blessings in disguise, describes the church very well.  

i've always been interested in magick, in all it's many forms.

it could be stage magic, old skool ritual or 80's chaos, it could be extreme tantra, synchronicities, dream yoga, cosmic alignments and influences, energy work, healing modalities or art. 
magick reduced away from all theories and practices is another word for 'applied imagination.'

 

that describes the church for me very well. never just a rock and roll band, steve writes lyrics and words and words can be spells. words can be all sorts of things but once cast out into the universe they are stories, communications, songs, dialogues, warnings and still a spell is cast. maybe that was never the intent of the creator but the listener is part of the equation and when i listen to the church i hear imagination.

to be honest i can't reduce the church albums into separate albums anymore, thus they are part of something bigger than the individual components. i cannot even split the instruments anymore as it reduces what is in essence a synergy. so for me it was easy to accept line up changes, new musicians and new energy creates new synergy. this is healthy within any organism, if it keeps things vital. all those comments people make about what is the best album went over my head, it's all just one piece of work for me, sure there's continuity but personally i can hear an acoustic version of 'unguarded moment' in a small club with steve banging away on a beaten up acoustic and feel the same as a new song cos it's all in the delivery and intent.

 

it took me a few weeks to get hold of the hypnagogue, i made several trips into the city but everyone said it was out in april officially, i avoided reading about it from fans and online media although my fatebook feed was filled with peoples thoughts and reveries. i must confess i heard the videos, i couldn't help myself. 
thus last weekend i found one copy at 'red eye' where i grabbed it like a greedy fucking pig, and went straight home to play it. however i was thwarted, called into work, drama after drama, almost 4 days passed and this morning i had the washing machine repair man come over, so as soon as he departed i put the cd on. volume up. 

i will leave it for others to break down the release into individual songs, as a concept album i want to respect the narrative and whole.
what i hear is consistency, surprise, intention, vast deep soundscapes that  second bridge time and space, intelligence, synergy, coherence, a story, the future (transhumanism) the human vs the technological, art, the creative impulse, the pulse and throb of love and passion (these musicians poured their hearts into this and it shows) the mysterious nature of nature, the strange pull of attraction, balance. personally i dig the vocal harmony (something the church are excellent at) but there is inevitably discord within the tale.  

having made music myself i know how difficult it is to get what is in your head out the way you want, after all there's a lot of stages and people involved, and it only takes one person to shift the sound from a pure state to something else but here i think there's a purity now in this album, steve's idea possibly as fulfilled as possible with musicians, mixers and producers and whatever influences aggregate the idea into conception keeping it pure until it hits the listener between the cerebellum and spinal cord, exploding into weird chemicals and synaptic sparks. the musicians are all masters and quite brilliant but for me it's not about who does what, it's about the collective and here is an example of excellence in collective creativity. i know prog music, yes, genesis (with peter gabriel) early floyd, tangerine dream etc but although steve describes the hypnagogue as prog for me it's just the church doing their thing, being innovative and smarter than the average band. challenging their listeners, pushing themselves forwards, pushing us to keep up. respect and love. 

obviously my words don't mean anything, i have no influence or hold upon the sales or response of others. love it hate it, all that matters is my relationship to it.

i love it. i love it so much it made me cry with joy. 
that's just one listen.