March 2025 and we have the eight album by Hats Off Gentlemen Its Adequate – and there’s nothing adequate about it. As ever with HOGIA it’s an album way, way in excess of simply adequate. Quality, varied, interesting and thought provoking prog of the highest order.
Yet another clear winner from the duo of Malcolm Galloway and Mark Gatland. Their albums generally have a running conceptual theme. This one being (as the title suggests) around Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. See what I mean by saying HOGIA makes you think….?
Eleven tracks including three instrumentals give a flowing listen which has bits of everything going on throughout.
Yes – overall it’s progressive, though you’ll be amazed by how much musical variation there with no two sounding anywhere near the same as it flows from some hard and heavy stuff with some nice riffs, impressive guitar and synth breaks through to ambient, jazzy, funky and electronic.
Lyrically it’s quite the trip also. If I can take a line from the notes which Malcolm included with the review copy he sent to me (thanks as always Malcolm): “several historical events that combine quantum physics and inter-personal uncertainty are explored.”
Certainty opens things up. A gentle first half breaks out nicely to give a rocky/funky latter half and is nicely engaging. Everything Changed gives sort of fractured/edgy feel.
Copenhagen is a broodingly dark number as it builds the tension along with the angst-filled vocal. The title track track similarly so being one of the harder edged songs and another tension builder the tale from WWII and an American spy sent to Italy with a mission to assassinate Heisenberg at a lecture if he (the spy) though Heisenberg was close to developing a nuclear weapon.
So well are the lyrics written and performed you can put yourself in the spy’s shoes and the dilemma of whether to pull the trigger or not.
The Think Tank is quite catchy. Then comes One Word That Means the World. One of those historical events mentioned. This is real life Crimson Tide stuff about a Russian submarine officer who back in the Cuban missile crisis days stood up to be counted and said no. Had he said yes – would we be here today?
A bleak chugging, dense riff gives a fitting claustrophobic feel as does the sonar “ping” and again a fine brooding vocal delivery amps up the tension. We don’t know who we are till we’re forced to decide. Indeed….!
The due of Between Two Worlds (a beautiful piano based/vocal song) and Living With Uncertainty close out a fascinating album.
Oh: almost forgot the instrumentals. The Ultraviolet Catastrophe, Cause and Effect and Inside the Atom. Each one to the point and varied bringing in a full range of musical styles merging effectively.
Given the merging of many styles The Uncertainty Principle is perhaps the most instantly accessible from Hats Off Gentlemen Its Adequate. If I tried to describe it in a few words to give you some indication would be somewhere between classic Van Der Graaf/Peter Hammill, King Crimson and at times say 1990s Rush.
Pick up the digital or physical version from the HOIA BandCamp page:
https://hatsoffgentlemen.bandcamp.com/album/the-uncertainty-principle
My thanks again to Malcolm for sending the review copy.
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