Brian Bennett – Voyage: a journey into Discoid Funk (LP)

Brian Bennett is best known as the drummer of the UK band The Shadows and as a composer of music for Films and TV. During the 1980’s he was awarded two Ivor Novello awards and wrote music for a wide range of programmes including Dallas, The Sweeney and also the Royal Wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer. In the 70’s Brian released four albums, the last of which was ‘Voyage’ released in 1978 & his first concept album.

“This was music to complement or invoke visual imagery and I had this idea of the Earth in space, it was around the time of ‘Star Wars’ so this space fantasy thing was very much in vogue. I was also listening to a lot of Brian Eno and I wanted to see if I could write some material along those lines. I was given the go ahead by the label DJM and the concept was a voyage around the Earth. All the drums and synths were played live and we were experimenting with all the latest sounds and technology”.

When originally released in 1978 during the height of Punk the album received a mauling from the critics and was considerably ahead of its time. ‘Voyage’ manages to combine rock, funk, disco, prog and library sounds to create a record that could have been created 30 years later and is now rightly recognised as a pioneering classic.