Anteater

^ Excellent review amigo, but as a longtime Balance Of Power fan, I can safely assure the readers that all the Lance King at-the-mic albums (Book Of Secrets, Ten More Tales Of Grand Illusion and Perfect Balance) blow Heathen Machine out of the water.

But then again, Lance reminds me so much of classic Geoff Tate on those albums I mentioned that I'm probably a bit biased truth be told...

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Trollheart

Thanks Ant! Nice to know someone else even knows of the band, much less is a fan. "Perfect balance" is my favourite from the guys, but I do think John K did a great job on "Heathen machine". Hope somehow they'll be back in some form or another.

BTW you know Lance has a solo album out?

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Trollheart

Welcome, one and all, to

No, I am not opening a trendy nightspot where you can go to meet available members of the opposite --- or same --- sex for discreet nighttime trysts. I’m talking about singles in respect of tracks off albums, you know the ones. The hits, or the ones released from an album which the label (and I guess artiste) hope will become hits. Or the herald of the album, the lead single which is put out before the album is available and so is your only clue as to whether or not it’s going to be something that’s worth waiting for.

It’s probably been twenty or more years since I bought a physical single. Back in those days, when itunes was still a mere glint in the eye of Steve Jobs and the guys from YouTube were still at college wondering what they were going to do with their lives, singles populated the planet like a companion lifeform to man. You could just go into a record shop and ask for a single and they would probably have it, providing it was in the charts or “bubbling under”, ie just lurking outside the top forty, waiting for its chance to impress. Some of the more serious shops could of course order in a special song if you wanted it, but generally in those times people bought the singles as they came out --- as these were generally what you would hear on the radio --- and then, if they liked what they heard, the album would be next. I used to have a huge collection of singles, now I have none. Unlike my albums, I gave them away in a moment of madness, but never felt the need or desire to buy them again, especially not on CD. I could never see the point of a CD single. A vinyl one was cheap, a CD one was maybe half the price of an old vinyl album and often had a lot of pointless remixes and special editions clogging up the disc, presumably to justify the rather stiff price tag.

I gave up collecting singles once I had moved away from the chart music and honed in on my own particular favourite genres, which lent themselves far more easily to the album format. I haven’t bought one since. But I thought it might be fun to try a few again, so in this section I’m going to be listening to some new singles --- well, at least released in the last year or so --- and see whether they make me want to check out, or anticipate the arrival of, the album. I’ll be looking at singles by artistes I don’t know, so in some ways this will be a smaller, leaner version of “Rolling the dice”, but not quite as in-depth. Basically I’ll be talking about the single, what it sounds like and what I think of it, anything I know or can find out about the artiste, and whether in the end it makes me want to proceed on to the album.

To do this right I’m going to my favourite music online vendor, choosing a date or dates and just picking every single that I see. If I hate it I’ll say so, if it’s just ok or boring I’ll tell you and if it makes me think about the artiste or affects me in any way you’ll read about that here too. The good, the bad and the meh, so to speak.


Lessons --- SOHN --- 2013

Okay, so this is the first one I’m listening to, totally out of the blue. And it turns out I’ve already missed the boat. How surprising. Goofle11 probably knows this artiste inside out. I don’t know the guy’s real name, but he goes under the name of SOHN and is apparently a one-man show; though he has yet to release his first album he has already worked with people like Lana del Rey and is becoming very respected in the music business apparently. I liked the sixty-second preview I heard of this, his second single after having been snapped up by the 4AD label, so now I’m going to listen to the whole thing.

I really like(d) the hypnotic synth beat that opens the song, almost Alan Parsons Project in ways, and the guy’s voice is certainly what you’d call soulful. Nice sort of dour piano line joins the synth, which runs weirdly at a much faster pace than the piano. Percussion cutting in now and some sample-y synth joining in with a sort of organ sound; the vocal is quite incongruous really, as the music sort of seems to want to take you in an “up” direction whereas the vocal is distinctly mournful and doleful. Very catchy though and very memorable. I’m not sure what genre this would fit into: at times it almost reminds me of Jean-Michel Jarre’s “Oxygene”, and then at other times there’s a real sense of soul in it.

Must say I’m quite impressed with this and I really like it. His album is due out next month and I think I may be one of those now waiting to catch it. Perhaps the rest of his music is nothing like this but even so I reckon I’ll be taking a listen soon as it pops its head up. Nice.

Rating: 8/10


Seninle --- Yukset Sadakat --- 2013

Time for a Eurovision joke. According to my research (yeah, yeah, Wiki I know! Sue me!) this rock band from Turkey were slated to represent their country at that august competition but failed to get to the final, making it the first time Turkey was NOT stuffed at the Eurovision! Oh ho ho ho! How very droll!

