying a heavy metal album has never been more apparent than on this record. On Obsidian Heart, one of the standout tracks in which she glides between vocal registers seamlessly with her signature piercing, crystalline timbre, she’s never sounded better.

Everything on Aspiral is carefully considered, but there are many moments that feel more organic than on previous records, like the chugging breakdown and harsh growls at the end of Apparition; there’s more equilibrium between the metal and orchestral elements, with neither overpowering the other.

Is this the ultimate Epica record? While songs such as Metanoia are undeniably them, T.I.M.E. and The Grand Saga Of Existence, while excellent, could almost have been pulled from Nightwish’s Imaginaerum and Human. :||: Nature. respectively. Tuomas Holopainen might not have the monopoly on haunted merry-go-round SFX and existential philosophy, but it’s hard not to draw the comparison.

What Aspiral does have is the atmosphere, emotion and irresistible hooks that Epica are known for, with real warmth beneath the polish.

Aspiral is out April 11 via Nuclear Blast. Epica tour North America from May 6 and play European festivals this summer. For the full list of dates visit their official website.

In 2011 Kate Bush ended a six-year silence with the launch of self-covers album Director’s Cut, followed by a completely new work, 50 Words For Snow. She discussed the matters arising with Prog in her trademark maverick manner.

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You wait six years for a Kate Bush album, then two come along at once. By the standards of most musicians it’s is an impressive work rate. By the standards of this most reclusive of artists, it’s nothing short of miraculous.

50 Words For Snow may have been recorded in parallel with its immediate predecessor, Director’s Cut, but it’s no companion piece. Where the latter album found the singer re-imagining songs from her own back catalogue with a perfectionist’s ear, 50 Words For Snow is a brand new work – and one that Ronseals her standing as one of British music’s great mavericks.

Which other artist would sympathise with Bigfoot, as she does in Wild Man; or fantastise about a roll in the slush with a snowman without a hint of a blush, as in Misty? She evens adds Stephen Fry to her list of unlikely collaborators –the plummy-voiced raconteur recites the eponymous words for snow, all of which sound like they’ve been completely made up: ‘whippoccino,’ ‘phlegm de neige,’ ‘merenguer peaks.’

An exploration of humanity’s relationship with the elements, 50 Words represents the latest step on Bush’s 30-year journey from the wide-eyed ingénue of debut album The Kick Inside, through the mystical pagan-folk faerie queen of The Hounds Of Love, to her current incarnation as a regal, if slightly batty, earth mother. Musically, it’s intricate and otherworldly – prog with a small ‘p.’ Not for her the grandiose musical statement; for Bush, it’s all in the details.

The myth of the singer as some sort of reclusive Miss Havisham isn’t strictly true. She simply had pop stardom thrust on her early, and has spent the past 30 years beating a retreat, preferring the comforts of domesticity to the trials of self-publicity. She is a reserved interviewee, preferring to mull over answers rather than serving up zinging quotes. But then that’s just something else that sets this quiet maverick apart.

50 Words For Snow is a very wintery-sounding album.

I see it as a winter album. I love the feel of a cold, long winter in the countryside. I love everything about it, really. Making snowmen, how the moonlight reflects on the snow, the muffled sounds, log fires, midnight Mass, walking through the woods. I noticed that when I left London, I started to experience the seasons more deeply.

Modern civilisation seems intent on eliminating every ounce of mystery we have left

The song Misty is about a woman who spends the night with a snowman. You sing, ‘I can feel you melting in my hand’ – is that meant to be as rude as it sounds?

No, nothing that graphic! I just wondered what it was like to sleep with a snowman, to experience that kind of fleeting intimacy. Of course, the lyric can be interpreted as containing symbolic references: wet sheets…

In Wild Man, you describe a mythical, Bigfoot-like creature who seeks human contact.

I love mystery – things we don’t quite know for sure; uncharted territory. And modern civilisation and so-called progress seems intent on eliminating every ounce of mystery we have left. Knowledge is a beautiful thing, but sometimes not knowing something, not being absolutely sure, can be beautiful too. Maybe on some level we don’t want to be told Santa Claus doesn’t exist.

