Big Big Train

Big Big Train is a progressive rock group from Bournemouth, United Kingdom, active since 1990. The band is based around founding member Gregory Spawton, also listed as Greg Spawton, and has worked with a changing line-up over time. Members associated with the group include Andy Poole, Ian Cooper, Martin Read, Steve Hughes, Tony Müller, Phil Hogg, Sean Filkins, David Longdon, Nick D’Virgilio, Dave Gregory, Danny Manners, Rachel Hall, Rikard Sjöblom, Carly Bryant, David Foster, Alberto Bravin, Clare Lindley and Oskar Holldorff. The group releases music through Big Big Train Ltd and is tagged as crossover prog and progressive rock.

Early years and first releases

The band forms in 1990. Its first songs appear on a demo cassette recorded on 8-track and released in October 1991, followed by live shows. Another early demo, From the River to the Sea, is re-recorded and issued as a self-financed CD in May 1992, after which the band plays higher-profile gigs in England. A second demo, The Infant Hercules, appears in January 1993. The band then spends around six months writing its first proper album, Goodbye to the Age of Steam, which is recorded over two weeks in July 1993.

After this, Big Big Train signs to the progressive rock label GEP, alongside IQ. Goodbye to the Age of Steam receives a strong response and is later reissued in Japan with a bonus track.

Line-up changes and 1990s releases

Ian Cooper leaves the band for family reasons, and live activity is paused while a replacement is sought and new material is written. Recording of the follow-up album starts in July 1995, with Greg filling in on keyboards, and continues intermittently until completion about 18 months later. Tony Müller joins on keyboards during these sessions. Some songs are first performed at the band’s only show from this period at the Astoria in London.

English Boy Wonders is released in autumn 1997, before the project runs out of money to complete it fully. The album combines progressive rock influences associated with Genesis and Van der Graaf Generator with indie-pop influences linked to XTC and The Cure. Steve Hughes leaves in September 1998 and is replaced by Pete Hibbit.

2000s development

After a period of irregular writing and recording, Bard is released in February 2002. Around this time Steve Hughes rejoins the band. Sean Filkins is then recruited as vocalist in place of original singer Martin Read, and Gathering Speed follows in March 2004. That album is a concept record about a fighter pilot in the summer of 1940 and marks a shift towards classic prog-rock territory with post-rock influences.

The Difference Machine is released in September 2007 and raises the band’s profile. It includes extensive contributions from Pete Trewavas of Marillion, Dave Meros of Spock’s Beard, and Nick D’Virgilio, then associated with Spock’s Beard, Genesis and Tears For Fears.

In 2008 the band reissues English Boy Wonders as an updated and completed version, with some parts re-recorded and the album fully remixed by Rob Aubrey.

David Longdon era and later albums

In 2009 Sean Filkins and Steve Hughes leave and are replaced by David Longdon and Nick D’Virgilio. Longdon has previously recorded for Epic Records in the 1990s and is signed to Rondor Music. His earlier band The Gifthorse supports Kirsty MacColl, Blur and The Pogues. He is invited to audition as a possible replacement for Phil Collins in Genesis and works with Tony Banks, Mike Rutherford and producer Nick Davis on recordings that later become Calling All Stations, though Ray Wilson is eventually preferred. In 2008 Martin Orford of IQ invites Longdon to sing on The Old Road, recorded by Rob Aubrey.

Longdon joins Big Big Train in time for The Underfall Yard, released in 2009. The album becomes the band’s best-selling release and receives significant critical acclaim. The 41-minute EP Far Skies Deep Time follows in 2010. English Electric is issued in two parts, with the first appearing in 2012 and the second in 2013.

Folklore arrives in 2016, followed by Grimspound in 2017. A companion release, The Second Brightest Star, draws on unreleased songs from the Folklore and Grimspound sessions. Merchants of Light, a live album released in 2018, enters the Official UK Rock Album Chart at number two. The Grand Tour follows in 2019 and becomes the band’s first album to reach the top 40 of the Official UK Album Chart. The band’s first UK tour takes place in autumn 2019, followed by the live Blu-ray Empire, filmed at the sold-out Hackney Empire show.

Planned European and North American tours in 2020 are cancelled during the Covid pandemic. The band returns to the studio in November 2020 and releases Common Ground in 2021 as its thirteenth studio album. David Longdon dies in 2021.