Oriphiel

Sorry for making you do all of this work, Trollheart. Liao Hua takes the vanguard...

I know it can be difficult to juggle so many tasks, but you should know that everyone really does appreciate it (even if it can be hard to tell when people rarely give feedback).

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Trollheart

Note: I'm not doing any full reviews here, particuarly as this album is intended to feature in my journal later in the year, so this will be another short “Love or Hate?” style.



Famous Last Words (1982)

This was the last album to feature founder member and co-creative force Roger Hodgson, and remains my all-time favourite Supertramp album. I feel that Hodgson brought the fun, lighter element to the band, and when he exited their next few albums were all notable for being much more serious and for a sort of darker tone that began with Brother Where You Bound and more or less persisted right through to their, so far, last release. I've loads to say about the album but will reserve that for my actual review in my journal. For now, let's just get down to tracks.

1. Crazy: The classic Supertramp happy piano and a blast on the harmonica gives the song a cheerful feel, yet there's a dark tone of worry underlying it, as in much of this album, as the two friends contemplate life without each other. It's quite commercial, as is much of this album. It's almost like the guys are trying to put a brave face on things, grit their teeth and get through without getting too emotional. You'd certainly know this was a Supertramp song. Bouncy, uptempo, piano driven and a vehicle for Hodgson's higher, almost effeminate at times voice. A solo from John Helliwell on the sax completes the song and we segue directly into
2. Put on your old brown shoes: A song of letting it all go, saying to hell with it and just enjoying life. Davies sings the lead vocal and exults as he grins “Kick out the morning blues/ Who needs a job?/ Who needs the pain and the pressure?” Another uptempo one, with some great harmonica and backing vocals from Heart's Ann and Nancy Wilson.
3. It's raining again: You might know this even if you're not a fan, as it was a single and relatively successful. Upbeat despite the lyric, very catchy and certainly you can read between the lines when Hodgson sings “You're old enough some people say/To read the signs and walk away.” Indeed. Another great sax solo to end.
4. Bonnie: The first time the album slows down and gets a little maudlin, and surprise surprise, it's thanks to Rick Davies. “Bonnie” is a lovely song, but it has a sort of yearning that turns into something a little darker in it, like he's stalking the titular character. The piano is, well, darker, too: whereas up to now it's been bouncing along happily, now it's taken on a moodier tone. The first song on the album that has no harmonica.
5. Know who you are: Another slow one, but this time it's Hodgson (and yes, I am a fanboy) but it's a far gentler, softer song with a really nice lyrical line that basically tells the listener not to change, and to find what is good and unique in themselves. Again, Hodgson could be giving advice to himself here. He certainly plays some truly expressive and emotional guitar on the song. Dreamy is really the only way to describe this song.
6. My kind of lady: The boys ignore the impending departure of Hodgson and just have fun on a mid-paced love song, recalling the glory days of Breakfast in America and Crime of the Century. Great backing vocals, lots of fun, not a whole lot else you can say really in a short note on the track.
7. C'est le bon: Beginning to get more serious now. Actually, from here the album enters much more serious, darker, mature territory as the End draws nigh. It must have been like being on a train ride you hoped would never end and then suddenly the lights of the station are coming up fast. Almost an autobiogaphical song when Roger sings “I met a man from the ministry/ He said my son, better work in a factory/ Oh there are days I can tell you quite honestly/ I saw myself winding up in the military/ So lucky to have all this music running through me.” A reflective, thankful and yet in ways perhaps bitter and sad little song.
8. Waiting so long: Davies has his final say, and it's angry and hurt: “Did you get all you want? / Did you see the whole show? /Where's all the fun that we used to know?” A powerful, snarling sound on the guitar and a morose brooding piano, as it would seem Davies digs his heels in and refuses to change: “Must be set in my old ways”, he admits. “I would rather taste the old wine /Than mess around with something new” and though it's surely not the case I see this as being the metaphor for the final argument which leads to the departure; this is Davies trying to convince his friend not to leave the band, not to leave him, which then finally plays out in the final track, the last time we ever hear Hodgson as part of Supertramp. Superb and really emotional guitar outro which segues on a dark, hollow, ominous synth sound into
9. Don't leave me now: Opening on a lonely, melancholy sax from Helliwell, it bursts to life on powerful, emotional piano before Helliwell comes back in to join the melody. This song truly breaks my heart. It's hard not to see it as a plea from Davies to Hodgson (even the other way around perhaps, and even though it's Hodgson, who, fittingly, sings their last song together) as every line in the lyric begins with the title, with lines like “Don't leave me now out in the pouring rain” and the heart-shattering final line, “Don't leave me now, when I'm old and cold and grey and time is gone.” Sensational sax solo and it ends on a lonely harmonica, kind of harking back to the opener of what many people would consider their first real album, Crime of the Century.