Having said that, of course I’m all for science. And maybe one day science will allow us to communicate with angels or other mysterious creatures. Never say never.

You often use background noises to create an ambience. In Lake Tahoe, it’s crows.

Rooks, rather. I wanted to suggest desolation; a bare, slightly depressing landscape. You often hear that sound in movies about the Middle Ages. I’ve always found it odd that, in a lot of popular music, you almost never hear nature. Maybe it’s because I live in the country, but I find nature is so overwhelming.

There’s a real magical-realism feel to Snowed In At Wheeler Street. A pair of lovers turn up in different eras: in Paris in the 20s, London during the Blitz, New York post-9/11.

I’m fascinated by other eras, but I’m glad to be alive now… not that long ago, women weren’t allowed to be creative

I was looking for an original approach to tackle reincarnation, and that déjà vu feeling you get. Like meeting someone who seems so familiar it’s uncanny. Sometimes it’s hard not to feel you’ve known them before, sometime, somewhere. The lovers I describe are mad about each other, but torn, like magnets, attracting each other and pushing each other away.

Your music seems to soundtrack events from a different era.

Well, I’m fascinated by other eras, but I’m glad to be alive now. I mean, not that long ago, women weren’t allowed to be creative, to have a career. Women were expected to sacrifice their own aspirations to their husbands.

Of course, any artist would like their work to have a timeless quality, in that it transcends fads and trends. I think I’ve been quirky and stubborn and original enough not to be stuck in a trend.”

Which historical characters would you invite to dinner?

Winston Churchill and Stephen Fry.

Stephen is on the new album, reciting the 50 different words for snow. Some of them, like ‘zhivagodamarbletash,’ sound completely made up.

I made most of them up! I mean: ‘phlegm de neige’ – ‘boomerangablanca’? I loved Stephen’s delivery; I wanted a voice that could project both authority and warmth.

Given the quirkiness of your songs, how do you give directions to the musicians you work with? Do you ever say, “This should sound like a willow tree in a rain storm?”

I’m not happy about working so long on one project… But what’s the alternative? Releasing a mediocre album?

I usually start by explaining the structure of the song. I tell them what the rhythm should be, and the key obviously. And I point out where the song should remain bare or understated, and at which points in time they can add fills, little touches. Sometimes, but not always, I tell them what the lyric means, what the song is about. And then it’s their turn to surprise me.

Do you tend to write ‘up’ music when you’re feeling good, then moody, ‘dark’ stuff when you’re down?

No, I don’t think so. Aerial had a couple of heavy songs – I sang about the death of my mother. And yet I was happy during that period.

Aerial came out 12 years after your previous album, The Red Shoes. Why did it take so long?

I’m not happy about working so long on one project or about not having released more work. It is hard work, it can be tedious, absorbing, exhausting even. But what’s the alternative? Releasing a mediocre, rushed, half-finished album?

You continue working on songs even after they’ve been released. Isn’t that a bit obsessive?

That has happened, yeah. I wouldn’t call it obsessive – it’s simply being dedicated and caring, I suppose. I’m never content. It’s never quite perfect. That’s why I did Director’s Cut. I hear a perfect version in my head, and sometimes the version on record wasn’t quite that. I don’t know whether that’s just me or whether all artists feel like that.

To some people, visibility is everything. We tend to forget that fame and all that should be a by-product of talent and hard work

Last year and this year were pretty intense. People tend to think you’re idling when you don’t release any work, but I work all the time. Only at my own pace, and to my own standards.

Do you work at home?

Yeah. I function better in controlled surroundings. Simply being at ease, surrounded by… well, love and beauty. And nature. And I didn’t want to miss out on my son growing up.

To some people, visibility is everything. We tend to forget that fame and all that should be a by-product of talent and hard work, not the other way around. I’ve found seclusion and creativity to be natural partners.

You’ve famously only toured once, in 1979. What’s keeping you from doing it again?

