(Neo Progressive) Merchants Vice - Amber (2003), FLAC (image+.cue+artwork), lossless

- Les Wardle / lead vocals
- Nick Martin / guitar
- Mark English / keyboards
- Chas Allen / drums
- Paul Brown / bass
- Nick Martin, Mark English, Chas Allen, Keith Blakemore-Noble / backing vocals

Flighty keyboard solos ala Clive Nolan, a vocalist who sounds like a Nick Barrett/Paul Wrightson combination, and a strong IQ/PENDRGON/ARENA compositional flavour overall: it's hard to get any more neo-prog than MERCHANT'S VICE. The band was formed in 1997 around vocalist Les Wardle, keyboardist Mark English and drummer Chas Allen. Guitarist Nick Martin (MEDICINE MAN) later joined them alongwith bassist Kevin Rowe, who was later replaced by Paul Brown (JANISON EDGE, MEDICINE MAN).
In 2001, the band released a 3-track demo titled "A Story to Tell" and in 2003, a full-length album called "Amber" containing 8 tracks of pure neo reminiscent of PENDRAGON, IQ and especially early ARENA. Some passages also bear a little resemblance to PALLAS, GREY LADY DOWN and TWELFTH NIGHT. It is a consistent album that centers around Mark English's keyboards and Les Wardle's distinctive vocals. The guitar usually takes a back seat although Nick Martin does lash out with a fine solo here and there. An entertaining promising debut album which, btw, was mixed by Rob Aubrey, known for his work with IQ and JADIS.
Fans of IQ, PENDRAGON and especially ARENA will want to keep an eye on the VICE.

Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 3 from 29. August 2011
EAC extraction logfile from 6. November 2014, 21:09
Merchants Vice / Amber
Used drive  : TEAC    CD-W516EB   Adapter: 0  ID: 0
Read mode               : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache      : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No
Read offset correction                      : 685
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out          : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks   : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations       : Yes
Used interface                              : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Used output format              : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate                : 1024 kBit/s
Quality                         : High
Add ID3 tag                     : Yes
Command line compressor         : C:\Program Files (x86)\FLAC_1.3.0\flac.exe
Additional command line options : -6 -V -T "ARTIST=%artist%" -T "TITLE=%title%" -T "ALBUM=%albumtitle%" -T "DATE=%year%" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%tracknr%" -T "GENRE=%genre%" -T "COMMENT=%comment%" %source% -o %dest%
TOC of the extracted CD
     Track |   Start  |  Length  | Start sector | End sector
    ---------------------------------------------------------
        1  |  0:00.06 |  7:31.40 |         6    |    33870
        2  |  7:31.46 |  7:10.15 |     33871    |    66135
        3  | 14:41.61 |  6:46.50 |     66136    |    96635
        4  | 21:28.36 | 11:45.46 |     96636    |   149556
        5  | 33:14.07 |  9:05.64 |    149557    |   190495
        6  | 42:19.71 |  6:05.20 |    190496    |   217890
        7  | 48:25.16 |  2:47.69 |    217891    |   230484
        8  | 51:13.10 | 12:30.42 |    230485    |   286776
Range status and errors
Selected range
     Filename Y:\EAC\wurensh\Merchants Vice\Merchants Vice - Amber.wav
     Peak level 99.0 %
     Extraction speed 7.4 X
     Range quality 99.9 %
     Test CRC 2667D65B
     Copy CRC 2667D65B
     Copy OK
No errors occurred
AccurateRip summary
Track  1  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [D2C591A4]  (AR v2)
Track  2  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [136BCAE2]  (AR v2)
Track  3  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [B2CBADF2]  (AR v2)
Track  4  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [581B2C3C]  (AR v2)
Track  5  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [12C5A05C]  (AR v2)
Track  6  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [D583343A]  (AR v2)
Track  7  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [AE785320]  (AR v2)
Track  8  accurately ripped (confidence 1)  [D668838A]  (AR v2)
All tracks accurately ripped
End of status report
==== Log checksum CB3EB69B0CFE4C9D86C0A389E0602B4CE82E5A5634F5264043A4DCFED9A5D502 ====

REM GENRE "Progressive Rock"
REM DATE 2003
REM DISCID 730EEF08
REM COMMENT "ExactAudioCopy v1.0b3"
PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
TITLE "Amber"
FILE "Merchants Vice - Amber.flac" WAVE
  TRACK 01 AUDIO
    TITLE "Reason To Change"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 00 00:00:00
    INDEX 01 00:00:06
  TRACK 02 AUDIO
    TITLE "Storyteller"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 07:31:46
  TRACK 03 AUDIO
    TITLE "Glass Child"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 14:41:61
  TRACK 04 AUDIO
    TITLE "Intoxicated"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 21:28:36
  TRACK 05 AUDIO
    TITLE "The Hollow Man"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 33:14:07
  TRACK 06 AUDIO
    TITLE "End Of Story"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 42:19:71
  TRACK 07 AUDIO
    TITLE "Dark Before The Dawn"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 48:25:16
  TRACK 08 AUDIO
    TITLE "All Our Lives"
    PERFORMER "Merchants Vice"
    INDEX 01 51:13:10

[CUETools log; Date: 08.11.2014 18:32:29; Version: 2.1.4]
Pregap length 00:00:06.
[CTDB TOCID: 2rtj7Y0ra6pLgB.1Dkvq2no1jRo-] disk not present in database.
[AccurateRip ID: 0013682f-00819a03-730eef08] found.
Track   [  CRC   |   V2   ] Status
 01     [51cf3489|d2c591a4] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 02     [d983ec7a|136bcae2] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 03     [ffdd33fc|b2cbadf2] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 04     [7996620b|581b2c3c] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 05     [f35c91fb|12c5a05c] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 06     [60b86ab1|d583343a] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 07     [a62c704b|ae785320] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
 08     [0c8e726b|d668838a] (0+1/1) Accurately ripped
Track Peak [ CRC32  ] [W/O NULL] [  LOG   ]
 --   99,0 [2667D65B] [402CCE1E]   CRC32
 01   97,5 [1676F412] [9FC80731]
 02   99,0 [4FDA6095] [AE57FA85]
 03   97,4 [82B489BD] [9FA6CF08]
 04   98,6 [D3F6B210] [8568AA0F]
 05   98,9 [0526F3AE] [F4165BD4]
 06   98,5 [E6910CDD] [85714E0B]
 07   90,0 [3EBA1A6F] [ACA2BC62]
 08   98,7 [05DE49C4] [1C1FB3EE]