Unitopia is an Australian music group using progressive rock as a framework, but also including elements of world, classical,jazz, hard rock, and groove. Unitopia began when a mutual friend introduced Mark Trueack and Sean Timms after realizing the two had similar musical tastes. Twenty-five years ago, on 25 September 1996, the duo began work on a track which was to become “Take Good Care” and a songwriting partnership developed that led to the band’s debut album ‘More Than a Dream’, which included contributions from conductor/arranger Timothy Sexton and the Adelaide Art Orchestra, Pat Schirippa, Constantine Delo, Bradley Polain and Ian ‘Polly’ Politis. After spending 8 years on the album, More Than A Dream was independently launched in October 2005 to a sell out audience at The Cavern Club, Adelaide. Further live work followed in Australia, including supporting Daryl Braithwaite and playing the Norwood Food and Wine Festival. In March 2006, Canadian label Unicorn Records re-released ‘More Than a Dream’ internationally.
 
Wishing a consistent team both live and in the studio, Trueack and Timms recruited Adelaide instrumentalists Matt Williams (guitar/vocals), Monty Ruggiero (drums), Shireen Khemlani (bass) and Tim Irrgang (percussion) to complete the Unitopia line-up.  In February 2008, Unitopia signed a worldwide publishing deal with Shock Music Publishing, which became Perfect Pitch Publishing in 2010 when publisher Clive Hodson took over the company struggling financially.
 
In July 2008, the track “Lives Go Round” from ‘More Than a Dream’ was included on the CPR Volume 3 compilation CD. In August 2008, Unitopia became the first Australian band to sign to Inside Out Records, the world’s largest progressive rock label, signing a three album deal.
 
On 18 November 2008 Unitopia’s second album ‘The Garden’ was released after 3 years of writing, recording and mastering. The band’s influences stretch all across the progressive scope and make for a very intriguing sound that has one foot in “retro”-70s style progressive while still being able to sound like other artists in the modern progressive scene. They have a rather large sound to them, which is no doubt helped by their 6-member roster. ‘The Garden’, released internationally, is a double CD with 15 tracks and over 100 minutes of music. According to Review Busters “This double disc release is defiantly one for the ages. Unitopia offers a unique blend of progressive rock with some symphonic parts that are incredible. If you never heard of this band then you will want to pick up everything they have to offer, The Garden is a non-stop ride into a progressive sound that is easy on the ears, yet at the same time it offers everything you would have ever wanted from a progressive release.”
 
 “‘The Garden’ is epic, diverse, grandiose, musically brilliant, lyrically complex and just a tad self-indulgent. In short, everything a good prog rock album should be.’ Billboard magazine wrote, “‘The Garden’ is a respectable, nicely crafted example of what prog rock had to offer in 2008. ‘The Garden’ has a lot of heart.”
 
On the release of ‘The Garden’ Cross Rhythms broadcaster Jonathan Bellamy suggested that the message of ‘The Garden’ was hope coming from despair. Mark Trueack agreed. He said, “We try to not be doom and gloom; there’s enough of that from the media, from just general aspects of everyday life, and so we like to say things in a positive way as much as possible. That’s not to say that everything is sort of very, very light and breezy, we do have some very strong feelings about certain areas of concern in this world, but that’s not to say that you have to portray that in a negative way. We always try to be as positive and uplifting and optimistic as we can.”
 
Shireen Khemlani and Mike Stewart left in 2009 but the band was joined by Shaun Duncan on fretless and fretted bass, and Peter Raidel on saxophone.
 
With this new lineup  Unitopia released their third album ‘Artificial’ in 2010. Jones, Duncan and Raidel were replaced, respectively, by David Hopgood, Craig Kelly and Ian Ritchie, who performed on the More Than A Garden Of Dreams tour of Europe in 2010 which included Summer’s End Festival, a progressive rock festival in England. Prior to its release in Europe on 3rd May and in the US on 4th May, a press release described ‘Artificial’ as using “symphonic, progressive, world, jazz and art rock elements to illustrate the dichotomy of an artificial world that is developing within our real world and how we as human beings relate to each of these worlds.” Rayna and Mark Monforti from the Music in Widescreen website and progrock.com radio have chosen “Artificial” as Best Album and “The Great Reward” as Best Track for their 2010 awards. ‎”Artificial” was proclaimed Album of the Year 2010 by The International Independent Radio (AiiRadio.net), Best Album of 2010 by paperlate.nl, an internet magazine from the Netherlands and nominated by the international Jury of Progawards in Italy for Best Foreign Record and Best Production.

One Night In Europe, released in 2011 is the first double-DVD plus double-CD containing live recordings of the Australian prog band Unitopia. The images were recorded at Cultuurpodium Boerderij in Zoetermeer, The Netherlands on October 15, 2010. This concert was part of the first European tour called ‘The More Than A Garden Of Dreams Tour 2010’. This tour brought the band to The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and Great Britain. Additionally, 5 songs were broadcast and recorded Live On TV Limburg (Live Performance On TV Limburg, The Netherlands): Angeliqua, More Than A Dream, Nothing Lasts Forever, One Day and Reflections. These are available on YouTube on the ‘Video’ page of this website.
 
In 2012 with Ritchie replaced by Daniel Burgess on saxophone, the band released its fourth album ‘Covered Mirror Vol. 1: Smooth As Silk’, in December. It’s a concept project, imagine hearing classics arranged in progressive style.