Seriously, these guys have been around since 1997 and have released, um, three albums in that time. Although to be fair, they seem to have kicked around for almost ten years before releasing their debut in 2006, don’t ask me why it took so long. These crazy Turks eh? This single, which I keep thinking is called “Senile”, is from their latest and, I guess, fourth album, which Wiki has not yet got round to updating their page for yet. I say must be because their previous album was in 2011, and this single was released last year, so I’m assuming it’s a new one from an album as yet not shown on the page. So what’s it like?

Well there are two versions, one called the “Kirmzi version” and one the “Mavi version”, but don’t ask me the difference. It’s a pretty okay rock song with AOR overtones but a nice sort of semi-acoustic feel to it too. No idea what it’s about as it’s sung in their native Turkish. To be honest it’s good until it gets to the chorus, which is generic and really lets the song down. But of all the Turkish rock bands I’ve ever heard --- none --- this is pretty good. Misspoptart may be able to shed some light on these guys. Wiki says their name is a translation of “High fidelity”, which anyone old as me will remember used to be what record players came labelled as.

Yeah it’s good, but would it make me go looking for their album? Um. Good guitar solo there, but really if it wasn’t for the chorus I’d like this a lot more. It’s just too obviously a bunch of guys trying to sound like an American rock group, or how they think one should sound. Which is a pity, as they have a pretty decent sound of their own and don’t I think need to go emulating anyone.

Rating: 7/10 (would be higher if not for the chorus being so disappointing)


A perfect day --- Standing Egg --- 2012

Now these are harder to get information on, but I found out they’re an indie pop band from Korea, and apparently someone called Windy features on this single from 2012, my guess being that she’s the vocalist here but I could be wrong. This is in fact from an album called “Ballad with Windy”, but when I look at the tracklisting every single track bar this is in Korean, so I have no idea what else is on it. I’m going to assume --- perhaps wrongly, but I’m going to do it anyway --- that this is one of those girl groups that have sprung up all over Asia, particularly in Japan. They seem to have a decent discography, with albums stretching back to 2010, so they’re not new. Neither is this single, but I liked what I heard. Let’s have a closer listen.

Nice soft female acapella vocal before the acoustic guitar comes in almost unobtrusively, then takes in soft percussion as the guitar itself gets a little more forceful, though not much. I don’t think this is meant to be forceful music. Quite an entrancing voice, whether this is one of Standing Egg or the mysterious Windy. Lyric slips into what I guess is Korean about halfway through, then back to English for the chorus. Very pleasant. Nothing terrific but very nice. Quite long for a single at over four minutes, but with a voice like that you really don’t mind that it’s basically just repeating the same phrases and chords over and over.

Lovely little vocal harmony there in the third minute, and it stays through the chorus. I like that there are no other instruments other than the guitar and a little percussion. Very stripped down and yet it manages not to sound barebones. Just the sort of thing to relax or drift off to.

Rating: 8/10


En esch, mona mur --- Eintagsfleigen --- 2012

This one confuses me. I know nothing about this band or artiste, and sadly Spotify ain’t got them so I go YouTubing and come across something similar but not exactly the same. I get the feeling this is two tracks (“En esch” and “Mona mur”) but I’m not sure. At any rate it appears to be EDM or some electronic stuff that I’m not really into. I’m assuming the band/artiste is/are German, though of course they could be Dutch, Danish or any other similar-sounding nationality. But my guess would be German.

Anyway, this one involves a female singer who kind of reminds me of yer wan from Propaganda, with buzzy synths and sort of clanging, crashing drums, no real melody I can discern and seems to be that sort of thing that you will hear endlessly pumped out of techno dance clubs, not that I’ve ever been in one. The vocal is okay once it gets going, and the guitar, well in the background, weirdly reminds me of that Belle Stars hit, “Sign of the times”. Go figure, huh?

Rating: 3/10


Turquoise hotel --- Fungi Girls --- 2010 (No picture available)

And finally … yeah I know it’s reaching back a little but I told myself I’d grab one more before heading for the door and this is it. Another band who believe everyone who goes to their Bandcamp page should know who they are --- no profile, guys? So I had to trawl Pitchfork (my first ever visit) to find out who these lads are, and it turns out they’re from the Republic of Texas, and all very young: preteen, says the reviewer but I wonder? Can you legally publish and/or play music live if you’re under the working age? Maybe in Texas you can.

I guess this was their debut single four years ago, as in 2011 their debut album had the B-side, “Doldrums”, on it, but not this strangely. Anyway to be perfectly honest I was not impressed by what I heard in the preview. Let’s see if that changes with a full listen. Hmm. Clangy, muddy guitar with a sort of fifties rock sound to it, then it speeds up into what I would almost call a punk rhythm, and as in the sample I find the vocal completely subdued, almost indecipherable. Whether that’s down to the prowess --- or lack of --- of the singer, or the production I don’t know, but when you can hear him he seems to have little or no emotion or inflection in his voice, almost as if he’s singing off an autocue or something. Rhythm is rocky enough and uptempo, and maybe it’s the shoegaze thing again, where you’re not really supposed to hear the vocalist or make out the lyrics, but it annoys me.