I don’t know. I hear people claim that my first and only tour was such a horrible experience, but that’s not true. I had a great time; I loved the show and the circus troupe-like camaraderie. Maybe not the stress and the travel. But when I think about it, I feel primarily a sense of euphoria. And those were pioneering days, you know. I think we were the first to use headset microphones – made from a coat hanger!

You were in the audience when David Bowie ‘retired’ Ziggy Stardust, at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973. So you know how much fans hanker for more.

I remember that Bowie gig quite clearly. I cried, like all other girls. I remember he seemed rather moved too. It seemed the end of an era.

Performing live isn’t a priority for me. Creating new work in the studio is, as is family life. I keep busy – and then when I look up another five years have passed.

My father was always prepared to listen to any new song… even if it wasn’t very good

What advice would you give to a young songwriter just starting out?

Persevere. Don’t be afraid. Realise it’s a learning process – nothing will ever be perfect. Be stubborn. Demand respect. Don’t rush a song that doesn’t want to come just yet.

Create a pleasant working environment; surround yourself with people who encourage you. I’ll always be grateful to my father who was always prepared to listen to any new song I’d made, even if it wasn’t very good.

I’d like to say more, but it’s hard to put in words. That’s one of the problems with interviews.

For a 77-year-old who just a few years ago was told he was terminally ill, and on “a slippery slope to inevitable death”, Ian Anderson looks and sounds in remarkably fine fettle. And creatively, he and Jethro Tull, the band with which he will forever be synonymous, are on a prolifically productive roll the likes of which we haven’t seen since their 70s and early-80s prime.

Released last month, Curious Ruminant is the band’s third album in just over three years since they were reanimated as a recording act with 2022’s The Zealot Gene, the first Tull album of new material in 23 years. So what has inspired this sudden late-career burst of activity? And is it really any dignified way for a man in his midseventies to behave?

Anderson has told this publication before that showbiz old stagers like him “aspire to be rock’n’roll Eric Morecambes and die with our boots on like a cowboy in a western”. While we sincerely hope he doesn’t mean that literally, he seems more committed than ever.

“I am driven by two things,” Anderson says. “Desperation and enthusiasm. The enthusiasm I’ve always had, the desperation is because I’m an old guy and I know that sooner or later I won’t be able to do this any more.”

Anderson is also a man who follows his muse – and it seems to be pretty hyperactive right now. “Once I have a notion, an idea, a title, a song, or something conceptual,” he says, “then it’s like a snowball at the top of a slope, rolling down, gathering momentum.”

Tull have also toured tirelessly, despite the pandemic making the prospect more hazardous for a senior gentleman like their founding frontman and principal songwriter.

Indeed, given the ongoing health issues that he has revealed in recent years, that approach still seemed brave verging on reckless. In 2020 he revealed that he had been diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) a while previously. Thankfully he has found out since that the prognosis isn’t quite as grim as first thought.

“In 2017 I was diagnosed with COPD, which is pretty serious, a slippery slope to inevitable death. But that was re-diagnosed in early 2022 as asthma. They said: ‘You probably had asthma all of your life. You just didn’t know that was why you were having all these bronchial problems.’ So I take my medication religiously now, and things have got a lot better in the last couple of years.

“It’s made a big difference to my breathing, my singing, my flute playing. I have more capacity.”

While there’s no doubt that in his later years Anderson’s voice has evolved to a softer tone – compared to the sometimes theatrical, occasionally abrasive timbre he had on the band’s classic early albums such as Aqualung and Thick As A Brick through to folkier late-70s ones such as Songs From The Wood and harder, more fantasy-infused 80s records like The Broadsword And The Beast – his flute playing is as spritely as ever on new tracks including The Tipu House and Stygian Hand, where it throws up many of the melodic hooks that make Curious Ruminant such an arresting listen.

As anyone who’s played one knows, breath control is a huge part of mastering the flute. So if we happened to live next door to Mr Anderson, would we be likely to hear those trademark tones every day?

