Anyone: On The Ending Earth…

Although their fledgling days found both Taylor Hawkins (drummer in Foo Fighters) and Jon Davison (singer in Yes) in their number (the latter on bass), Anyone quickly evolved into a one man project revolving around multi-instrumentalist and singer Riz Story. Also a producer, photographer, film maker, activist and much else, that Story hasn’t really taken Anyone to prominence could well be down to his seeming unwillingness to fully concentrate on his musical outlet. Or, of course, it could be that Anyone are maybe just a little too idiosyncratic to truly capture the wider imagination. Whatever the truth, the third album from the project (featuring a guest appearance from Davison on bass again), On The Ending Earth… takes the environmental causes that form Story’s activist role and build something of a concept album from them, turning a light on how we are slowly bleeding the Earth dry of its resources and its natural ability to heal.

Arguably, the album revolves around the ten minute piece “All That Lives Is Born To Die�, where gently psychedelic themes are built through a Porcupine Tree like framework that takes us into sparsely populated prog rock that has much more going on underneath the surface than first hinted at. Story is a fine singer, albeit one who it could be said lacks for the variety of attacks truly required to take this album to where it hopes to go. However, his plaintive sorrow seeking tones do certainly help paint the album’s pictures of despair and disappointment at the actions of the human race towards its home. Musically, the whole ethos here and pretty much everywhere else is to build sprawling soundscapes that really prove quite evocative, even if claims that Anyone create an altogether new kind of rock music are grand in the extreme.

With roaming bass and incredibly nuanced drum fills, opener “It’s Already Too Late�, as much here does, reminds of Rush, while sounding nothing like that band whatsoever. Something that “Sip The Pleasure Of Days� could also have levelled at it, even if the attack here is much more riff based and aggressive. “A Brief Sparkle In The Nothingness� offers something different altogether; voice and guitar line aping each other over a pulsating synth motif, while “Sister Wrongway�, for me, is the album’s sing along moment, even if it’s hardly an exercise in ‘here comes the chorus’.

On The Ending Earth… has proved to be something of a grower, with initially uninteresting ideas slowly unwinding into the mind and planting seeds there that draw you back for more. I can’t say that I’m completely sold on what has been revealed, but there’s no doubt that at this album’s core sits an intriguing set of musical ideals that deserve further investigation.

Track Listing
1. It's Already Too Late
2. Mother Superior
3. Sip The Pleasure of Days
4. All That Lives is Born to Die
5. Thought I Was
6. A Brief Sparkle in the Nothingness
7. Lament
8. Sister Wrongway
9. Want
10. Sip
11. A Love Letter to Humanity
12. Die With Me
13. Fade To Black

Added: March 13th 2021
Reviewer: Steven Reid
Score:
Related Link: Anyone online
Hits: 1548
Language: english

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