No, I don’t like this. Does nothing for me. Very amateurish and doesn’t really seem like they’re even trying. Maybe that’s the curse of youth, maybe it’s lack of experience, or even talent. I certainly wouldn’t bother listening to this again though. Mind you, I said that about My Bloody Valentine, so what do I know? But this is definitely not my cup of poison. Pass.

Rating: 2/10

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Trollheart

When I look back I’m somewhat amazed to see that the last time I did this was back in October, during Metal Month. Admittedly, there were four instances during that special edition, but still, it’s been nearly five months now since we last went looking for a heavy metal band I could talk about and listen to, so it must be time to put on the leather-studded wristbands and dig out that old faded denim jacket once again, pretend I can ride a motorbike (it’s hell waiting on the 27A I can tell you!) and disappear off down the dark hot dusty roads in search of another metal band via the random function at Home - Encyclopaedia Metallum: The Metal Archives

So, who’s up first? And not a player with the unlikely name of Who: I’m talking about the pronoun here. Right then, clickety-click, metal gods be good to me …



Well, interesting in that when I do a cursory gander around the internet I can find some of their songs, though to be honest this is not good news for me, as this is a black metal band from Norway: can there be any blacker? However I am unable to piece together a full album, so let me just grab what there is an throw it here for you. This is called “Capische”. I don’t, honestly. Just sounds like noise to me but anyway…



Another singer who sounds as if this should translate into “Get this fucking thorn out of my foot! It really hurts!” but surely doesn’t. Batlord probably loves this. Here’s another from them, called “Vergangenheit”. Slower, doomier, might not be that bad...
[youtube]aQv-u50DLFk[/youtube

]Yeah, you know, almost sort of melodic. Far different from “Capische”; the vocal is still a growly croak rising to a gutteral scream but you know, as some people here have advised me, if you either shut out the voice or consider it a musical instrument you can kind of get through this without blood coming out of your ears. Almost. Kind of Maiden influence in the guitars there. Interesting. One more? Sure why not. This is called “Tomorrow”, and is apparently from their farewell concert of 2005. Very interestingly starts off with a big synth intro, kind of proggy but also reminds me of Manowar’s “Gates of Valhalla”.



At least the stupid knobs in the audience closest to the person filming this have shut up now enough that we can hear the band on stage. Nice almost acoustic guitar coming in and the song for the moment sounds quite slow, but now of course it’s picking up tempo and our roaring friend is back. Still, not really half bad at all. I wonder what a full album from these guys would have been like? Oh well, time to shuffle on down the track…



That says “Blackout” in case you can’t figure out the logo, and they’re a stoner band from Brooklyn it says here, who have only been together since 2011 and released their first album last year. Wonder if it’ll be available? Woo-hoo! It is! Spotify has it. So these will be the guys then, good or bad, we’ll concentrate on.



OK then, points of interest, points of interest. Well, it’s noted that one of the band members has only one leg! Whether vocalist/guitarist Christian Gordy lost the other one in an accident, is a war veteran or was born without two legs I have no idea, and as this band are relatively new there is as per usual very little information about them. But it’s certainly a hook, even if it’s not meant to be one. Here’s how they line out:

Band name: Blackout
Nationality: American
Subgenre: Stoner metal
Born: 2011
Status: Active
Albums: “We are here” (2013)
Live albums: None
Collections/Boxed sets/Anthologies: None
Lineup Christian Gordy (Guitars, Vocals)
Taryn Waldman (Drums)
Justin Sherell (Bass, Vocals)

So they’re a three-piece, and I’m reliably informed their music moves at such a slow pace that doom seems positively breakneck by comparison. This could be something of a struggle for me. As I mentioned (I think I mentioned: did I mention?) they only have the one album, having been formed a mere two and a bit years now, and that debut came out last year.

We are here --- Blackout --- 2013 (Self-released)


There are only six tracks on the album and each has a single-word title. We open on “Indian”, with a screeching guitar that sounds like air brakes or something, then heavy almost tribal drumming from Taryn Waldman takes us into a nice catchy groove until suddenly it all comes to almost a dead stop as the crashing guitars of Christian Gordy pound in, his vocal more like something between a moan and a chant, the rhythm behind the music sort of lost now, almost as if everyone is doing their own thing. I’ve never quite seen a song begin so promisingly before to suddenly fall totally apart, and so quickly. It’s only just under five minutes long but sounds or seems much longer due to the complete lack of cohesion and ideas on the song. I fear this may be the beginning of something truly awful.

