Album title:Rock Bottom
Artiste: Robert Wyatt
Genre: Folk
Year: 1974
Label: Virgin
Producer: Nick Mason
Chronological position: Second solo album
Notes: Between this and his previous, debut solo album, Wyatt suffered a terrible, life-changing accident that paralysed him. He subsequently began to think about his life and this album contains his reflections on same.
Album chart position: n/a
Singles: n/a
Lineup: Robert Wyatt– vocals, keyboards, percussion,slide guitar(2)
Mike Oldfield– guitar (6)
Gary Windo–bass clarinet,tenor sax(5)
Ivor Cutler– voice (3 and 6), baritone concertina,harmonium(6)
Alfreda Benge– voice (5)
Mongezi Feza– trumpets (3)
Fred Frith–viola(6)
Hugh Hopper– bass guitar (2, 4 and 5)
Richard Sinclair– bass guitar (1, 3 and 6)
Laurie Allan– drums (2 and 6)
Review begins
Much as I hated the previous album, it's in a way gratifying to see that Wyatt himself later dismissed it as “juvenilia”, this mostly I guess being due to his new way of seeing the world, due to the accident related above. So from his, and many of his fans' point of view, this is really his debut album, though in a more, real way, it isn't. You can hear much more of an attempt at serious music in the opener, “Sea song”; the noises and effects of the previous album are nowhere in sight, and this is more folk or even prog rock, probably more something fans of Soft Machine would have expected. The music still tends to be annoyingly discordant at times, but at least I can distinguish it as such this time around. The
vocalise puts me off still though, but it's a hundred percent improvement on
The End of an Ear. You can definitely hear more of the prog rock influence on “A last straw” though it's more kind of jazz/avant-garde for much of “Little Red Riding Hood hit the road”, with screeching horns and what sounds like loops (though I guess those weren't around in the seventies) but apparently are multi-tracked arrangements. There's a vocal halfway through, by Ivor Cutler. Does add something to the composition, though I'm not quite sure what. He sounds a bit like Bowie. Okay, now he's just talking.
“Alifib” on the other hand features some beautiful classical guitar, is a nice little laidback piece, quite pastoral and relaxing, and it kind of continues on into “Alife”, which introduces some little effects, piping horns and acquires a darker texture. The closer then, and the companion piece to “Little Red Riding Hood hit the road” is called “Little Red Robin Hood hit the road”, driven mostly by a droning synth, screeching guitar and a repetitive vocal. Halfway through we get a recitation by Cutler of some nonsensical poem. Apparently, his vocal work here and on the first part gained him a recording deal. Go figure, huh? Violin coming in now over a harmonium (it says here; I would have said uileann or bagpipes, but there you go) setting up a kind of Celtic feel to the end part.
Track listing and Ratings
Sea song
A last straw
Little Red Riding Hood hit the road
Alifib
Alife
Little Red Robin Hood hit the road
Afterword: Yeah. Better by miles than the previous effort, but it's still a little freaky for me. Some nice moments, some decent music and some clever ideas, but nothing here that makes me want to hear more. Though as part of this overarching project, I have no choice but to do exactly that.
Rating: 