LONELY ROBOT – Please Come Home (2015)

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LONELY ROBOT is the new project from producer, guitarist and vocalist John Mitchell (It Bites, Frost*, Arena, Kino) and the debut CD is the entitled “Please Come Home” to be released tomorrow.
Mitchell is backed by the storming rhythm section of Nick Beggs (Steve Hackett, Kajagoogoo) on bass and Craig Blundell (Pendragon) on drums, with plenty of guests including Marillion’s Steve Hogarth, ’80s pop wonder Nik Kershaw, Jem Godfrey (Frost*), Kim Seviour (Touchstone)… and Go West’s Peter Cox, among others.

I must admit that what most picked my interest about “Please Come Home”, for one reason and one reason only, track three “The Boy In The Radio” which features the vocals of one Peter Cox, singer with ’80s poppy melodic rockers Go West.
That’s because these days it isn’t very often that you get to hear Peter’s superb set of pipes being stretched outside of the nostalgia led circuit that his day job band currently resides in. For me though he is still one the best AOR vocalists to come out of the UK.

But after the first minute of opener “Airlock” I was ‘in’ with this record. It sets the scene nicely, as the album explores John Mitchell’s fascination with space and space travel. Atmospheric and big on the musical bombast, this is perfect for a movie soundtrack.
Track two “God vs Man” is where the album really gets underway though, and this is a thundering epic of a track, Mitchell handling the vocals for the first time and sounding somewhere between Peter Gabriel and Seal, something that for me makes the record’s more out and out progressive moments so much more palatable.

The aforementioned “The Boy In The Radio” breezes in next and immediately I find myself wishing that Cox was singing on more tracks. I simply LOVE this song and worth the disc alone.
Cox’s voice lifting the almost FM like spiralling opening guitar riff into the realms of much more contemporary pop/rock acts is exceptional.
I’m sorry I don’t want to talk down the rest of ‘Please Come Home’ because Mitchell along with Heather Findlay (Mostly Autumn) and Touchstone’s Kim Seviour all turn in excellent vocal shifts, it’s just that for me to hear Peter Cox singing original more Rock orientated material again is just something I thought I might never hear again, with his solo and most of the latter day Go West material sadly being a tad too MOR for my tastes.
So, have I gushed enough now? Okay let’s move on..

So what of the rest of ‘Please Come Home’ then? Well the appearance of Seviour on “Oubliette” is a fantastically grandiose highlight with Mitchell once again sounding mature and melodic.
Elsewhere Steve Hogarth turns in some fragile piano work on “Why Do We Stay”, whilst vocally Findlay plays a Kate Bush-like performance on on the mournful “Why Do We Stay?”

There are also a trio of melodic progressive pop rock numbers (for fans of Mitchell’s day job band) in the shape of title track “Lonely Robot”, a tour de force veering from quiet vocal passages through to heavy instrumental break outs, where actor Lee Ingleby (Harry Potter films) provides the narration on this and “A Godless Sea”.
The other more proggy tracks are “We Are Copies” which makes me wonder if Queensryche fronted by Peter Gabriel would sound this good, and finally another highlight in “Construct / Obstruct” which has a bounding ‘Synchronicity’ feel about it.
And seemingly as big a fan of Eighties rock&pop as yours truly Mitchell also has Nik Kershaw guesting on guitar on the swaying power ballad “Humans Being”’ whilst Nick Beggs plays bass and his signature Chapman Stick on a few other songs.

You know I’m really glad Peter Cox is on this record because otherwise I would never have given “Please Come Home” the proper interest, when in reality it is a fantastically accomplished slice of Progressive Melodic rock&pop.
I’m not going to even try to start to unravel the concept largely because records like this demand the listener to form their own opinions, something that is sadly lost in our buy it yesterday consumerist landscape… Oh wait I think I may have just done a little spoiler there.
Either way, this is a hugely entertaining record that demands repeat listens, it’s intelligent, articulate and above all really fun and enjoyable…. Oh and did I mention the awesome Peter Cox is on it?
Highly Recommended.

01 – Airlock
02 – God vs Man
03 – The Boy In The Radio
04 – Why Do We Stay?
05 – Lonely Robot
06 – A Godless Sea
07 – Oubliette
08 – Construct / Obstruct
09 – Are We Copies?
10 – Humans Being
11 – The Red Balloon

John Mitchell (Kino, It Bites, Arena) – vocals, guitars
Nick Beggs (Steve Hackett, Kajagoogoo) – bass, Chapman stick
Craig Blundell (Pendragon) – drums
guests:
Peter Cox (Go West) – vocals
Steve Hogarth (Marillion) – vocals
Kim Seviour (Touchstone) – vocals
Heather Findlay (Mostly Autumn) – vocals
Jem Godfrey (Frost*) – keyboards
Nik Kershaw – guitar
Lee Ingleby (Harry Potter actor) – narration
Rebecca Neew-Menear (Anavae) – vocals
thanks to Johnny H

PRE-ORDER:
www.insideoutmusicshop.com/lonely-robot-please-come-home-pre-order.html
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