Grinding almost melodic guitar is encouraging though as “Amnesia” opens and Waldman’s percussion takes up the rhythm, Justin Sherrell’s bass holding the line nicely, and even when Gordy’s more recognisable vocal comes in this time it’s keeping a little more with the music being played. It’s not much better to be honest but it does hang together a little better. Sort of Sabbath feel to it, though nowhere near as good. Waldman may be able to hold a beat but she’s no great drummer; I don’t hear any finesse or style in her performance, and though I’ve already admitted I wouldn’t know a good drummer from a bad one, well let’s just say she’s no Cozy Powell or Keith Moon!

That hard grinding screeching guitar is back for the superslow “Smoker”, so slow you can count the individual notes and even the spaces in between them. Gordy’s vocal is kind of phased or something, but even the effects can’t disguise that he’s at best a very average singer. I would say he should concentrate on playing the guitar, but he’s a very average guitarist too. Sadly, the same goes for his bandmates, and I’m not hearing anything at all that’s interesting or even holding my attention here. Well, the guitar just got a bit faster and almost boogie-ish, so that in itself is something. I mean, I don’t know stoner metal that well, but I’ve heard Stormbringer and Doomsword and they are miles, light years, ahead of these guys who are really coming across to me as total amateurs. And amateurs who suck into the bargain.

(This is the only --- I mean only --- video I could get of this band. The quality is crap, but then, so is the music…)

There’s a decent little groove set up in the last minute or so, but nothing about this track, or the two that have gone before it, is likely to remain in my head once this review is over. I seriously doubt, unless there is a major seachange in the second half of the album, that anything following them will do anything different. “Columbus” and “Anchor” are short tracks, each just shading the four minute mark, the former seeming to consist of Gordy bashing the hell out of his guitar while Sherrell copies him, a real melange of noise with no real target or purpose and not too much in the way of vocals, but when they come again they’re phased for some reason. The latter seems to try to emulate the quintessential Sabbath track, their signature tune, but fails miserably as this band keep coming up against the same staggering lack of talent. At this point I’m not looking forward to the closer, as it’s easily the longest on the album, coming in at a worrying nine minutes plus.

Confusingly titled “Seven”, it’s another slow grinder which does little or nothing to distinguish it from the five tracks that have preceded it, and although the longest it doesn't do anything to convince me that this band is worth another try. I don’t see them getting a second album out but given this is self-released maybe there’s nothing to stop them. However I’d be surprised if they got signed any time soon by any of the major or even minor labels.

“We are here”? Yeah, well you can stay there as far as I’m concerned!

TRACKLISTING

1. Indian
2. Amnesia
3. Smoker
4. Columbus
5. Anchor
6. Seven



Well at least I didn’t have to search four or five times to get a band I could actually review, though after listening to this substandard dross I wish I’d just opened the throttle and kept ridin -- I mean, stayed on the bus till the next stop. Yeah, single to the city centre please mate: think I need to do some serious drinking. Not, I did not mean thinking…

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Trollheart

The turn of a friendly card --- The Alan Parsons Project --- 1980 (Arista)


Though both "Eve" and "I robot" had explored related themes this was really the first proper concept album from the Alan Parsons Project, based around one of humanity's vices, gambling. All right: their debut, "Tales of mystery and imagination", was a concept based on the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, but that was all instrumental, so this is the first chance they got to explore common ideas through the medium of actual songs, rather than just musical passages. The title track is an epic sixteen-minute piece, broken onto five sections, and easily the longest APP song ever. The album was also the first to feature Eric Woolfson on vocals, and is far from my favourite APP album, but far from the worst either. Its strength, or weakness, lies in the title track: after all, if you don't like it then that's really about a third of the album you're not going to want to listen to, and while it's good in my opinion it's perhaps not as good as it could have been. The rest of the album is a kind of hit-and-miss affair, with some very good tracks and some, well, not so good ones, as we shall see.

"May be a price to pay" starts us off with synthesised trumpets and a somewhat ominous-sounding fanfare before it comes to life on the back of David Paton's instantly recognisable bassline and swirling keys from Eric Woolfson, uptempo percussion from Stuart Elliot. The vocal is taken by Elmer Gantry, AKA Dave Terry. He has a strong rock style voice, and it is of course and always has been a feature of the Alan Parsons Project that they utilise different vocalists on each album, almost on every track. There's a nice orchestral section which flows into a smooth keyboard line with attendant piano, almost edging into semi-jazz territory for a moment, then the main melody reasserts itself. Of course the guitar work of Ian Bairnson is as always flawless, if not quite as pronounced as expected. A busy keyboard line brings in "Games people play" with a somewhat more funky feel to it, and the vocal taken by Lenny Zakatek, one of my least favourite APP vocalists, though here he does a decent job. I've just always found him very harsh in style compared to Woolfson, Blunstone or Miles.

