If one could only use one adjective to describe veteran Birmingham experimental band Pram, it would be “unpredictable.” Over the course of their twenty-five year run they have never stood still, and while record labels and band members and changing times and tastes have come and gone, these things mattered not, as the group existed in their own little world with groups such as Stereolab, Broadcast, Third Eye Foundation, and Laika being quite distant cousins yet having very little in common with their peculiar Pram relative. But no matter; to listen to any Pram record is to enter a world unlike anything that came before it or after it. Although they fell silent in 2007, they resurfaced earlier this year was an extremely wonderful and beautiful album entitled Across The Meridian. All of the elements are here, with swirling dark atmospherics, weird sounds, and unique arrangements that bare little resemblance to Anything you’ve heard before. Personally, I am in love with “Footprints Towards Zero,” a jittery little number that doesn’t bother to define itself for very long, and could best be described as the musical background to a reading of a Harlan Ellison short story on the Mind Webs radio broadcast.
In other words, it is Pram at their best. Perfect music for a quiet and rainy autumn evening as you spend the hours curled up reading vintage speculative fiction.
The Recoup 
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