THE NICE
General Rating: 2
ALBUM REVIEWS:
Mmm, nice. Or not very nice? Bet you haven't even heard of them, if
you're not a fan already.
Hey now, cut the crap! The Nice are a band unique in all senses. Sure,
they made only five albums, and only one of them (maybe two, 'cause I still
haven't got Ars Longa Vita Brevis) has really significant artistic
value, I mean, has enough value to be valuable and listenable at
the same time. But it's not a coincidence that I once caught myself repeating
the tricky way of Wilson & Alroy - praising the Nice in the introduction
paragraph and actually condemning most of their records for self-indulgence
and tediousness. Because, as inconsistent as these guys were, their cultural
importance is impossible to underrate: this is the first prog rock band,
the combo that started it all. Not the first band to merge rock with classical
music, of course - both the Moody Blues and Procol Harum had already bothered
to do that by the time the Nice arrived on stage, but it was the Nice who
kicked the bottom out of the 'pop music' barrel and came out with compositions
like 'Rondo' - completely groundbreaking at the time. The Nice were to
prog rock what Cream were to hard rock: the forefathers, whose merits were
increased and superated by more inventive followers. Of course, tradition
usually names King Crimson as the band that started real prog rock,
in its most well-known and also most easily accessible form: where that
band managed to churn out rock music that benefited from jazz and
classical stylisations, the Nice just shoved all the genres together in
a messy, unstructured melting-pot without second thought. They did not
even bother whether this approach would work at all, because the very thought
of a rock band re-arranging entire pieces by Sibelius and Ravel accompanied
by a full-blown symphonic orchestra was so revolutionary and amazing at
the time (and remember, this was the time of Sgt Pepper, when one
of rock music's main goals was to demonstrate its competence as a 'serious'
genre) that the 'entertaining' criteria were just not there - nobody gave
a damn.
Unfortunately, this leads to the sad fact that a large percent (actually,
more than half) of everything the Nice ever put out has dated, and dated
badly. In 1969 people just gaped with open mouths at Keith Emerson and
Lee Jackson extending Dylan's 'She Belongs To Me' to a twelve-minute running
time and engaging in all kinds of mind-blowing gimmicks on the way. Nowadays,
at best we just shrug our shoulders and say: 'So what?', and at worst,
with horrible screams of 'EEEEK! This singer has an AWFUL voice!' throw
the album away. All these pieces are now more of a priceless historical
document - a vital link to the understanding of the development of rock
music and maturation of the 'progressive' genre. Frankly speaking, I can't
even imagine how could a typical Nice fan look like now, and I never fell
upon even a single one on the Web. If anybody knows anything about the
Nice, it's usually represented in the idea of 'that crappy band where Keith
Emerson played before ELP'. The scarce existing reviews of the Nice are
more often negative than positive, and finding a Nice tribute site is a
task equivalent to the one of finding an Allen Klein homepage.
Which, of course, is more than unjust. Even with all their faults, the
Nice were still a highly interesting band, and, even if not all their output
is listenable today, that doesn't mean they produced nothing but
crap. This is simply not true. Yes, the band never had a great songwriter;
their lead vocalist is one of the most obvious examples of a prog vocalist
with the shittiest voice possible; yes, their guitarist left in the midst
of recording sessions for their second album, depriving them of their 'rock'
element forever; and yes, they liked to engage in lengthy, pointless jams
that started out of nowhere and led nowhere (then again, who didn't at
the time?) But they were all extremely talented and gifted players and
arrangers, and their keyboard player was acknowledged as best rock organist
already at that time. Their classical excourses were brave and tasteful,
and might well convert even a stubborn rock lover. And their gimmickry,
though not always 'pleasant', at least made for a diverse listen with unexpected
surprises - where Cream and the like might just stand like assholes (sorry)
and jam for hours, the Nice tried to make their jams entertaining and flashy.
My advice is to grab hold of the band's first album at all costs
- it is one of the forgotten gems of 1968 - and then carefully proceed
to the others if you liked it. But only if you liked it very much, mind
you.
Lineup: Keith Emerson - piano, organ, silly noises, feedback, knife-throwing,
etc.; Lee Jackson - bass, vocals (horror!); Brian Davison
- drums; David O'List - guitar. O'List was an impressive guitarist;
unfortunately, he quit in 1968, only after about a year of work. The rest
carried on as the Bloody Triad till 1970, when, as you all know, Keith
Emerson had another crazy idea...
What do YOU think about the Nice? Mail your ideas
Your worthy comments:
<[email protected]> (10.09.99)
Wonderful band: sorely missed. the marquee will never be the same without
them.
Much as i like emerson (and i suspect you're not over-keen) and his subsequent
work, nothing will ever touch the power and inventiveness and sheer magic
of the nice. It's possible davey o'list could've been a world-class guitarist
if he'd hung in there. Yes, poor old lee jackson has to be the worst vocalist
EVER (well, not quite) but i still loved it. He wasn't a particularly good
bassist, either, but then, who gave a damn when you were listening to the
nice??! Blinky davison is a good, solid, drummer, with more talent than
most, but, again, it was the overall effect that mattered. The nice were
simply the best.
THE THOUGHTS
OF EMERLIST DAVJACK 
Year Of Release: 1968
Record rating = 10
Overall rating = 12
It's easy to see the beginnings of prog in this overall pop album...
Best song: RONDO
Ooh yeah. As obscure as the Nice really are, they were a first-rate
band - the best, actually, in that short-lived glorious epoch when progressive
tendencies were not yet seen as a self-aim, but rather tried to be painlessly
incorporated into the usual pop/rock trends. Thus, this record tries to
(and ultimately succeeds in) marrying Beatles-inspired pop to classical
music, heavily borrowing from Jimi Hendrix on the way. I must confess that
it took me a really long time to get into it, but it was worth the while
- now I can't seem to get the line 'flower king of flies' out of my head...
If you don't know it (or, better still, if you haven't yet read the intro
paragraph), the Nice in 1968 consisted of Keith Emerson on keyboards,
David O'List on guitar, Brian Davison on lead guitar and
Lee Jackson on bass (if you're puzzled about the italicized segments,
you'd better check out your IQ). Like I said, these guys were keen on revolutionizing
rock music, and in a certain way they did so, but you wouldn't have guessed
it from this album, of course, if you were to omit the best song... but
let's deal with this in a correct manner. If you hate ELP more than income
tax and have made a solemn vow not to touch anything that bears the name
of Emerson on it, you're making a big mistake: this album sounds nothing
like ELP. As I said, their biggest influence were still the Beatles, plus
their guitarist was really a big fan of Jimi, adding 'psychedelic' and
heavily distorted, rip-roaring leads everywhere. He hasn't got the needed
skill, of course, but there's no way you could deny the professionalism,
and the main riff of 'Bonnie K' is as good as anything Jimi ever penned
in person (except for 'Purple Haze', of course, which is often correctly
denoted as a song with one of the best riffs in rock). Emerson himself
hadn't yet discovered his synths, chiefly because they still weren't invented
(or at least, went subject to mass production), and mostly sticks to piano
and Hammond organ, and his mastery of everything that has got keys on top
is already unsurpassed. The only big problem with the band is that they
lacked a vocalist - bassist Lee Jackson was probably the closest to a 'singing
talent' they could get, but he still couldn't sing worth a damn. The band,
apparently, realized that as well, which is the reason for which his vocals
are either drenched in harmonies and drowned in choruses ('Flower King
Of Flies'), or masked by some furious shouting and screaming ('Bonnie K'),
or distorted to the point of total neutralization ('Tantalising Maggie'),
or almost non-existent, being replaced by a chilly, creepy whisper ('Dawn'),
or, well, totally non-existent, like on the lengthy instrumentals
'Rondo' and 'War And Peace'. The only tune, in fact, where he boldly steps
up to the microphone, is the pompous title track, and while it's not bad
per se (actually, it's a first-rate pop anthem), you sure wish they'd bothered
to recruit a professional singer. They probably didn't want to share the
royalties that were rather scarce anyway. That's the way it goes.
Still, this is not ELP, this is the Nice, and you shouldn't go for vocals
when you're about this band. Instead, concentrate on the impressive songwriting
- most of the songs are co-written by two or more members of the band,
and they're usually splendid. 'Flower King Of Flies' and the title track
deceive you into thinking this is going to be a super-duper soft-pop record
with elements of orchestration along the lines of Sgt Pepper, but
as the crunchy riffwork of 'Bonnie K' steps in you're left with a strong
conviction that the guys can really rock. 'Dawn' shows the band as a spooky
dark-psycho unit - there's not much of a melody on here, but the atmosphere
is really shuddering, if you only can get adjusted to that ominous, murky
whispering. 'Tantalising Maggie' is a silly electrified country throwaway,
and 'The Cry Of Eugene', a song that supposedly inspired Pink Floyd for
their most famous song title, is a nice, although pointless and probably
meaningless, ballad. That said, the record's centerpiece is undoubtedly
the nine-minute 'Rondo': this pseudo-classical piece that was later reworked
on their third album under the title 'Rondo '69' (also known as 'Blue Rondo
A La Turk') and stil later became a regular ELP live favourite, is simply
breathtaking. The big superstar of the composition is Keith, of course,
who milks his Hammond to the extreme, culminating in a series of flashy
riffs that are among his well-known (you know them too, don't you? That
'wheeeez - wheeeez - ta-ta-ta-ta-ta - wheeeez - wheeez...', sorry, I'd
give the chords if I knew them. However, O'List also shines here, adding
some crisp, tasty leads, and asserting that this track, the longest on
the album, never gets boring. Unfortunately, the other instrumental, 'War
And Peace', is not that good, even if it has some more cool guitarwork,
but it's just not as memorable and next to 'Rondo' pales in its shadow.
My edition of the CD adds three bonus tracks culled from contemporary singles,
one of which is rather throwaway ('The Diamond Hard Blue Apples Of The
Moon'), but the other two are essential: 'Azrael (Angel Of Death)' is a
gloomy, repetitive and slightly pompous march that foreshadows the later
Nice, and their version of 'America' (nay, not the Simon song, but the
adaptation from West Side Story) was also a landmark in prog history,
although I confess that I find it more important from this historical point
of view than from any other. Still, it's just me. I honestly recommend
the album in its whole - the American bastard recording companies seem
intent on never letting Nice material see the light of day, but search
for it in the import bins if you're rich or in the used bins if you're
poor. That way or the other, you might get lucky someday and have a chance
to appreciate the band as well as me.
America and
the rest of the world, please mail your ideas
NICE
Year Of Release: 1969
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 8
Pathetic. You know, Keith Emerson is a good lad, but he can't really
pull out an album all by himself...
Best song: RONDO (69)
[Note: I'm still looking
for Ars Longa Vita Brevis, their second and last album with O'List;
said to be a classic, and it'd better be one...]
O'List probably never meant it, but he dealt the Nice a death blow
when he left in the midst of the sessions for Ars Longa Vita Brevis
in the fall of '68. The band's main selling and artistic point lied in
the crazy interplay between his maniacal guitar chops and Emerson's frantic
organ playing, and now one of the two key elements was gone. Even worse,
it now becomes obvious that O'List was also the main songwriting force
for the band - without him, they were simply at a loss for solid material.
Keith could throw in some classical improvisations, of course, but everybody
knows that as a pop songwriter his talents only surpass those of Elvis
Presley. Add to this the rather standard playing of the rhythm section
and Lee Jackson's horrible singing voice, and you get a clear case of a
band in a terrible mess.