The song concerns the desperate need to fill up the time now that the family have grown and moved on, and can be taken I suppose as both a reference to sexual games or to gambling, with the line "Games people play/ In the middle of the night", though with the theme being centred around the latter one would have to assume the song is about that. Great solo this time from Bairnson as he's allowed to do what he does best, then we drift into the standout of the album, as mentioned the first vocal performance from Eric Woolfson, though it would of course not be the last. "Time" is the ballad on the album, and like the river about which Woolfson sings, it flows along gently on a breezy synth passage and rippling piano. The difference in the vocal from Woolfson and the one from Zakatek is the difference between night and day. Woolfson breathes the song, almost an exhalation, soft, gentle, caressing, and he has the perfect voice to take the album's laidback slow ballad. Again beautiful orchestration accompanies him, supplied by the Orchestra of the Munich Chamber Opera, and really adds an extra touch of class to an already classy song. When Woolfson goes up a register it's just like hearing a male angel sing, and the almost ELO-like violins and cellos just make it perfect. The backing vocal from Parsons himself, singing a separate lyric, adds the final sheen to the last verse.

As "Time" fades down and slips away like the memories of a dying dream, it's rather unfortunate that the mellifluous tones of Woolfson are followed by a return for Zakatek, in the comparatively substandard "I don't want to go home", which despite its interesting solo piano intro turns into a relatively basic rock song. Although it retains the basic motifs of the APP I just find it quite disappointing, which is not to say that it's a bad song, but it can't hold a candle to "Time" or even "May be a price to pay". Again it's got an element of funk in it, particulalry in Bairnson's guitar work, with some nice trumpeting synth. That takes us to the first instrumental, and the APP are known for a few. This more or less introduces us to the title track, and opens with a whistling keyboard intro like something out of an Ennio Moricone western before breaking into a melody which has by now become synonymous with the APP, the bass of Paton joining with the smooth percussion of Elliot and the sparkling keyswork of Woolfson and Parsons, a little sound like fingers clicking and then a sort of saxophone line coming in. As instrumentals go, it's pretty cool.

Sixteen minutes and twenty-four seconds of the title track then closes the album, and you either love this or hate it. It's split into five sections, the first of which is called "The turn of a friendly card part one" and features Chris Rainbow on vocals, as indeed does most of the piece apart from one section. Opening on a medieval little piano piece it brings in flute and some sparse bass before Rainbow's voice sings the vocal, sounding rather pleasantly like Woolfson, in fact I used to think it was him. He cries "The game never ends/ When your whole world depends/ On the turn of a friendly card", a theme which will recur later in the song. Nice little laidback acoustic guitar line from Bairnson then a gong sounds and we hear the sounds of a crowd as we move into "Snake eyes", and things get a little more intense. A big, thick, marching bassline and slow, thumping, almost heartbeat percussion brings in a sharp, swaggering guitar line from Ian Bairnson, the song changing from slow ballad into a more sleazy, shuffle style.

Another fine little guitar solo from Bairnson, more punchy this time, with a descending synth to take us into "The Ace of Swords" which is the instrumental in the piece, played on what sounds like a lyre or lute, and with soft keyboard accompanying it, revisiting the theme from the first movement but then adding in some harder, faster material as the percussion ramps up and the keys get a bit more intense. The trumpeting fanfare makes a return and once it gets going this piece is mostly keyboard-driven with some orchestration helping out. Violins, violas, cellos and harps help to heighten the sense of anticipation and urgency and desperation as the gambler's addiction begins to take him over and he can see no way out. Indeed, eventually he decides there is "Nothing left to lose" and this brings us to the fourth section as Eric Woolfson takes the vocal, accompanied by Bairnson. The tempo slows a little; it's not a ballad but it's certainly not a rocker, almost acoustic in ways.

Some nice backing vocals here too, and a ticking bassline that keeps the rhythm going as celtic style keys enter, with something like uileann pipes or somesuch, perhaps an accordion sound there too. Bit of reggae thrown in there before the tempo kicks up again and the melody from "Snake eyes" comes back in. The final part of the piece is "The turn of a friendly card part two", and basically returns to the melody and lyric of the first part, with lush orchestration and Chris Rainbow back on vocals, reprising his role from the opening part, and giving it all he has on the final lyrics. Most of this is instrumental though, with the final two minutes a showcase for Bairnson, Woolfson and the orchestra, fading out magnificiently.