“Well I don’t necessarily have to practise every day,” he says, “but every couple of days is certainly a good idea to do it, especially as you get older, because the muscle memory of where to put your fingers can start to slip, and the embouchure, the control of the lip, the muscles there can get a bit floppy. James Galway, the famous classical flautist, told me: ‘As I get older I have to practise more.’ You really do have to put in the hours.”

On the new album, Anderson is credited as being in charge of “flutes, vocals, acoustic guitar, tenor guitar, mandolin, odds and sods, bits and bobs”. But it’s the first of those that he will forever be associated with. So what possessed young Ian, coming of age in Blackpool in the 60s, to opt not for the perennially sexy choice of the guitar, but instead learn to play the flute?

“I had a fascination for other instruments, and I was a guitar player at first – but not a great one,” he recalls. “I got a Fender Stratocaster, whose previous owner was Lemmy, who was a rhythm guitar player with Rev Black And The Rocking Vicars in Blackpool at the time. He traded it in when he went on to play bass, and I bought it second-hand. Lemmy still owes me a pound, in fact. And I don’t think I’m going to get it back.

“But I was never going to be as good as Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Ritchie Blackmore, who were the hot-shot guys down in London, so I cast around for something different to play, and decided, for no particularly good reason, to trade in my trusty Fender. I got a thirty-pound flute and a thirty-pound Shure Unidine 3 microphone out of the deal.

“So I walked away a relatively happy man – even though that guitar is probably worth £50,000 now. And I still think it was a good deal, because the flute gave me a much-improved chance of getting noticed in a world where, in terms of flute players in blues and rock, there was… well, just me, really.”

Just you? What about Ray Thomas of the Moody Blues?

“Yes, fair point. And Chris Wood from Traffic played flute and sax, and there was a guy in King Crimson. Talking of Ray Thomas, his playing wasn’t the most adventurous, but the one thing that was hauntingly beautiful was the flute solo in Nights In White Satin. I always had a hankering to play that, and when Justin Hayward was a guest of ours at Canterbury Cathedral some years ago, we did Nights In White Satin, and I finally got to play the flute solo. It was a touching moment.”

While it’s easy to get the impression that Ian Anderson is something of a workaholic, the title track of new album, Curious Ruminant, stresses the importance of making time to sit back and ruminate. As the lyrics have it (referencing a song on Aqualung): ‘Days of quiet watching, thought bubble clouds blow through the years, wond’ring aloud.’ The same song also refers to ‘dissenting voices from steeple spires… as brief as mad March daffodils’, possibly in reference to today’s insistent chatter of social media, rolling news and opinions that constantly vie for our attention.

“People do tend to get caught up in it,” he says, “and I think that robs the majority of people from those precious moments that might arguably be much better spent stopping to calm yourself down, thinking things over.”

Having travelled the world with Tull and as a solo artist, Anderson also feels it’s important to soak up your experiences at your own pace.

“Some things are very obviously profound that you take in, and you find yourself thinking about them quite often,” he muses. “I visited Chernobyl [site of a catastrophic nuclear reactor explosion in Ukraine in 1986, the effects of which are still being felt] some years ago, and was able to go down in the depths of the reactor building next to the one that melted down. I can still hear my Geiger counter, which my wife kindly bought for me ready for the trip, going: ‘Tick… tick… tick… tick, tick, tick, ti-ti-ti-tick… Oh my gosh! Those things, you really do need a lot of time to ruminate on, to process and think through and re-evaluate in the light of further information.

“Every day, I do like to feel I’ve added to that capacity which the human brain seems to have in spades – even greater than the capacity of my Apple iMac that I’m sitting looking at right now, which probably is getting rather full, I imagine.”

He’ll be all the more sure to make sure he backs up his files, though, after an episode that turned out to play a key role in the new album – and the reason its credits include the names of old Tull members Andrew Giddings and James Duncan.

“My son happened to be looking through an old Macintosh computer, and he was just about to trash it, wiping everything. Then he came across a music file, and he said: ‘Is this anything you recall? Something we should keep?’ I listened, and it all came flooding back. I thought, wow, amazing flute playing, which I wrote for the Indian classical flautist Hariprasad Chaurasia, for us to play together at some concerts in India. I guess he didn’t like it, because he never replied to my email, and we ended up having to play an Indian raga of his choice instead.