So, Love or Hate? This is my favourite Supertramp album. It's stellar all the way through, it's heartbreaking and a triumph of passion and emotion, it captures them at their very best and makes you just wish that somehow, somehow they could have worked it out and stayed together, but it was not to be. An absolute True Love, and always will be.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

neardeathexperience

I bought a couple of the last Supertramp albums that they made. They were kind of jazzy.

Unknown Soldier

If you really want to do it tell me before I start it, as I won't be doing it until the weekend.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

OccultHawk

Brother Where You Bound

I have three Supertramp albums in my official music collection: Even in the Quietest Moments, Paris, and the album I'm reviewing here, Brother Where You Bound. If you're the sort that still buys records or CDs and you want just one Supertramp album in your collection I definitely recommend the live album, Paris. I have it; double album on vinyl. Great live album that showcases the best they had to offer in an incredibly meticulous perfectionist way. Fans of Rush can understand. It's like Exit Stage Left or any of the other live Rush records. Unlike Rush, I regretfully never had the pleasure of seeing Supertramp live.

But this isn't a review of Paris. Brother Where You Bound isn't a sure fire work of genius. It's the sound of a band making what many fans would consider an uncomfortable transition. There's lots of information and excellent reviews on Amazon that spell the out the ramifications of the major personnel shift on this album. But in a nutshell this is the first Supertramp record without Rodger Hodgson which is a lot like Pink Floyd carrying on with Roger Waters or if you want to imagine a fictional scenario it's sort of like The Beatles without Paul. The master melody maker had moved on. However, it doesn't necessarily take a personnel shift in order for a band or solo artist to make a paradigm shift, as fans of Neil Young and Bob Dylan can attest to.

Brother Where You Bound is an interesting record. I like interesting records. This record is fun to listen to even if you're thinking about whether or not it successfully achieves what it set out to do. The songs may not be great but they're good enough to merit your consideration. I have friends who if you mention the Stones they'll say, "Not as good as the Beatles", if you mention My Bloody Valentine well they're not as good as The Jesus and Mary Chain. The Dead not as Good as The Band (I don't agree with that but I've heard it). Well, a record doesn't have to be as good as Revolver, Psychocandy, or Music from Big Pink to be worth listening to. By the same token Brother deserves the same charity when compared to previous and obviously better earlier Supertramp. In other words, put down your swords and enjoy it for what it is.

I bought this on cassette when it came out. I was drawn to it because I was interested in the darker prog direction and because of David Gilmour's presence. Before I go into a song for song tally I'm going to list three albums from various rock'n'roll time and places that all remind me of this record for whatever reason:

The Grateful Dead - Terrapin Station
Roger Waters - Radio K.A.O.S
Sonic Youth - Goo

Brother Where You Bound only has six tracks:

Cannonball - The opening track clocks in at 7 minutes and change and if I got my info straight was an American Top 40 hit. I wonder what Casey Kasem thought. Anyone who hasn't heard Negativland's U2 should go dig it up. Yeah, so this Cannonball is definitely inferior to the Breeders track. Keyboard and Sax solo repeat the main theme. Hodgson is missed nowhere so much as he is on the hit. Still, if this came on Pandora I'd go ahead and click thumbs up. It's kind of catchy if you don't think too hard. Plus, there is a background laughter that's kind of Pink Floydy.