TRACKLISTING

1. May be a price to pay
2. Games people play
3. Time
4. I don't wanna go home
5. The gold bug
6. The turn of a friendly card
(i) The turn of a friendly card part one
(ii) Snake eyes
(iii) The Ace of Swords
(iv) Nothing left to lose
(v) The turn of a friendly card part two

An album with a sixteen-minute track was never going to set the charts alight, and though the APP had their hits it really wasn't till after this album, with their most memorable and successful coming from the "Eye in the sky" album, released two years later. But lack of hit singles didn't keep Parsons down and with the Project he went on to record another six albums before embarking on a solo career under his own name, but basically Alan Parsons Project albums in all but name, with the conspicuous absence of Eric Woolfson, after the two founders had fallen out. Woolfson passed away in 2009.

An ambitious album, "The turn of a friendly card" realises its lofty goals more often than it does not, but there are points on the album where it's almost degenerating from high concept into basic rock and I think this is where it lets the listener down. This should have been a fluid, linked piece of music from start to finish and though the title track mostly accomplishes this, it is some of the preceding tracks that prevent this album from gaining a place it might otherwise have deserved within the hierarchy of the Alan Parsons Project's releases.

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Anteater

Fantastic analysis dear boy, fantastic. I agree that one's love, hate or indifference to The Turn Of A Friendly Card depends entirely on the title track, but I for one have always dug it.

Speaking of Chris Rainbow though, I would love to get your impressions of his solo work one of these days. He did three interesting albums back in the 70's (Home Of The Brave, Looking Over My Shoulder, White Trails) and they're all awesome...especially if your a big fan of lush, layered Beach Boys-styled harmonies.

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Anteater's 21 Fav Albums Of 2020

Anteater's Daily Tune Roulette

Trollheart

The French Revolution (1789-1799)

Revolutions come about for many reasons; people want independence, injustices need to be redressed, loss of confidence in the ruling government or monarch, and in a way one of the most famous has most if not all of these traits. At the tail end of the eighteenth century the people of France were fiercely and savagely divided. The poor were unremittingly poor, destitute and without a voice, while the nobles and gentry lived it up and cared nothing for the ordinary folk. Their king, Louis XVI, continued to levy crippling taxes upon the people to finance his ongoing wars with the British and Germans in the American Revolutionary War and to maintain his increasingly hedonistic lifestyle and that of his court, completely oblivious to the want and destitution stalking the streets of his country. Isolated in the Palace of Versailles, where the walls did nothing but reflect images of his own glory, and keep out the desperate cries of the poor and the hungry, King Louis, by all accounts a weak ruler, refused to deal with the rising crisis, refused to even see it as such until the Bastille was stormed and then Versailles itself, which forced the king to pull his court back to the capital.


Rising food prices, a spiralling cost of living and bad harvests, together with growing resentment of the clergy and the nobility would lead to a popular uprising the likes of which the world had never seen, with the king being arrested and then executed along with his queen, Marie Antoinette. However, as is so often the case with new power bases, the Committee of Public Safety, headed by Maximellen Robespierre, drunk on power instigated what became known as the Reign of Terror, in which first only nobles and their supporters were executed by the dread guillotine, but soon anyone who got in Robespierre’s way or threatened his grip on power would find their head rolling into a basket. As in all such “purges”, many of those who lost thier lives under the blade did so for no other crime than thinking differently to what was offically espoused by the Committee, or as a result of scores to be settled. A hundred and fifty-odd years later the same thing would happen to the Jews in Hitler’s Germany.

But as always happens, Robespierre overreached himself and went too far. Gaining too much power in the Committee he became less a leader and more a liability, and his fanatical devotion to his ideals --- which had earned him the epiteth “The Incorruptible” --- was another factor which led to his eventual and inevitable downfall. With the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1804 the Committee of Public Safety was disbanded and the Consulate established, paving the way for Napoleon to be named the first French Emperor. On his defeat in 1815 the monarchy was restored, though as a constitutional, rather than absolute power.


Between then and near to the end of the nineteenth century France wavered between monarchy and republic, finally emerging as the latter in 1870, and today it is still the Republic of France. So in some ways the French Revolution succeeded spectacularly, but in other, perhaps more important ways, it failed miserably. Hundreds of thousands of French citizens, many of them guilty of no crime, died under the hard, unyielding steel gaze of Madame La Guillotine, and in the end even those who had masterminded and driven the Revolution died, as they had condemned so many others, beneath the pitiless descent of the blade.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Back a short while ago I decided to take on the untakeonable (yeah I know it’s not a word) and review Floyd’s superb classic “Dark side of the moon”. It occurred to me afterwards that it was quite possibly a waste of time: after all, who has not heard that album? But then Briks came along and announced that not only had he never heard that album, he had never heard any Pink Floyd! So I began to rethink, and this is what I’ve come up with.

