The name Spirergy will probably sound unfamiliar to most progressive rock fans. The man behind this musical project is British multi-instrumentalist Dave Allen. So far, he has released three full-length albums: Aeon (2023), Journey Beyond (2024), and most recently Wherever Forever (2026). His music derives from many different influences like prog rock, folk rock and jazz rock from the early seventies to the present day. His albums contain excellent music that will surely appeal to fans of Yes, Genesis, Emerson, Lake & Palmer and Mike Oldfield. The editorial team of Background Magazine believes that fairly unknown musical talents in the progressive rock scene deserve some extra attention, so we asked this versatile musician about his past, present and future.

Would you please introduce yourself, and tell our readers how you got into the music business?
"Firstly, thank you for arranging this interview, I very much appreciate the opportunity to appear in Background Magazine,

Dave Allen

and to be able to introduce myself and Spirergy to fellow music lovers. I'm originally from Swansea in South Wales and moved up to Hoylake in Wirral in 2005, where I live with my wife Gill. My musical journey started early in life being involved with singing, acting and performing throughout my time in school. However, I first picked up a Spanish acoustic guitar at the age of eleven. I wrote a basic song which sparked an interest in creating music. I had to persuade my dad to pay for classical guitar lessons, so I could learn to play properly which turned out to be a good move as it would have been difficult to play the complex pieces that are an integral part of progressive rock music. Then, as a teenager, I progressed onto electric and bass guitar and played in several bands in South Wales. I became great friends with Steve Evans (Chasing The Monsoon), a renowned sound engineer. Back then, we set up a recording studio in Swansea, where we would write material together and record local bands."

Which acts influenced you at the time?
"It was in the early seventies that I discovered my passion for progressive rock music, bands such as Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Yes, Genesis, Camel and so many other great bands from that era. They all had an influence on me and still have today."

You released your debut album Aeon in 2023. Why did you choose Spirergy instead of your own name, and what does this name actually mean?
"I originally intended to use my own name when I produced Aeon, but when I looked online at how many thousands of Dave and David Allens there were in the music industry - including many in the prog scene - I felt I needed something more unique. In the late nineties I started writing a science fiction novel, which is still not finished, and I called it Spirergy, a tale all about spiral energy in a dystopian future world. That seemed like a good band name, so I decided to use it instead."

Is Aeon a concept album, and if so, what is the main theme of the album?
"Aeon is not a concept album in the traditional sense. However, there is a sci-fi theme running through it based on future space and time travel, finding new worlds and the human condition imagined from that existence. I wanted the vocals and lyrics to be more like an additional instrument that paints a picture rather than just telling the story. To invoke a bit of mystery that makes you think and interpret the meaning yourself."

Why did you choose to do everything yourself, and not asking other musicians to help you out?
"I suspect that the lives of many of your readers changed dramatically in 2020, just like mine. The covid pandemic came along, and I found myself with a lot of time on my hands and an enormous number of musical ideas still to be recorded. So, I decided to set up a studio in my home with some decent equipment and started recording songs, some of which became Aeon. At that time, during the lock down, it was impossible to collaborate with any other musicians or sound engineers, and I didn't want to wait, so I decided to do it all myself. It was a huge learning curve, but a very rewarding experience. However, it was always my intention to collaborate with other musicians, which I have now done over the last year, with Colin Powell (A Multitude Of One, Nova Cascade), and I'm also working with John Wilkinson (Mama) (Mama is a Genesis tribute band, HS) and Ellesmere and with Colin McKay (The Swan Chorus), so I'm getting there eventually."

Dave Allen

Your voice sometimes sounds like Jon Anderson (Yes) or Pye Hastings (Caravan) because of your high-pitched vocal parts. Is this caused by your influences or did it just happen by chance?
"This is such a huge compliment for me to be mentioned in the same breath as these prog royalties! The answer is a bit of both! In school, I was a boy soprano and when my voice broke, I morphed into an alto-tenor and have always had a high-pitched vocal. In the early seventies when I started writing rock music, I felt my rather angelic, high-pitched voice was a big disadvantage because I couldn't sing like Ian Gillan (Deep Purple) or David Byron (Uriah Heep). Then I heard Jon Anderson sing with Yes and I thought: wow, there's someone singing with an amazing melodic, angelic, ethereal, high-pitched voice and he gave me the motivation to sing in what was a natural way for me, that worked with the progressive rock music I was writing."

