Another dense, rewarding week at PRJ. Between a Paris-based all-string collective bringing string instruments to the front lines of prog-metal, a Japanese forgery that fooled the entire global collecting scene, and fresh instrumental statements from Belgium and Boston — this week had range. Here’s everything you shouldn’t have missed.
— EXCLUSIVE / PREMIERE —
2BIRDS BAND — “Top Of The World” feat. Laure Le Prunenec (Official Video + Exclusive Q&A): The week’s most striking exclusive came from Paris. 2BIRDS BAND — 2 violins, cello, bass, and drums — unveiled the official 4K video for “Top Of The World”, the opening track from their album “Flip the Bird,” featuring the extraordinary Laure Le Prunenec (Rïcïnn, ex-Igorrr). Captured live at Festival R4 in Picardie, the clip delivers something the audio alone can’t: raw, headbanging energy and a stage presence that dismantles any notion of classical restraint.
In our exclusive Q&A, the band articulated what amounts to a genuine manifesto — their slogan, “THE STRING REVOLUTION IS ON!“, isn’t a marketing hook but a compositional philosophy. The approach: forge new bowing and fingering techniques that acoustically replace guitar and keyboard textures before ever touching a pedal. The result, with Laure Le Prunenec adding depth and drama, is one of the most genuinely original things we’ve covered this year. [Read the full Q&A + Watch the video]
— REVIEWS —
Lazer — Far Away: Vienna-based Heavy Psych quartet Lazer arrive at their debut with a record that knows exactly what it wants to be — and executes it with a discipline that many first albums lack. “Far Away,” released March 4 via StoneFree Records, is nine tracks of monolithic rhythm, layered guitar work, and Atmospheric control, anchored by the warm, expressive vocals of Tanja “Aunty” Peinsipp. The reference points are clear — Elder, Mars Red Sky, Weedpecker — but the band wears them without hiding behind them. [Read the Review]
PSI PHI — PSI PHI: No label machinery, no promotional scaffolding — just four musicians and forty-two minutes of instrumental Progressive Rock that know exactly what they’re doing. Sam Cope (Hammond), Kumar Shome (guitar), Ryan Monro (bass), and Will Hull-Brown (drums) build their self-titled debut around the gatefold-era architecture of British and European Prog — organ-led counterpoint, shifting time signatures, keyboard-guitar dialogue — but engage with that tradition from a position of genuine musicianship rather than nostalgia. The compositional centrepiece is “Demon vs Sinner”: a Symphonic Prog construction that opens in Mellotron territory, escalates through sophisticated voicing and rhythmic complexity, and resolves in an extended guitar solo that feels earned. A strong debut, self-released and self-sufficient. [Read the Review]
— INTERVIEWS —
Sagor Som Leder Mot Slutet — A Decade of Devastation and the Mountain Called IV: A conversation with one of the most uncompromising voices in contemporary Scandinavian Doom — a band for whom a decade of work has led to their most focused and devastating record yet. Full interview on the site. [Read the Interview]
Unité Douleur — Pollen Haze, and the Architecture of Feeling: Unité Douleur are a French quartet whose EP “Pollen Haze” (March 21, 2026) navigates Progressive Rock, Alternative, and Post-Rock without fully committing to any of them — which turns out to be their strength. The name itself, which translates as pain management unit, came to founder Dino while staring at a hospital department plaque: unity built from individual pain, brought into a collective space. Their music follows the same logic — compositions begun before the band existed, shaped season by season through rehearsal, with influences spanning Deftones, The Cure, and Neurosis. The EP moves from winter (“Below Zero,” their debut) into spring: nerves waking up, old scars reopening, something still growing. That arc is as precise compositionally as it is conceptually, and the result is one of the more emotionally coherent short-form releases we’ve reviewed this cycle. [Read the Interview]
— NEWS —
Quantum Fantay — “Vernal EquinoX” (Official Visualizer) | The Butterfly EffeX — Out May 15: Belgian instrumental Space Rock/Progressive Rock outfit Quantum Fantay unveiled the official visualizer for “Vernal EquinoX”, the lead single from their upcoming album “The Butterfly EffeX,” due May 15, 2026 via Progressive Promotion Records. Eight tracks, flute, duduk, cello layered over the core quartet — and a preorder open now. An album worth watching. [Read the News + Watch the Visualizer]
Gozu — “Corinthian Leatherface” | Gozu VI — Out May 15 via Blacklight Media/Metal Blade
Boston Stoner/Fuzz Rock outfit Gozu dropped “Corinthian Leatherface”, the latest single from their long-awaited sixth album Gozu VI, also landing May 15 via Blacklight Media/Metal Blade Records. Produced and mixed by Benny Grotto at Mad Oak Studios, the record was forged through two years of near-nightly guitar work — emotionally roughed-up material that hits accordingly. [Read the News + Stream the Single]
— HIDDEN RARITIES —
Ballettirosadimacchia — The Forgery That Fooled the World: This week’s Hidden Rarities is unlike anything we’ve covered in 57 previous entries. For decades, the self-titled album of Ballettirosadimacchia circulated through international record fairs as a lost “Holy Grail” of mid-1970s Italian Progressive Rock — complete with a Rockit Enterprises label and catalogue number RIES 74, firmly placing it at the Symphonic Prog apex. Collectors paid staggering sums. Reference catalogues cited it as canonical. Then the inconsistencies surfaced. The pressing origin claims didn’t hold. The “German producer” and “Canadian pressing” turned out to be decorative mythology. Linguistic analysis and the work of dedicated prog archaeologists eventually revealed the truth: the album was most likely recorded in the late 1980s or early 1990s — and the band behind it wasn’t Italian at all. They were from Osaka, Japan. The Italian pseudonyms — Tonino Leo Ucchi, Antonio Sassada, Gianni Mazzi, Marcello Taddeo Matteotti — were the final layer of a meticulous pre-internet deception, built in genuine admiration for a genre that has always had a devoted Japanese following. It is one of the most extraordinary stories in the history of prog collecting, and we documented all of it. [Read Hidden Rarities #58]
— SPOTIFY PLAYLIST —
PRJ Spotify Playlist — Psych / Space / Krautrock — April 2026
A new thematic playlist is live — pure Psych, Space Rock, and Krautrock in one continuous journey. [Read the Article]
Stream on Spotify:
— PRJ COMPILATION — Vol. XVI: Five Continents, One Consciousness —
The sixteenth entry in the PRJ compilation series is live on YouTube — five continents, one unbroken sonic thread. An exclusive article accompanies the stream.
Stream on YouTube:
— PRJ YOUTUBE CHANNEL —
High Peaks — Demo [19xx, Full Demo] — a raw, archival upload continuing PRJ‘s work preserving overlooked and hard-to-find recordings.
Stream on YouTube:
Morto — Abismos De Locura (Official Lyric Video) — created entirely by PRJ. Another lyric video production added to the catalog.
Watch the official lyric video on YouTube: