Refestramus return this week with their third studio album, “Morri’s Rock Boutique,” a nine-track release scheduled to be on all streaming media this March 20, 2026, via Melodic Revolution Records.Prog UK calls “Morri’s Rock Boutique” “enjoyably vibrant and hooky.”Echoes and Dust praises the album’s “cinematic landscape with its surrealistic wonders, ghost-town amusement parks, and the haunting ghost that spooks the location”!Powerplay writes the album features “Grown up prog full of Great musicianship and songwriting.”The order link for the album on digital and CD is refestramus.bandcamp.com/album/morri-s-rock-boutique “Morri’s Rock Boutique” charts a path through collapse and illusion toward clarity—where the joke turns serious: right and wrong still exist, and you still answer to them.A concept album about surviving the absurd—emotionally, spiritually, and politically— “Morri’s Rock Boutique” moves through storms of loss, collapse, and memory toward moments of humor, tenderness, and human connection. Blending folklore, mental health, myth, and modern life into an eclectic progressive-rock soundscape, the record explores the fragile beauty of becoming: not perfection, but refinement.Across the album, each song presents its own vignette. “Storms” frames a human life like a thunderstorm—powerful, beautiful, and temporary. “The Lucky Ones” nods to the Sermon on the Mount’s upside-down blessings and features Crack the Sky guitarist Rick Witkowski. “Tonight, Tonight, Tonight, Tonight, Tonight” (feat. Lynx of Old Blood) plays like a David Lynch noir—dreamlike, unstable, and haunted by the question of what’s real and what’s remembered—until the only way out is forgiveness.“The Cossack’s Dream,” featuring Kansas electric violinist Joe Deninzon, is Refestramus’ English-language adaptation of a traditional Slavic song. “Lakeview Samurai” is a surreal character sketch set in Chicago—part satire, part fever dream. “Hell or NYC?” features Van der Graaf Generator saxophonist David Jackson, leaning into the album’s vertigo and dark comedy.The record’s culminating epic, “Deathless,” draws on Slavic folklore’s Kashchey the Deathless—a figure who feeds on conflict and feels at home in the smoke of war—unfolding as a three-part suite: “Above Volokov’s Mill,” “Goodbye, America!,” and “And He Always Will.”“Morri’s Rock Boutique” is produced by Ian Beabout, mostly in Dan Bozek’s studio at Aardvark Productions in Steubenville, Ohio. The group Refestramus is a Chicago-based progressive rock project blending literate songwriting, political reflection, and classic prog influences. Led by Derek Ferguson (songwriter, drums), Refestramus features Jan Christiana (vocals/keys/guitars/bass) and Dyanne Potter Voegtlin (keys/vocals) of Octarine Sky, with Mitch Lawrence (saxophones, clarinet). (The CD edition includes two bonus tracks not available on streaming or vinyl.)
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-view-from-the-writing-instrument--1023245/support.
Show more
Show less
Apr 3 20264 mins
10 mins
6 mins
6 mins