You play the guitars and keyboards on the album. Are you a guitarist by nature or a keyboardist. What do you prefer: the guitar or the keyboards?
"As I mentioned earlier, I started out as a guitarist but on listening to Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman playing piano and keyboards, I was totally inspired to at least understand the rudiments and learn to be proficient enough to play the keyboard parts that I was writing. But where I don't have the dexterity to achieve what's in my head, I utilise programming techniques to make up for it. So, to answer your question: I'm a natural guitarist but love to play both. Also, every guitarist has a frustrated drummer trying to get out which is a whole other story!"

You released your first album independently. Have you ever tried to get a record label to release your music?
"You're right, I've released all my albums independently, and so far I've not yet investigated getting involved with a record label. It's not something I thought much about to be honest. My main motivation has always been the thrill and excitement of writing, playing and recording my musical ideas and thankfully, I've been able to do this myself. I'm using Distrokid to list the albums and distribute to streaming services and Bandcamp to sell downloads and CDs which seems to be working out well so far."

One year later you released Journey Beyond (2024). Was it easy to produce a successor so quickly?
"Most of Journey Beyond had already been written by the time Aeon was released, so it was reasonably straightforward to plan a release date for a year ahead. My big challenge for 2024 was to improve the quality of recording and production for Journey Beyond. Aeon was my first ever attempt at producing an album from concept to dispatching the CDs and everything in between. It was a big learning curve, but I really enjoyed the entire process and wanted to tackle the follow up album again myself, which I did and Journey Beyond was released in September 2024."

Is there a special concept behind this album, or are they just random songs put together on an album?
"Just like Aeon, Journey Beyond is not a true concept album, but I wanted to stay with a sci-fi theme and take the listener on a journey to futuristic, imaginary, dystopian worlds and beyond. I'm fascinated by all the unknowns in space and time, but also in human consciousness and spirituality. I wanted to try and capture this void in our knowledge through the music. I love to ponder these questions myself, they stoke my imagination, so I wanted to invoke some of that in the songs for others to experience too."

I sometimes get the feeling that your first two albums contain more progressive rock influences than your latest album. In my opinion, Wherever Forever has more songs you can easily sing along with. Is that accidental or intentional?
"That's an interesting remark, because six of the tracks on Wherever Forever were written before I produced Aeon, back in 2023. I had accumulated at least four albums worth of useable material over the previous few years, so I had to pick the songs I felt would be best to work on first. I guess I was influenced by where my head was at that time, musically. I must have been in a more progressive mind set back then. I think I've always been led by my feelings rather than specific design. If it felt right, I went with it."

After your first two albums, you released in 2025 Richard III and Sanctuary Sky with Riffstone. How did that collaboration come about, and is it easy to combine Riffstone with your solo career?
"Several years ago, my wife Gill had a significant birthday. I was deliberating, what could I get the woman who has everything? I wanted to do something special to mark the occasion. Gill has always been a big fan of Richard III, the much-maligned King of England back in the fifteenth century and I came up with the idea of writing a concept album in the ilk of Six Wives Of Henri VIII and Journey To The Centre Of The Earth by Rick Wakeman and producing a CD of a dozen songs, just for her, as a present. Then, back in February 2025, I heard A Templar's Tale by the amazingly talented Colin Powell, a narrated concept album, played on the radio. It started me thinking that I could re-visit Richard III and produce it properly with narration and make it available to a wider audience. So, I reached out to Colin, to see if he might be interested in a collaboration and hence, Riffstone was born. It is such a privilege to be working with Colin. We have slightly distinctive styles but both love the same kind of music, and I think we get really well together. For a long time, I had wanted to work with other musicians, and this was the natural progression for my own musical development as well. We are about to release our third Riffstone album which I'm really excited about!"

Isn't it difficult for you to decide for which musical you use your compositions?
"I feel incredibly lucky that since 2020, I've been on a rich vein of writing form. I've been producing more than enough material to put forward for collaboration whilst still having a back catalogue ready to produce the next Spirergy album later this year."

As far as I'm concerned, Wherever Forever is just like its two predecessors, a great album. Did you choose a different approach for this album, and what are the lyrics on the album about?
"Thank you, that's very kind of you to say. I tend to approach each album based on the feelings I have at that time. Wherever Forever was slightly different to the previous two albums. It was very much influenced by the dreadful wars happening around the world. Seeing innocent people getting caught up in conflict just breaks my heart and conjures huge emotions that influence my lyrics and the music more generally. I try not to bring current politics and divisions into it, but rather to aim my feelings into a more futuristic world perspective and let the listener make their own judgements. The title track is about a group of people having to leave a destroyed world and head off into the unknown to look for another planet to live on. I just hope it doesn't come to that for us now!"

