It is great to see Census of Hallucinations back to their prolific best and also the revival of the splendid Stone Premonitions label.
This trilogy of albums began with 'Spirit of Yellow' in 2013, a fine rereading of 13 of their seminal songs as a reminder of where they are coming from; 'Coming of the Unicorn' took a psychedelic , space rock path with welcome nods to the past on 'Stars' ('My God, It's Full of Stars') while 'The Nine' concentrates on song craft in the 3 to 5 minute range. All flows to make an album that demands listening from start to finish (and repeated listening). There is a touch of Kevin Coyne intensity and Peter Gabriel sardonicism about 'Delivering The Goods' which features a soaring guitar break from John Simms. Tim Jones leaves the guitar to concentrate on the vocals and is in fine form and the multi-tracked ghostly voices of Maxine Marten add ambience and atmosphere on songs like 'Timelessness' on which Kevin Hodge's acoustic guitar leads the way for Tim's narrative before John's spacey guitar fades leads towards 'The Crunch'. This is a great song about numbers, a topic very important in the C of H psychi. They may provide the answer to everything but this time it is the negative 'parasitic' side of numbers that is examined. 'Childhood by numbers' to 'old age by numbers'- yes, indeed! I was intrigued to know what the 'Most Remarkable Number' is and the answer is '9' ('the image of 6')- 'the power of nine is found in no other number'. Tim reels out the old fingers trick on the 9 times table and shows how 9 keeps reappearing in much larger numbers. 'The Truth Inverted' makes the ultimate statement: 'the truth is out there somewhere' and features John's most expansive guitar solo; indeed, all of Census of Hallucination's music is a search for truth and even although you may not necessarily agree with all of the conclusions (or find them disturbing) this is just one reason of many to explore it further.
(Reviewed by Phil Jackson)