The journey continues to continue. The result of two nights in London in 2023 for Big Big Train.

Release Date: 13th September 2024

Label: Inside Out Music

Format: 2CD / BluRay / 2LP

Into history, into legend, into folklore…etc. The Passengers know the routine.

It’s been a big year for Big Big Train. A new album, their first US tour, Cropredy and a UK/European tour. But for the latest release, we look back. Not too far though, to 2023, when a run of dates around the UK and Europe found the band taking another step with not-so-new-now singer Alberto Bravin.

Having seen the ‘journey continues’ tour at Birmingham Town Hall, A Flare On The Lens is both a souvenir of the short tenure of guitarist Maria Barbieri and of the two Cadogan Hall/London dates with one whole show (the second of two) supplemented for a complete souvenir by the addition of tracks played at the first show but not the second. Geddit?

It’s, as expected, a lovely set; beautifully played and recorded, and for most if not all Passengers (and casual fans who may be working their way on board) a setlist that is pretty hard to beat and a strong focus on what’s turning out to be a landmark in the legacy, the English Electric albums. In that respect, A Flare On The Lens feels a little like Seconds Out in capturing a period where the baton is being passed and the older songs are getting a new interpretation. And it may be that as Big Big Train pass into a new era, the concerts in London may have been the last time some of these numbers might be played.

Plenty of long form pieces form the cornerstones and in the key opening slot, Folklore a fabulous opening, the band emerging from the shadows to the fanfare and into the exchange of vocals passages that leads into the reedy organ chords. Curator Of Butterflies and the section from “so far out of reach” is another convincing piece of evidence for any sceptic fans who feel that Alberto has still to earn his stripes. Album highlight? In a set where there are many contenders, “the end is the start is the place where we came from” and the crescendo that leads into the guitar solo part towards the end of the piece is arguably the ultimate tribute to DL, Alberto sings it beautifully.

It feels odd to have Apollo mid set, being now used to it as a set closer with Alberto pressing the flesh with those close enough. The soft fluted keyboard line just over halfway gives the signal for the final lap when the full brass section, for one of the final times in this format as the band moves into a slimmed down format, swell the music and prepare the floor for the guitar solo. Maybe not Dave Foster’s searing effort on this occasion but Rikard and Maria swap solos impressively.

The lengthy acoustic medley of Leopards / Meadowland / Wassail, that starts off like a country jugband and ends with a soul show as the cry of “Wassail!” is taken up with Nick D’Virgilio rabble rousing the crowd and the brass section adding some funky parts before a suitably folky ending straight out of the Levellers tune book. The finale of two epics which have formed the spine of the BBT set and indeed the BBT legacy, East Coast Racer and Victorian Brickwork make up a half hour

From the opening night come a handful of extras. Oblivion makes sure the additional night gets a new song, added to the touching Love Is The Light that seems destined to become a BBT landmark – the second teasing of what would at the time be the unreleased album that is destined to get its own turn in the spotlight (Beneath The Masts please…) on the 2024 Autumn tour. And while some songs may be getting prepared for hibernation, “a song never played live,” Keeper Of Abbeys is delightful, Clare Lindley adds some lovely violin to Judas Unrepentant and Hedgerow is always a similar delight especially the ending part with the overlapping voices and the brass clarion call.

A Flare On The Lens; not just a fine souvenir for the converts, but a release that may well prove the ideal starting point for new passengers to jump on board and see what the fuss is about.

Here’s A Boy In Darkness from the album:

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