Running in sort of tandem --- though not really --- with my “Classic albums I have never heard” journal, these will be reviews of albums everyone has, or should have, heard, but they will be written for those few --- or perhaps many --- who have not had the pleasure. I will therefore approach them speaking to those people, so if you know these albums backwards keep your sniggers to yourself; nudge your partner if you must, but be aware these reviews are not directed at you, you who have seen it all and heard it all. These are for those who have yet to partake and who, just maybe, through these words may find they’re attracted to listen to the album and discover it for themselves. Somewhere out there, believe it or not, there are people who have never heard “Hotel California”, “Bat out of Hell, “Led Zeppelin IV”, “Paranoid” and a whole host of others. And it’s quite possible they may never do.

So these reviews are for those lost souls, in the hope they may find their way into the light and share the glory of these classic albums with the rest of us, and finally, once and for all, be able to truly call themselves part of the human race.

And as it was reviewing Floyd's “Dark side” that gave me this idea, we’ll kick off with them.

Animals --- Pink Floyd --- 1977 (Harvest)


Of course, this section could be filled up with Floyd albums alone. “The wall”, “Wish you were here”, “Meddle”, even “The final cut” has to in my opinion go down as a classic of the age, if only because it was the last hurrah of Roger Waters. And if you look at the discography of the band, this album comes smack bang between two serious classics itself, with “Wish you were here” released two years prior and the awe-inspiring “The Wall” two years after it. So a triumvirate of classics, you might say.

One thing about Floyd albums has always been their iconic album covers. I mean, you can not know who the band are and still recognise the sleeve of “Dark side”, “Wish you were here” or “The Wall”, and their tenth album was no exception. Working as ever with Hipgnosis and the late, lamented Storm Thorgerson, the album cover was in fact more the brainchild of Waters, but realised and created by Hipgnosis. When you look at it first, as I did all those years ago, you really only see the dour towers of Battersea Power Station, then your eye is drawn to the shape floating high in the sky just to the left of the picture, between the first and second chimney stacks. It’s a pig.

With a name like “Animals” it will be no surprise to find that the five songs on the album are all about, well, animals. But drawing inspiration from George Orwell’s literary political satire masterpiece, “Animal farm”, Waters gives each animal the characteristics of societal classes, so that pigs are obviously the rich and powerful, dogs their henchmen and enforcers, and sheep are the vast mass of humanity who just accept things and move right along, never questioning, never trying to effect change; keeping their heads down in case someone notices them.

Bookended by two simple love songs, the rest of the album (the other three tracks) are all long ones, the shortest coming in at just over ten minutes and the longest at over seventeen, each of which take one of the animals as their subject matter. Between the five they tell a story of political and class struggle which, unlike Waters’s later opus “The Wall”, has a relatively happy and upbeat ending. And it’s very much his concept; he writes all the lyrics and sings all but one of the tracks. This, and the next album, show his tightening grip on the band which would result in his leaving them altogether in 1985. It would probably be fair to call him a control freak, and yet you can’t argue that the albums from where he began taking the reins, from “Dark side” up to and including “The final cut”, stand as the very best in an impressive discography. So maybe he can be excused for being such a tyrant. Maybe. Still, for this album he not only wrote the lyrics, sang and played guitar as well as bass, but also designed the sleeve: little bit overkill? Nevertheless, you can’t say this isn’t a classic.

A simple acoustic love song gets us underway, as “Pigs on the wing part 1” opens the album, deceptively uncomplicated and mundane but still with that Pink Floyd edge to it. Waters does his usual great job on the vocals with an almost fatalistic yet emotion-filled performance. As songs go on the album it’s almost the shortest, and leads into “Dogs”, the only track on the whole album that features any contribution (other than his usual excellent guitarwork) from Dave Gilmour. On this he helped write the music and also shares part of the vocal with Waters, but to be honest much of the power of the song revolves around Rick Wright’s superb keyboard work, particularly the opening organ. Sublime solos from Gilmour of course as he sings about the rough and tough dogs, who live hard and uncompromising lives --- ”You’ve gotta keep runnin’” he advises, ”Gotta keep lookin’ over your shoulder/ It’s gonna get harder/ As you get older.”

There’s a nice little instrumental section then that reminds me of much of the work on “Shine on you crazy diamond”, mostly the opening sections, then some heartfelt guitar interplay between Gilmour and Waters, then it slows down into an almost acoustic vein with the sound of dogs barking and baying --- perhaps slightly unoriginal, but Floyd almost wrote the book on originality so you can forgive them this obvious step, and anyway it fits in well with the overall feel of the piece. Another, more powerful solo from Gilmour as Wright keeps a nice piano line going under the melody, then the vocal becomes a duet as Waters joins in, which really helps to solidify the atmosphere of the song. The creed of the Dog surfaces as we’re told ”You have to be trusted by the people you lie to/ So that when they turn their backs on you/ You’ll get the chance/ To put the knife in.” Usage of what would become classic Waters devices like the mention of “the stone” and the repeated echoing fading last word which would crop up again later in both “The Wall” and “The final cut”.