“So this demo sat there for a long time, and then I heard it and I thought, wow, I’ll write some lyrics for that. I also kept the original keyboard parts, which were played by Andy [Giddings], our keyboard player at the time. I rebuilt the rest of it as a song for the new album, and it was fortuitous, because although it’s a long piece – the third longest Jethro Tull track ever – it doesn’t seem out of keeping with the rest of the music.”

The song’s title is Drink From The Same Well. Its lyrics unfold in a beautifully meditative, meandering 16-minute track, appealing to find common ground – and a little sanity – among the mania of modern cultural discourse. ‘Culture bending, message sending, shouts of river to the sea, displaying wilful ignorance as to shifting tides of history/They drink from the same well as you.’

The subject referred to by that mention of ‘river to the sea’ is Palestine and the chant of many a protest march, which many Jewish people feel suggests a desire to wipe out the state of Israel. Delicate subject matter to broach in an age of culture wars. But Anderson goes further on this album on Over Jerusalem, once again despairing at the polarisation of the situation in Israel and Gaza: ‘There is no time for meditation, pause for thought or hesitation… angry gods of retribution, driving hate without solution.’

He explains further: “I’ve been to Israel, and Jerusalem, several times, and I have a passion for the city and its history, which of course is a long one, full of torment, destruction, hatred, vengeance, loathing, invasion. And yet it is, in a way, the geographical centre of the universe for the Abrahamic religions. So it has a special significance for me as a traveller.

“I suppose we think we know from our television screens more about the city and Israel as a whole, of course, and sadly, about the West Bank and Gaza. But there are no clear-cut rights and wrongs for me. I’m not preaching one side’s merits over the other.

“It’s all about vengeance and it’s all about nastiness. And my own effort is to be involved with some NGOs and charitable bodies who endeavour to try and bring the different factions and cultures and religions together, particularly through the performing arts. Somewhere, those differences can be, at least temporarily, forgotten.

“For quite a few years I’ve been giving the money from concerts to a couple of bodies you’ll see on the Jethro Tull website at the bottom of the home page. It’s a tiny thing, but it makes me feel that I can stand up for myself if anybody gets stroppy with me about either not boycotting Israel, or in some way being a bit harsh on the Israeli government. Because too often, anything you say will be taken, especially at the behest of Netanyahu and his cronies, as being antisemitic.”

Trying to find a middle ground, though, surely won’t prevent Anderson from offending both sides in the modern climate. “Yes, but I suppose at my age I’m less careful than I perhaps would have been twenty years ago. Being cancelled would make no difference to me in my life, because I don’t do social media, therefore I wouldn’t know I’ve been cancelled.”

Other topically relevant songs on the new album include Dunsinane Hill, its title being familiar to those au fait with Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Like the Scottish play, its theme is ruthless ambition and betrayal of erstwhile brothers in arms. The lyrics, however, make more contemporary references, to scenes ‘as brothers roam the Commons, encounter pushy spin doctors’ while being ‘seduced by wicked promises’. A throwback to severed alliances such as Blair and Brown, or more recent examples?

“It’s a story that is continually retold,” Anderson says, “whether it’s Blair and Brown or Boris Johnson and his colleagues. There’s always a couple of brothers in arms, who are all nice and cosy and fighting the same cause, who fall out with each other. And I suppose the next one might well be Trump and the electric car guy… whose name I cannot be persuaded to utter. Mr Tesla – even the name is a rip-off.”

Soundtracking such timeless tales is a Tull line-up that has remained unchanged since the band’s return to the studio in 2022, with the exception of 30-year-old new guitarist Jack Clark, who replaced the similarly youthful Joe Parrish last year. Clark completes a pan-generational line-up alongside a rhythm section of bassist Dave Goodier (70) and drummer Scott Hammond (51), and keyboard player John O’Hara (62).

