Clouds

Clouds - 1-2-3

 

You would like to think that if in the second half of the sixties, your band got a support slot with Jimi Hendrix, a regular spot at the Marquee Club in Wardour Street, a Billboard Magazine review that screams “This band will be a giant”, cited as a big influence by Rick Wakeman & Keith Emerson, name checked by David Bowie & Pete Townsend, oh, and signed by Brian Epstein, that your place would be reserved in the Rock & Roll hall of fame.

Scotland 1964 - The Premiers were a soul band that included Ian Ellis (vocals) and Harry Hughes (drums) that were well known on the circuit. In an effort to boost their success they added Billy Ritchie on organ, who’s busy and flamboyant musicianship quickly rubbed the other musicians up the wrong way causing their departure, thus leaving just Ian, Harry, Billy and a rather large dilemma.

London 1966 – Ian Ellis had moved to bass, the trio had moved to London and renamed themselves 1-2-3. While their new line-up and style had not worked on the Scottish Club circuit, they were quickly absorbed into the London scene and signed to Brian Epstein’s NEMS management company.

London 1967 – Following the death of Brian Epstein, Robert Stigwood takes control of NEMS and decides to send 1-2-3 on a cabaret tour of North England, fitting in around comedians, ventriloquists & jugglers.  

So on returning to London and seeing The Nice steal their thunder must have been almost as depressing as sharing a dingy Sheffield club dressing room with a comedy balloonist. Their fortune seemed on the upturn after being signed by future Chrysalis Label partner Terry Ellis who changed their name to Clouds.

Their first single, released on Island in 1969 is the very hard to come by “Make No Bones About It”, a superb pop song backed by the proto-prog “Heritage”.

Despite successful American tours and three superb albums, by 1971 Chrysalis were putting all their effort into Jethro Tull and the Clouds parted.

 1-2-3 has since been given a re-appraisal by Music magazines (for whatever that’s worth) for their precursory influence on progressive rock. The only official release is on “Up Above our Heads - Clouds 1966-71 2CD anthology” as a bonus track. Recorded live at The Marquee, 1-2-3’s version of Paul Simon’s “America” was recorded a year before it was released on Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bookends”. Paul had originally recorded a demo in London which passed to 1-2-3 by studio engineer Stu Francis, along with “Sound Of Silence” they performed this at the Marquee Club in April 1967. In the audience was Yes vocalist Jon Anderson, who would use this arrangement on their own version several years later.

It’s a shame Clouds do not have the same rock mag pass, the 2 CD anthology shows them to have a superb collection of songs, smartly captured with some great performances.

 

For more information on Clouds visit www.cloudsmusic.com

 

If you don't listen to what I say, you'll hear what I do

If you don't listen to what I say, you'll hear what I do

Sound limiters

After years of telling people I won't plug into sound limiters, welcome to the McGregor £15 100 watt amp. It sounds like a bag of farts but if you don't care about my equipment, I don't care about what you have to listen to. 

I have no problem playing quietly, in fact I'm happier performing at lower volume. I've even had shows where I can't hear what I'm playing over people talking, but if I get paid I'm fine with it. 

What I object to is the arbitrary cutting of power to my equipment which in the past has damaged it and left me a huge bill to cover. The last time this happened was about ten years ago, not because I was playing at any sort of volume (this was the aforementioned can't hear myself over the talking scenario) but every time someone shouted or laughed the power cut off. 

Cutting the power to an amp means the fan stops working, this stops keeping the power sink cool and can cause damage, which is what happened to me.

So please, keep the sound / noise indicators, ask the band to keep below it or even better give them a contract that means they won't get paid if thier music exceeds the levels, rather than destroying thier equipment. 

Keith Emerson - maximum punk until the end

Keith Emerson – Maximum Punk until the end.

 

I’ve never understood the divine worship of the Sex Pistols mythological defeat of the dusty old guard, supposedly symbolised (with an equal amount of vitriolic hate) by Emerson Lake & Palmer. To me, using whips and daggers to play a Hammond organ was far more punk than nearly swearing on TV.

Yet again it’s time to bid bon voyage to another musical great; Keith Emerson was a rare musician whose ability was only bested by his high octane performance. His assault on his Hammond and the playing of a spinning piano to huge stadium audiences can be found on You Tube, however it’s time to close our eyes and listen to my favourite Keith Emerson album. 