A deep, atmospheric instrumental passage as Wright takes over on the synthesiser, the barking dogs back but never too loud, always in the background, like you often might hear in a neighbour’s garden a few houses away, close enough to annoy but not enough to worry you. Squealing, screeching guitar again reminiscent of some of “Shine on” turns the tune a little manic, a little unhinged in places while Wright steadily and carefully keeps the synth melody striding gracefully forward. Then as the screeching guitar fades back a little Waters’s acoustic comes in with a reprise of the opening melody line and it’s he who takes the solo vocal for the second half of the song (well it’s eleven minutes into a seventeen-minute song, but this is still reckoned to be the second part) and you can hear some of the elements which would go to inform the lyrics and themes of the next album as he asks ”If I don’t stand my own ground/ How can I find my way/ Out of this maze?”

Another fretburning solo from Gilmour as the organ comes back in and then it stops for a moment as guitar takes over, before Waters brings back the “stone” theme for the conclusion of the song as he sings ”Who was fitted with collar and chain/ Who was given a pat on the back/ Who was breaking away from the pack/ Who was only a stranger at home/ Who was ground down in the end/ Who was found dead on the phone/ Who was dragged down by the stone.”

“Pigs (Three different ones)” opens with an almost electronica synth and quiet guitar before Gilmour kicks it up a little with some heavier riffs as Nick Mason’s percussion punches its way in and the song becomes something of a rocky blues tune. Waters’s vocal is mostly quite low-key and restrained on this: he doesn’t snarl angrily or roar as he has been known to do. Around the fifth minute Gilmour takes over with some nice guitar licks which takes us well into the seventh, where Wright’s organ comes into its own, then the vocal comes back in the eighth, as Waters rails against Mary Whitehouse, the self-proclaimed protector of decency and morality who was a thorn in the sides of TV producers during the seventies and eighties, and became synonymous with the nanny state and interfering nosy parkers who have nothing better to do with their time than try to force everyone to conform to their skewed and outdated moral values. No, I wasn't a fan.

More superb soloing from Gilmour takes us out and into “Sheep”, where some gorgeous Fender Rhodes from Wright opens the song, Waters’s bass then walking along and bringing the feel of a stride/boogie rhythm before his vocal, angry and frustrated again, bursts forth and the song springs to life, rocking along at a great lick, Wright exchanging his Fender for a Hammond. I've always found this to sound a little like “One of these days” off “Meddle”. Not exactly, but the bass line is similar and I hear a lot of the basic melody here. Anyway Gilmour cuts in now with some fine riffs before Waters throws in a bass line that would recur later in part on “Goodbye cruel world” to some extent and then Wright spreads synthesiser goodness all over the track before Gilmour again cuts loose. We’re now approaching minute five.

Waters’s bass takes over in about the sixth, almost solo and carrying the melody as Floyd desecrate the Lord’s Prayer in a way that would not be attempted again until Marillion recorded “Forgotten sons” almost ten years later: ”He maketh me to hang on hooks/ In high places and converteth me to lamb cutlets”...

As the mindless sheep finally turn on the dogs and kill them --- ”Bleating and babbling we fell on his neck with a scream” --- Gilmour lets loose again and Wright’s organ follows him every step of the way. Fading out on guitar we’re into the closer, the reprise of the opener, “Pigs on the wing (Part two)”, another simple, short acoustic song that uses the very same melody as the first part but with different lyrics, and brings to an end a seminal and classic album by one of the greatest progressive rock bands of all time.

TRACKLISTING

1. Pigs on the wing (Part one)
2. Dogs
3. Pigs (Three different ones)
4. Sheep
5. Pigs on the wing (Part two)

What can you really say in conclusion about a classic album? One of three, maybe four if you include “The final cut”, concept albums released by Floyd between the years 1973 and 1983, “Animals” not only shows the band growing and stamping their own identity on their music and on the progressive rock scene in general, but foreshadows dark clouds on the horizon, as tensions within the band build and grow to a point where Roger Waters’s almost megalomaniacal control over Floyd would lead to him departing for a solo career, leaving Gilmour to take the helm and pilot them through what would turn out to be their last two albums. I personally like both “A momentary lapse of reason” and “The division bell”, but it’s fair to say that neither was a patch on the clutch of classic albums they released over this ten year period.

As the saying goes, they don’t make them like this anymore!

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Moss

Animals, my favorite Floyd album and one of my favorite albums of all time. Nice review.

Isbjørn

*ahem* Trollheart, I have liked Pink Floyd for a long time, I think it was Powerstars who hadn't heard them.

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