Songs like Innocent Hearts and It's Here Again sound more radio friendly. They seem destined to be released as singles. Are you hoping for a wider audience this way, or is it just a coincidence?
"I've genuinely not thought about releasing singles from the album, it's purely a coincidence if some of the tracks sound a bit more commercial. I simply selected the songs on the basis they conveyed my thoughts and worked in the context of the album. If it does happen that they generate wider appeal, I would be delighted but it wasn't planned that way."

It seems to me that you are inspired by Mike Oldfield on this album. Am I correct?
"Again, I take that as a big complement, thank you. Mike Oldfield certainly played an influential role in my early music career in the seventies with his groundbreaking Tubular Bells and that iconic style that he has made his own. I can't say that I have actively followed his releases since then, but significant influences do become burned into your subconscious and tend to stay with you, don't they? I often wonder where my song ideas come from because they just seem to pop into my head in the middle of the night, and I have to get up to sing the melody, riff or whatever, into my phone. I currently have over two hundred voice memos from the past few years that I'm working through. It's a very strange process but if I don't do it at night, by the morning it's completely gone from my memory."

Carry Me Home has some nice jazzy piano parts. Are you influenced by jazz as well?
"I'm definitely influenced by jazz, especially jazz rock artists like Al Di Meola, Stanley Clark, Chick Corea, John McLaughlin etcetera. However, I'm particularly influenced by Emerson, Lake & Palmer and Keith Emerson and his amazing piano work which for me, cuts right across jazz, classical and prog music which is my happy place! I truly miss his genius now that he is no longer with us."

Dave Allen in his studio

See It In Your Eyes is a great instrumental piece. Why didn't you include more of this kind of compositions on the album?
"There's a definite possibility that I will include more instrumental work on the next Spirergy album. I experimented a bit on Journey Beyond by including Ethereal Child, a short classical guitar piece and See It In Your Eyes on this new album, but I wasn't sure how it would be received alongside the longer form songs I tend to write. However, the feedback has been good, so it's given me more confidence to go further with instrumental tracks in the future."

All your albums have a fairy tale kind of design. Who is responsible for this great artwork?
"I absolutely love creating artwork for my albums and designing CD booklets and promotional materials, etcetera. It's something I've always enjoyed doing as well as painting in oils and acrylics and producing videos, although I don't have as much time to spend on this as I would like now. For me, the album artwork goes hand in hand with the music. It's all part of the listening experience. Roger Dean is a particular hero of mine. He created the most memorable experiences of my youth when opening a Yes album and discovering works of art like Tales From Topographic Oceans and Relayer, just fantastic! For my Spirergy albums, I use the latest technology as a tool to help create images that work best to represent the music I produce and to provide a visual experience for the listener. This is the only affordable route for independent artists to achieve a decent result without incurring unrecoverable costs."

Do you have any plans of performing your music with a band live on stage, or will it forever be a studio project?
"I never say never to putting a band together and performing live in the future. It's certainly on my bucket list of things I'd like to do. However, there are no plans on the table at the moment, so I'll continue working in the studio and see how things develop."

What has the future in store for you?
"I'm really excited about the future. Colin Powell and I have just finished our third Riffstone album to be released shortly, and I can't wait to hear the feedback. It's a project we are both proud of. I've just finished producing a Spirergy single called Chasing The Rain which didn't make the latest album, but I decided to release it as a bonus track and offer it as a free download for all the wonderful people who have kindly followed me and supported Spirergy on Bandcamp. I've just started working on a new album project with John Wilkinson and Colin McKay which I'm really looking forward to. They are both such talented musicians and song writers and fantastic professionals. It's going to be a wonderful experience. I've worked with Colin McKay over the past twelve months when he did a brilliant job of mixing and mastering Wherever Forever and Chasing The Rain. He is an amazing sound engineer, and his work is game changing for me. And finally, I have started working on the next Spirergy album which I'm aiming to be released towards the end of the summer 2026. So, I guess it's watch this space!"

Thanks for answering all my questions!
"It's been a real pleasure, thank you."