Before ELP had even thought of its first Opus, Keith found fame with The Nice, formed out of PP Arnold’s backing band. Their debut “The Thoughts Of Emerlist Davjack” was released in the heady year of 1967, the LP is often mentioned in passing as the first proto-prog record, it is in my view one of the finest psychedelic albums of all time. Like many of its contemporary releases, Emerlist Davjack swerves from the lighter pop of the title track to the heavy rock of “Bonnie K” with alarming ease. Whilst the psychedelic box is ticked on tracks “Dawn” & “Flower King Of Flies”, while  “War & Peace” is a full on rock jazz freakout with classical undertones, overtones and wombling free tones. Side 1 concludes with a Hammond offensive on Dave Brubeck’s “Blue Rondo à la Turk”, side 2 concludes proceedings with the Floyd meets Pretty Things epic “The Cry Of Eugene” which cuts out at around four and a half minutes, almost just before it reaches what you think will be the ultimate crescendo finish. This is more than just a historical curiosity; it’s a truly great under the radar album. 

My copy is a mono version which I believe is a dedicated mix rather than a fold down, having just listened to a stereo version for the first time. It has the splendid pink label which puts to rest a sometimes quoted “pub fact” that the Immediate grey labels were mono & the pink were stereo. 

Keith would move on to grander musical ventures in 1970 with ELP who were at the shaper end of progressive-rock throughout the upcoming decades, giving performances that made other Prog bands of the era look like a bunch of woodwork teachers playing to a pub filled with real ale enthusiasts. The albums “Pictures At An Exhibition” & “Brain Salad Surgery” will always have a soft spot in my record collection but my heart will always be with Emerlist Davjack, a genuine black eye kaleidoscope in all its raw punk beauty. 

Keith Emerson & The Nice are neatly summed up on an Immediate sampler of the album by the great late John Peel thusly:-

“1967 was a strange year for pop music with groups experimenting with new sounds and bouncing on and off bandwagons with dizzying speed and agility. They were calling themselves ridiculous names and regretting it shortly. The Nice came together in a void and will be here when the others are in pantomime in Wolverhampton.”

Or making butter commercials…

 

Sir George Martin - All Quiet On The Mersey Front

Of all the well known producers that have graced recording studios over the last 100 years, none can compare to the exhaustive résumé of Sir George Martin, who sadly passed away yesterday aged 90.

George will always be synonymous with The Fab Four, but even before George Harrison insulted his tie, Martin had successfully turned round the fortunes of the Parlophone arm of EMI. Taking over  as A&R Manager of what was regarded as a label for EMI's insignificant acts in 1955, Martin had released a discography of hugely successful comedy acts from Peter Sellers, The Goons to the groundbreaking satirical "That Was The Week That Was". It was this pedigree of comedy and tape effects that would cement his relationship with The Beatles, who were themselves huge Goons fans.

 

The Rubber Soul to White album "golden years" contains many of the tape effects that many believe where at the vanguard of a new sound. In fact, Les Paul had used different recording speeds back in the 1950 on his album "The New Sound". The first Beatles track to use a tape different speed was also the first Beatle song that George Martin performed on.

Misery was recorded on the infamous day long session of February the 11th, on which the bulk of their debut album was recorded. On February 20th, with the Beatles out touring with Helen Shapiro, George Martin added some piano embellishment first heard after the line "I Remember all the little things we done..."  The standard speed for the twin track EMI BTR tape machines was 15 ips (inches per second). To facilitate playing the tricky piano run, the track was bounced onto another machine that ran at 30 ips, the overdub was then performed an octave lower at half the speed (15 ips), which when played back at the original speed gives the piano sound a unique timbre. Martin would again use this approach for the baroque piano solo in Rubber Soul's "In My Life".

His creative input into The Beatles is immeasurable, it was his idea for the crashing chord at the start of "A Hard Day's Night" which he also played piano on and starting "Can't Buy Me Love" with the chorus.

Together with a long and winding list of artists and industry awards that would need eight arms to hold them, George's work as an arranger and composer, leaves behind a staggering legacy of achievement.

Old faces, new records

At the dusty end of of the year, it's usually a spartan offering of new releases that will generally be long forgotten by the end of year, in polls that themselves will be written in early November and often with a Goldfish view of the years music.

2016 kicked off with the beautifully packaged Blackstar from David Bowie, followed almost immediately by his untimely passing. It's impossible not to listen to this album without one ear in the grave and if any musician was going to make his own mortality an artistic statement it would be Bowie. I can't think of another performer with the breadth and commitment to his work than David, on his final album with the black on black printed font, a stunning book and the record itself neatly but securely behind a cut out star, this is a fitting farewell to us all, albeit with the suitable humour somewhere between Spinal Tap and  Disaster Area. 

The music is stark and moving without any overt sentimentality, this is by far my favourite Bowie album since nineteen eighty something.

It's been over twenty years since Britpop and twenty since Kula Shaker joined it's ranks. After the first two albums; both of which I still love very much, like many other sailors of the good ship Dadrock, Kula Shaker went down by the end of the decade, their buoyancy not aided by front man Crispian Mills making some foolish and ill thought out comments regarding Hitler. Having resurfaced in the mid 2000's and released several new albums, I made a pretty easy prediction about the new release K 2.0 - It'll have some sitar on it. Getting it on the turntable my guess was instantly confirmed, however the Deep Purple vibe has been replaced with a Ronnie Lane / Dylan one, which in itself is no bad thing. So while it's missing the great organ playing of Jay Darlington and in my view isn't as strong as thier first two albums, this is still a fine and worthy record to add to the collection.

