Album title: The Polite Force
Artist: Egg
Nationality: English
Label: Deram
Chronology: Second
Grade: B
Tracklisting: A Visit to Newport Hospital/ Contrasong/ Boil/ Long Piece No. 3 Parts 1 - 4
Comments: Bad joke time. Egg cracked pretty easily. Their career was scrambled. They went sunny-side up in 1972. It’s no yolk. All right, I’ll stop. Fact is, Egg had three albums in all but broke up (sorry) after this, their second, in 1972. For whatever reason though they re-formed in 1974 to throw one more into the pan (I know I said I’d stop. I lied) and then called it a day for real. So what effect they had on the prog scene I don’t know, but it might be typified by my initial belief that they were Japanese! Anyway, let’s serve this one up with some soldiers all right I really will stop now. It’s quite a dark opening to “A Visit to Newport Hospital” (Newport in Wales, one assumes) with an ominous ringing guitar and thick bass in a sort of mid-paced march which then breaks into a sprightly organ run like something you might hear on a cruise maybe. Quite nice really if unexpected. Jazzy in its way, then the vocal comes in from Mont Campbell and they’re very good indeed.
Swirling keys set up a really nice melody with some interesting effects, sharp guitar bursting through then some smooth piano and organ, not bad at all. Goes back to the darker, more ominous tone of the opening as it hammers out the ending and into “Contrasong”. I see where the title comes from: it’s that annoying thing they call atonal or something isn’t it? A sort of syncopation in the music and in the lyric. Despite the pretty cool piano line here I really do not like this at all, hard on the ear. Some very flutey sounding keyboard I think it is. Meh. “Boilk” (didn’t they have that on their first album?) opens with the sound of rushing, pouring water, maybe into a bath or down some sort of drain. Weird. Okay, they did have this on the debut album, though it was only a minute long and here it’s a full nine. Sounds like church bells and a synthy keyboard overlay, quite pastoral I must say.
Odd little feedback sounds and what could be a violin, warbling effects and some sort of muted guitar riff maybe. Apparently this also includes a rendition of a Bach piece, but if so I don’t hear or recognise it. Then we’re into the four-part “Long Piece No. 3” with a pretty frenetic start, sounds like organ and guitar with cantering percussion - oh, I see they use a tone generator and something called an “orchestron”, so, you know, whatever. Part 2 has more of a conventional melody to it, very much driven on the organ in a kind of nearly soul way I feel, quite pleasant. It all but stops then after two minutes then comes back in on a shimmering organ and keyboard line (or it could be the other two things, who knows) which gets a little, well, weird. Rises to a crescendo and stops. Again. This time it comes back on piano and organ with some gentle percussion and then back to that nice slow organ melody.
Part 3 opens on fast bright piano and sort of harder percussion, with possible addition of flute, then it gets a little more dramatic and speeds up in tempo, with oh hell I don’t know - flanged guitar maybe? Oh yeah: no vocals since “Contrasong”, nor do I imagine there will be. Jazzy sort of beat taking the melody now and a guitar shimmering in then the piece winds down on some freaky feedback and takes us into the final part, with a bouncy, bubbling organ to take us out.
Favourite track(s): Long Piece No. 3 Part 2
Least favourite track(s): Contrasong, Boilk
Overall impression: I expect there were non-Egg fans who bought this and though “what the hell am I listening to?” I mean, I’ve heard weirder before, but this is up there among them. It’s no surprise to me that Egg fried their career (I promise, that’s the last one) after this and only produced one more album before breaking up. Oh well, you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. I told you: I’m a liar. That is also a lie. And that.
Personal Rating: 2.0
Legacy Rating: 1.0
Final Rating: 1.5