Still In Love

Horrible Wonder Bread attempts at blues/jazz with an acceptable chorus. This is the type of song that might have made it on some Portland hipster's mix tape back in say 1992, like is he being ironic or not?

No Inbetween

Surprisingly, the talking blues style of this song actually works. And the sax solo has a nice Cinemax late night skin flick vibe to it. I'm not being ironic; it's a decent tune.

Better Days

OK, this takes us closer to the heart of what this record is meant to be in a thematic sense. Feels like early Genesis with lyrics a lot like Roger Waters. There's an excellent flute solo, fake crowd noise reminiscent of The Wall, samples of political candidates reminds me of Radio KAOS, which hadn't come out yet, and it has the best sax work on the record.

Look. There's something here that I don't want to be overlooked. The message of this music, what they were trying to say. Mankind moving toward disaster is still important. We shouldn't forget these issues. Like Nuclear Disarmament for example. How can America say to Iran that we deserve this military might and they don't? Why don't we lead by example and disarm ourselves. It's so dangerous to take this incredible attitude of superiority. It's like we're (sorry for the "we"non-Americans. I don't want to deflect responsibility here.) saying obviously your culture is inferior so we deserve to be more powerful. How can we expect another culture to accept that? Also, I've been to the A-Bomb museums in Nagasaki and Hiroshima. The horror that was inflicted was unimaginable. It's amazing to me how out of vogue nuclear disarmament has become. One of the things Supertramp was telling us back then, directly or indirectly, by asking us "Where You Bound" is that as long as these huge arsenals of WMD's continue to exist we might completely kill ourselves off. Completely completely. Thirty years on it's still just as important. Let's get rid of this ****. The world does not need thousands of hydrogen bombs.

Brother Where You Bound

This track is over 16 minutes long. Music snobs watch yourselves. Were Supertramp just radio friendly stylings? Was there enough depth to take this band seriously? Well, I don't know what they were listening to but there's all kinds of stuff that comes to mind here: a piano interlude that sounds like it was written by Arnold Schoenberg, a guitar crescendo seemingly taken from Glenn Branca's playbook, sound effects that could have been on Ummagumma. Plus, David Gilmour. His signature sound kills it (in a good way). I wish Gilmour had a stronger presence. The song is also peppered with quotes from Orwell's 1984 and actual Cold War rhetoric.

Ever Open Door - Final Track. Friendly song. Reminds me of Wings. Also reminds me of the Roger Waters' track The Tide is Turning.

Is this a prog rock masterpiece? No.
Is it worth a listen? Hell Yes.

Peace to Alexander Supertramp. A hero.

Trollheart

Indelibly Stamped (1971)

I hate this album. I think most Supertramp fans do. It bears little or no resemblance even to the debut self-titled, which itself shows little of the flair for catchy and memorable melodies that would characterise their career during the later half of the seventies and into the eighties, and though it's billed as “progressive rock” there's very little to mark it as such, most of the songs being basic rock songs. Even then I don't like them: I think there are two songs I can stick on this album, out of the ten on it.