The sight of another new live Who release in the record rack brings about mixed feelings. Does a record of Pete & Rodger's appearance in Hyde Park last year really add anything new to the Who cannon? Apart from those who were there who would want it, who is buying this stuff? Clearly people like me! Whilst there is nothing new or even vaguely outside of the park, the inclusion of "Pictures Of Lily" & "I Can See For Miles" make the set list partially enticing (just). 

What is clear from the outset is that both Pete & Rodger were on form that day and the sound is fairly accurate, lovingly reproduced on yet another Abbey Road Half Speed Mastered release, although live sound of bands today is another moan for another day. The only clunker is Pino's buried in the mix bass solo on My Generation. It's not an essential Who purchase, but with the inclusion of a DVD this is a fairly good value triple LP version of The Who's last gasps.



Spring is on it's way and with it two red hot releases are available for pre-order from State Records. The first being Thee Jezebels follow up to last years fine single and it's a 4 track EP. The second is The Galileo 7 Cruel Bird, available on purple vinyl. Get your orders in now at http://staterecs.com

Pet Sounds as Brian Intended

Analogue Productions Pet Sounds – The Beach Boys As Brian Intended

 

While I’ve recently lamented over some huge holes in mono re-issues, The Beach Boys “Pet Sounds” has one of the most thorough re-issue program of any album ever. So why are Beach Boys fans slavering at the thought of another batch from Analogue Productions?

Released back in the spring of 1966, Brian Wilson cites The Beatles “Rubber Soul” as an inspiration and a call to arms to write what he described as “sophisticated feeling music”. With The Beach Boys band on the road, Brian Wilson worked with lyricist Tony Asher to create songs that sent a seismic shock across the world of pop. At the epicentre, the rest of the band upon returning from tour were worried that such a departure would be too radical, despite these reservations they threw themselves into the project and worked hard embellishing & augmenting the songs. The album’s backing tracks were recorded on a 4 track recorder, which was then “bounced down” to one track on an 8 track recorder, from which other tracks were recorded & bounced down.  Due to Brian being deaf in one ear, He only produced a mono mix of the album with which Capitol also created an electronically reproduced stereo version for the much larger American stereo market. In 1997 Mark Linett would create the first genuine stereo version from the various tapes that were at his disposal, however due to technical reasons there were some variations over the original mix. Linett’s remix is highly regarded and is certainly worth having, but I feel there is a certain “photo-shopping the Sistine Chapel” feel to it. Mixing is as much a valid part of the artistic process as any other so I’m happy to stick with Wilson’s vision rather than what is admittedly a very good approximation of it. 

My original copy is from 1966 on the Capitol label that was pressed at EMI’s Hayes factory. I always thought that the lack of clarity & bass of Wilson’s multi-layered masterpiece was due to poor masters supplied from US Capitol; however I’m assured by several people that the US version sounds pretty much the same, along with the 2008 vinyl re-issue. 

About 4 years ago someone put me on to the infamous “two-fer” version.  Released as a bonus LP with “Carl & The Passions” 72 Album “So Tough”, it has long been regarded by Beach Boys aficionados as the finest sounding version. I picked up a clean copy soon after and they were right on the money.

  

So when I read the news that Analogue Productions were going to re-release limited editions of the Beach Boys catalogue, my ears certainly pricked up and now Pet Sounds has arrived it’s time to see if it was worth the wait. 

The high quality record sleeve comes in the Stoughton tip-on jackets & is to American Records what Garrod & Lofthouse are to British ones, the inner sleeve is a high quality “rice paper” style and the record is a quality pressed 200 gram beauty. 

Getting the record on the turntable I’m stunned by how much detail you can hear and the clarity of Wilson’s lavish mix, along with bass that I never thought was there.  At many points throughout the album I’m convinced that I’m listening to a stereo mix, the gold standard of great separation and recording expertise. The first song recorded for the album “Sloop John B” was the only one that initially was put down on three track and subsequently treated to more bounce downs than most of the others. Like every track on this re-issue, it sounds better than ever. An often repeated myth about “Sloop” is that Capitol forced Wilson to include this song on Pet Sounds. Beach Boys historian Brad Elliott points to the fact that Wilson had this song included from the outset and it being on the LP was completely his choice. Analogue Productions Pet Sounds is sourced from the original master tapes and produced with the attention to detail throughout the whole record manufacturing process that simply wasn’t a commercial option 50 years ago. This is such a great improvement on the original release, I’m forced to use the word “lush” in describing the sonic package. More importantly the emotions that Brian wanted to load this music with, gushes forth even more than I did in those previous sentences. Being able to connect with music takes many elements, dynamics is certainly one of them and itself a big looser to current “brick-walled” limiting. When the timpani bursts in on “I’m Waiting For The Day” you should feel it’s entry dynamically, rather than it being another sound. Trust Me, on this re-issue you feel it. “God Only Knows” is moving in any format but I’m moved literally to tears hearing it on this album, Brian’s aim of making a “feelings” album has been achieved in this household. 