Does the inclusion of younger players keep their boss youthful in spirit?

“Well, not necessarily,” says Anderson, “because we’re all basically just big kids, feeling lucky that we’ve never had to get a proper job. But it does remind you to appreciate what you do, when you see through their eyes the sense of wonder, playing in front of bigger audiences and travelling to different parts of the world, seeing something that they maybe dreamed about in connection with some degree of musical success. You relive that through them.”

The opening track on Curious Ruminant, Puppet And The Puppet Master, decorated enticingly by O’Hara’s piano and accordion as well as Anderson’s ever-effusive flute, could be regarded as a reflection of Anderson’s six-decade career on the stage and the duality of his task to serve an audience while also manipulating them. ‘I am both willing puppet, puppet master also, with lofty expectations set to pull me to and fro,” he sings. So who’s actually in charge here?

“Anybody who has to get up and perform, even if it’s in the Prime Minister’s questions,” he says, “it’s something of an art form, where you’re always risking getting caught out, trying to find that balance between authority their demands upon you. And perfection is always hard to find.”

True. But Jethro Tull fans now hardly demand perfection in the music Anderson and the band make. They’re happy enough that on stage he can still maintain that famous one-legged pose (memo to those who over-use the word: that is what you call ‘iconic’) while continuing to shift shape as an artist. No need to ruminate too hard on that one – job’s a good ’un.

Curious Ruminant is out now via Inside Out Music.

Johnny is a regular contributor to Prog and Classic Rock magazines, both online and in print. Johnny is a highly experienced and versatile music writer whose tastes range from prog and hard rock to R’n’B, funk, folk and blues. He has written about music professionally for 30 years, surviving the Britpop wars at the NME in the 90s (under the hard-to-shake teenage nickname Johnny Cigarettes) before branching out to newspapers such as The Guardian and The Independent and magazines such as Uncut, Record Collector and, of course, Prog and Classic Rock. 

Gene Simmons has appeared on the latest edition of Rick Rubin‘s Tetragrammaton podcast.

Over the course of a wide-ranging, three-and-a-half-hour, 28,000-word conversation, the pair discuss Simmons’ early years, the formation of pre-Kiss band Wicked Lester, Kiss’s 50-year career, Simmons’ relationships with his bandmates and romantic partners, and all points in between.

While lots of the stories are the usual, well-rehearsed Simmons schtick, the sections on Kiss’s music are more interesting, as he and Rubin listen to tracks and talk about their origins and recordings, and the producer remembers his early obsession with Kiss.

“I can remember listening to I want to rock and roll all night and party every day,” says Rubin. “I can remember I was in the gymnasium of my junior high school and I remember listening to it over and over again. I want to say trying to understand it.

“I don’t mean understand the words, and I don’t mean understand the music, but understand what was happening. Why do I want to listen to this over and over again?”

“This is really interesting to me,” says Simmons. “Keep going. Keep going.”

“I remember that experience of listening to it over and over,” Rubin continues. “And it didn’t relate to my life in any way, but something about the combination of the music and the sentiment of the words moved me at – I don’t know, 13 or 14 years or however old I was at the time – and I remember listening to it over and over and over again and just feeling like it made me want to know more.”

The podcast, which promises “In-depth interviews that may blow your mind,” has previously featured the likes of actor Al Pacino, journalist Malcolm Gladwell, controversial entrepreneur Peter Thiel, popular YouTuber Rick Beato, System Of A Down frontman Serj Tankian and Beach Boys’ members Bruce Johnston and Mike Love.

Online Editor at Louder/Classic Rock magazine since 2014. 39 years in music industry, online for 26. Also bylines for: Metal Hammer, Prog Magazine, The Word Magazine, The Guardian, The New Statesman, Saga, Music365. Former Head of Music at Xfm Radio, A&R at Fiction Records, early blogger, ex-roadie, published author. Once appeared in a Cure video dressed as a cowboy, and thinks any situation can be improved by the introduction of cats. Favourite Serbian trumpeter: Dejan Petrović.