1. Your poppa don't mind: Starts off with a nice Supertramp-y piano but quickly devolves into a bog-standard twelve-bar blues rocker with a fairly mindless lyric. Kind of reminds me of the Zodiacs' “Stay”. Davies sings this one. Not that it really matters. At least it's short, just under three minutes. Good piano solo, but you can kind of hear early Eagles here too. Not what I had expected even after listening to the debut.
2. Travelled: Hodgson takes a turn at the mike, one of only three tracks he will sing on this album, it being very much a Davies-driven beast. There is some nice flute opening it which kind of reminds me of the likes of “Shadow song” and “Maybe I'm a beggar” from the debut, and it's nicely restrained after the exuberant but very ordinary opener. Problem here is that Hodgson's voice for some reason is very low and quiet. Nevertheless, I could see this on their first album; it certainly fits more into that mould than track one does. Kicks up fairly soon though into a CSNY/Eagles idea. Meh.
3. Rosie had everything planned: This is the only track I can honestly say I like on the album. With a swaying, waltz sort of rhythm it's a song about a girl who I think kills her lover on incorrect intel --- “Acting upon information received/ Rosie had everything planned/ Standing there with a shotgun in hand” --- and Hodgson sings it beautifully. It's a plain, simple tune but cuts to the heart of the issue, and if the rest of the album could have measured up to this it would have been a much better prospect. Some evocative accordion and a lovely rippling piano.
4. Remember: Back to Davies howling his guts out with a lot of hard brass, giving this song a kind of soul feel and I reckon the production is not so hot either. I will say it's the first time we hear sax on a Supertramp album, something that would become part of their trademark sound, but it's not John Helliwell but some guy called Dave Winthrop, and there's also some nice harmonica added. Still hate the song though.
5. Forever: Davies maintains his iron grip on the mike, and we get a sort of sixties Fender Rhodes based ballad, whcih to be fair is not too bad but still a long way from the best Supertramp can do. Lot of blues and soul in this, and with a bit of polishing up I could see it having been on something like maybe Some Things Never Change or Free as a Bird. Winthrop does add some nice sax licks, it has to be said.
6. Potter: New man Frank Farrell takes a shot at singing. Unsurprisingly, he, Winthrop and the new drummer Kevin Currie would be gone before the guys went into the studio to begin work on their seminal third album, Crime of the Century. It's nearly as bad as “Your poppa don't mind”, but with even less of an idea for the song. At least, again, it's short, even shorter than the opener.
7. Coming home to see you: Starts out like a ballad with some sort of discordant piano then throws off the disguise and becomes a rockabilly uptempo tune driven on fast guitar and what sounds like organ. Fun yes, but even the harmonica blast and the long instrumental jam that closes it out can't really save this from going on the meh pile.
8. Times have changed: Another sub-Eagles ballad with echoes of early ELO and a definite Country flavour to the tune
9. Friend in need: Uptempo piano tune with some good backing vocals. At least it's short. Decent piano outro.
10. Aries: Hodgson comes back to close out the album with the longest track on it, nearly seven and a half minutes long. Winthrop bring the flute again and for a moment you get the feeling this could be a return to the debut, but then it gets more psychedelic rock than anything else, too much flute in the end. Jaunty guitar but for such a long song it's quite empty; elements of “It's a long road” but it's nowhere near as good as that song. Like much of this album it's relatively short on lyrics and tries to survive through jams and instrumental improvisations. It doesn't really work and it's something of a damp squib to end on.

So, Love or Hate? If I had to pick my least favourite Supertramp album, it would either be this or Slow Motion, so it has to be a Hate.

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Chula Vista

Thanks Unknown Soldier. I'll get to it in the next couple of days.

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“The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well,
on the surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away
and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.”

Pet_Sounds

Supertramp - Even in the Quietest Moments… (1977)

Give a Little Bit - Who doesn't know this? It starts off with some acoustic strumming (a rarity for Supertramp), and the bass and drums come in on the second verse. It's fairly simple and repetitive, but catchy enough that that doesn't matter. And now there's a great instrumental bridge/saxophone solo. This song is a rarity in that there's almost no piano, only a bit playing some bass notes in the third verse. And now it's over in just over four minutes. Perfect opener.

