the cdrwl has signed off... keep on truckin' Tom...

With great sadness I am told the cdrwl is no more, as of this week.

I remember like it was yesterday when the news broke of an unknown masterpiece called Ginga Rale Band, some three and a half years back.  For my contacts I am grateful I didn't have to wait long to get my ears onto that piece which, inevitably, turned out to be as fantastic as promised.   Around that same time a superb slice of progressive history and absolute masterpiece-level creation was made available in an LP reissue that I treasure to this day, Rob Thomsett's work Yarandaroo, and it goes without saying that without Tom's illumination I would never have known about that one either.  Today you can judge for yourselves the aptitude of his remarks at the time with regards to both Ginga and Rob.  As well you can easily ascertain how indebted I am to Tom's work if you do a quick search of tags relating to the cdrwl, keeping in mind that several if not dozens of albums that are in our compilation here appeared there but I have forgotten their entries in my rush to post.

Definitely Tom's knowledge of progressive music and gifts at unearthing gems (along with, obviously, his able contacts), and, presumably, a healthy dose of craft beers, was or is unparalleled, especially when it is understood he was there in the seventies & eighties at the time these works were being created, or shortly thereafter (which I cannot claim for myself, having come quite late to this game).

I for one certainly hope this is a momentary lapse, perhaps a temporary epiphany in the Colorado mountains may give way once again to the profound and ineradicable yearning that I can definitely endorse of sharing these discoveries with the wider world out there...  born out of the deepest love for this maligned music: progressive rock.

Keep on truckin' and keep on shinin' your light...




A beautiful little lost 1972 Canadian pop-soul album full of delightful songs, BST-style soulful and bluesy...