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"From out of the dark"

From Out Of The Dark

From out of the dark is a collection of 6 songs finished during the infamous Covid lockdown of 2020, drawing musical influences from many different genres and based on different themes close to my heart.

Some with a narrative, others about how I felt a particular junction in life, playing music, writing and recording songs has been a great outlet for me and helped me deal with and express myself in a productive fashion.

With no single genre over the six songs I decided to put them out as From out of the dark, to show how something good can come from the darkness. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed making them.

I appreciate so much all the friends and family who have helped critique these tracks ready for public consumption. Thanks also to my younger sister, Hannah, for providing her vocal talents and lyric writing on two of the songs.

Please listen below and follow me on all of my social networks using the links above.

Matt x

#TheFurthestStation by Ben Aaronovitch mini review


Firstly, as a novella this book is expensive. Less than a cm thick and still on Amazon for £8, does the quality of the story really warrant that? In short... no, not really.

Not to say it's bad, but the length and style of story don't itself well to Aaronovitch's normally heavily descriptive writing style. And as such it's probably only one for the fans. Saying that, I actually can't imagine anyone wanting to start a series a book at entry number 5 and a half, set between the writings of Foxglove Summer and The Hanging Tree.

Despite the failings though, I did enjoy this little mystery novella and the premise of the story was one that kept me reading. Ghosts have been set loose on the metropolitan train line harassing the commuters of London town. In search of something, Peter in his typically geeky 21st century wizard way sets up a series of experiments to try and lure the spectres out, only to learn of a magical abduction...

The ideas are great; an elderly couple inadvertently adopt a new river spirit in the form of a nursery aged boy; Peter's cousin Abigail is back on the investigative front, along with Peter's friend from the transport department Sergeant Jaget Kumar and there's good variety in the ghosts that occur along the trains. 

The usual humour and style of writing we've come to know and love is back - just in a slightly more stripped down style. I really enjoyed the conclusion of the story too, which felt like watching an episode of a good detective TV show where everything is wrapped up nicely. I just feel that for the calibre of ideas, an entire novel wouldn't have gone amiss.

Definitely worth reading for fans of the series, though definitely not a starting point for newcomers.