Amen

 

Full marks to Analogue Productions on this package, I will certainly be upgrading other Beach Boys albums this year.

 

Notes- 

Due to the limited run of this version, it’s not available at your usual run of the mill outlets, for example Amazon are still selling the 2008 Capitol version. 

2016 Analogue Productions version available From:  Acoustic Sounds - http://store.acousticsounds.com/d/95587/The_Beach_Boys-Pet_Sounds-200_Gram_Vinyl_Record

 

For a more detailed read about the making of this album, Brad Elliott’s liner notes for the 1999 Mono/stereo CD re-release are here: http://www.bradelliott.com/writings/ps.html

This 1999 CD release is a very good version of the Mono/Stereo mixes which can be picked up for sub £5, there is a more recent Mono version on gold HD CD from Audio Fidelity (2009) that is supposed to be superior, but be prepared to dig a lot deeper - £30 and upwards.

2015 - I salute you.

Happy New Year Record Lovers.

I spent Christmas & New Year in New York, since getting back its been a roller coaster of shows & rehearsals. We're slowly gathering some new songs for the return of Billy Wears Dresses, it could be a while though. On a far more productive band, The Gallileo 7 have just recorded two new songs for a new single along with some other tracks for a live release. There are lots of upcoming shows for the UK & Europe this year so I'm looking forward to seeing you there. 

I've also been busy on a completely unrelated to music project too, which is why I've taken so long to write another blog update. More about that another time.

2015 was a phenomenal year for turntable sales, with HMV reporting the sale of a record player every minute in the week up to Christmas. It was also a terrific year for new music & re-issues with record sales continuing to soar.

As always I shy away from proclamations of the BEST of 2015 with all the fanfare of arrogance that that entails but I’m happy to shine the light on my favourites of the year.

New Albums  

Noel Gallagher, The Libertines, Gaz Coombes, Weller & The Family Silver all released superb slices of wax, there are though two albums I keep coming back to.

Squeeze’s “From The Cradle To The Grave” is the long awaited follow up to 1998’s patchy Domino and is a real return to form LP, with the added bonus of exclusive to vinyl songs on side four – Nice touch lads.

Joe Jackson’s “Fast Forward” is also a welcome return to pop after a long period of jazz, classical & film music, producing a haunting and alluring album that isn’t a million miles away from later XTC albums.

 

New Singles

With so many other polls raving about The Optic Nerve’s “Penelope Tuesday”, plus it being label mates (State Records) I feel it could be seen as bunking on the bandwagon to pile yet more praise on this 45, but it fully deserves it so I will. Make sure you order it asap as stocks are running dangerously low. 

Just making it in time (it literally arrived on Christmas Eve) was Phoenix “Alone On Christmas Day” a great version of Beach Boys Mike Love’s unreleased song. Plus the added “Bill Murray” factor (who appears on backing vocals) makes this a strong contender for 2016’s alternative festive records.

Re-Issues 

On the album front The Zombies “Odessey and Oracle” is head, shoulders and ankles above everyone on the long player front, lovingly half speed mastered in mono at Abbey Road it’s another triumph & wake up call to all the other mono albums in waiting. 

Of the 7 inch-ers, The Who singles box sets have come close to being what the Beatles mono set was last year, certainly the Brunswick Box is sonic perfection and an absolute must for any Who fan, even if you do own the originals these sound so much better.

 

Christmas Eve saw the debut of The Beatles on streaming services, Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play, Tidal, Amazon Prime, Slacker, Groove, Rhapsody and Deezer all currently have the Fab Four on their roster. 

Quite a number of people thought I’d be angry about this! Let me say this again: - I’m not anti-digital!

I download music, I have about 6 iPods and I stream films & programs. I think it is good news that subscribers to these services have access to great music; it’s just a shame that they are using the stereo versions. Streaming is a great way to discover new music, however just like Prince did last year; all of a sudden you can find your favourite albums have been pulled from the service. Streaming also seems to be driving the upturn in record sales, in some part due to the reasons I just mentioned. 

 

2016 has begun with the sad news of the passing of the great David Bowie, my Dad is a huge fan and our house regularly rang with the sounds of these great albums in the seventies. The world has lost one of its greatest artists and will be sadly missed but gladly remembered.