Lover Boy - It opens with some jazzy, '30s music hall-sounding piano. And now the rest of the band comes in, giving the song a light prog feeling--Supertramp's unique sound. Now we're back to the music hall vibe. And just as quickly, that's over, with some electric guitar lines and feedback. Now it's fading out. Ooh, a trick ending. The tempo seems to have picked up, and the synth and guitar are front and centre. It feels mildly psychedelic. Now it's ending--for real this time.

Even in the Quietest Moments - This is, in my opinion, the most beautiful song Supertramp released. It begins with birds twittering, then an acoustic guitar riff--very Beatle-esque. And there are a synth and woodwind--probably a clarinet. Now the vocals come in. The lyrics are about spiritual longing. Now there's a bit of organ. The volume picks up a bit. Now the guitar sounds like the intro of Boston's "More Than a Feeling". Here are the drums. Now the vocals are getting distorted, repeating the same lines over and over. Now there's just a snippet--a tiny hint--of the opening track, "Give a Little Bit". Then it's just guitar and the vocalist for the final verse.

Downstream - Gorgeous ballad--just Rick Davies and his piano (recorded in the same take). The spiritual theme is back. Or is just talking about a lover? It's a bit unclear. This album is unique in that Supertramp almost never uses their signature Wurlitzer electric piano--it's all acoustic.

Babaji - This sounds like a precursor to Supertramp's 1979 hit, "The Logical Song" (which I'm not a fan of). However, this song is much better. It's heavier than the previous track, but the spiritual theme is definitely present again. Here comes the saxophone--maybe two of them. It fades out repeating the chorus.

From Now On Just hearing this intro gives me chills. It's my favourite Supertramp song, and one of my favourite songs in general. It's also very fun to play. Now the vocals come in, followed by drum and guitar. The lyrics express boredom with everyday routine and alleviating that boredom with fantasies of crime. Here comes a beautiful saxophone solo. And now Supertramp gets all proggy with a heavy guitar and synth. The piano intro returns, accompanied by drumming, and the sax plays over it. And the vocals are back. They fade out on the same lines as the background builds for two minutes.
"Guess I'll always have to be
Living in a fantasy
That's the way it's got to be
From now on"

Fool's Overture - It's been a long time since I've heard this song. It blew me away when I first heard it. Let's see if it has the same effect.
It begins with just a standard intro--piano chords and arpeggios. Now a synth comes in. At least I think it's synth--maybe a flute. No, it must be a synth. Now the string synthesizer joins in, and there's some muffled cherring. A couple trumpet lines. And now Big Ben. And now a snippet of Winston Churchill's "We shall fight on the beaches" speech. Here's the trumpet again. And now a synth comes in, picking up volume. It's joined by percussion. Now the synth is playing a riff of sorts. We're now over four minutes into the song--no vocals. A sax, bass and piano join in, providing an orchestral sound. Now it strips down to just piano. Here are the vocals--singing about a prophet who warns the people of imminent destruction, but who is ignored. Maybe that explains the Winston Churchill snippet. What a high note Roger Hodgson hits. Now the strings are back. Here's the rest of the band, with a powerful, proggy entry. And now it breaks down, with weird vocal whisperings, saxophone, and wind. Now there's a snippet of a choir singing William Blake's "Jerusalem". Now the synth builds up agin, playing the same quick riff as earlier. Now Hodgsond is singing that melody, backed up by the rest of the band. Now there are some woodwind arpeggios, and the strings hit a final chord and fade out, blended with the sound of an orchestra tuning up.

The verdict: This is one of my all time favourite albums, and in my opinion, it's perfect. Definitely a True Love.

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Plankton

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Trollheart

Just a note to OcculthawK; superb review. That's an album I never liked (well, being the first without HRH it was going to be a tough sell to me) but what's weird is that I, too, bought it on cassette! Never liked it enough to go for the CD or even the vinyl, as I think I mention in another review or did already.

Pet_Sounds: Love the enthusiasm and genuine love you have for EitQM:great review.

Well done, guys! Thanks for playing!

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018