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Review: 'SHATNER'
'Enlightenmental'   

-  Label: 'Self Released'
-  Genre: 'Pop' -  Release Date: '26th June 2018'

Our Rating:
Perhaps deliberately, perhaps not, Let There Be Light brings to mind 'Let's Do The Time Warp Again' from The Rocky Horror Show.

Certainly, it's easy to imagine these songs forming the basis of a similarly leftfield stage musical, perhaps (to further the William Shatner/Caption Kirk association) featuring actors in pseudo Star Trek costumes. I can even think that a good title for the show might be: "A puzzle called the universe" (a line from the track Living In A Maze).

All this is by way of saying that this West Yorkshire band's fourth full length release is a good old-fashioned concept album about life, the universe and everything.

To make this clear, the elegantly packaged album sleeve includes an extended quote by Carl Sagan declaring that "Science is more than a body of knowledge, it's a way of thinking".

If this heavy theme sounds a daunting prospect then rest assured that Jim Bower's songs are full of irony and humour.

He introduces us to a Heterosapien male (eating up my ecosystem") and boasts "I've got balls of crystal" on We Go Woo.

The serious message behind all this levity is, of course, that humans are fucking up the planet for future generations. In Speed Of Dark one of the prime exemplars of the closed mindset is not hard to identify : "There's a man with terrible hair, says climate change is all hot air".

For this album, Shatner are a quintet and while skilled enough in replicating 80s style pop arrangements, I'd say something with more of a contemporary or futuristic edge would have added to the drama.

Shatner's website
  author: Martin Raybould

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SHATNER - Enlightenmental