They had some better choices to take, of course. They could have simply
disbanded on the spot; for some reason, though, Keith preferred to preserve
the band. A possible exit would be to find a new guitarist, which they
wouldn't (couldn't? that's a question!) do, preferring to carry on as a
trio. The result is that the amount of new studio material on the band's
next three albums is down to a minimum, and even then the number of self-penned
compositions is miserable. This record (still viewed by many as a classic,
and I'm not gonna make a definite 'no') is an obvious case. The second
side is all live, concentrating on two lengthy jams: a guitar-less take
on 'Rondo' (here entitled 'Rondo (69)') and a twelve-minute cover of Dylan's
'She Belongs To Me'. The first side is studio work, but only two of the
numbers ('Diary Of An Empty Day' and 'For Example') are fresh originals,
because the other two are a re-arranged version of 'Azrael' and a cover
of Tim Hardin's 'Hang On To A Dream'.
The quality of most of these songs also leaves you wishing for better.
As I said, Emerson is a really weak composer, and so is Jackson. Their
two originals are absolutely structureless, unmemorable ramblings that
threaten to fall apart at every second, and only Keith's masterful piano/organ
work manages to pull them together - listen to his fills on 'Diary Of An
Empty Day', and if you succeed to concentrate on them you might even forget
about the loathsomeness of Jackson's singing the fast vocal melody, completely
incompatible with the capacities of his voice. And on 'For Example' Keith
even ventures into a full-fledged jazz jam with tasteful solos that later
reappeared in many places on ELP's albums ('Take A Pebble' is the most
obvious example); maybe the general effect from the song is kinda stiffling,
but it's worth hearing it if only for the masterful organ intro, later
expanded on the 'Tarkus' suite - only Keith could pull off stuff like that
at the time. Same goes with 'Hang On To A Dream' which is almost spoiled
by female backup voices and generic, unimaginative orchestration, but then
recovers with more great keyboard work - clearly, Keith was deemed the
mule on whose back the other two band members would manage to ride. The
only self-sustained song on the first side is therefore left in 'Azrael',
but we already know that one, and it was done better on the single version,
although Keith's electric piano here is well worth hearing as well. Still,
an album's worth of great keyboard work does wear me down - I sorely miss
variety, and I get none. Time for me to get used to treating electric piano,
acoustic piano and the organ as completely separate instruments that have
nothing to do with each other, I suppose. Enough of that stupid 'keyboards'
definition! Don't pigeonhole the instruments, I say.
Okay, let's move on to the live jams. The real nasty problem is hidden
here. Okay, Keith does let off some steam on 'Rondo' - while the lack of
guitar is very, very pitiful, he almost compensates for it by pulling every
known trick out of his sleeve. The fact that the organ is brought much
higher into the mix than on the original also helps - you don't have to
be distracted by that noodling 'do-droom-do-droom-do-droom' bass line all
the time. I wonder if Keith threw knives at the organ in the process or
was he just swirling it across the stage as was his usual custom, bashing
at it with his feet and fists? Whatever, 'Rondo' is a great song, and unless
somebody else plays it, it's hard to imagine it ruined - the mighty climaxes
are just as climactic as ever.
However, the excruciating, painful jam built around 'She Belongs To Me'
is an atrocious listening experience. First of all, Jackson really
can't sing worth a crap - Dylan's voice sounds like Jose Carreras in comparison.
Okay, so he doesn't even try, but that's small consolation. And the trippy,
avant-garde arragement that they offer can't be called anything else but
butchering the classic: it is so clumsy, artificial and stupidly pompous
that I'd really be prepared to slap Keith for lack of good taste. Not to
mention that it's so quiet and lethargic - when the band suddenly picks
up steam and starts to 'kick ass' near the end of the song, my attention
is already being paid to something else and I can't even get it back. And
it would be okay if it were short (we'd just forget about it in a moment),
but to let it drag on for twelve minutes? Gee, man, they must have
really been out of ideas. I ditched the album a whole two points
for that criminy, and I'll probably never regret it. Well, it's a good
thing that they didn't carry on making these crappy Lee Jackson records
for very long, anyway.
But please don't think too harshly of that stupid 'eight' rating. I still
think highly of this band's and even this particular incarnation's of it
and even this particular album's potential. It simply sets a very high
plank which, unfortunately, they really weren't capable to jump over without
a guitarist in the picture. This, and the murky singing. Hell, in the hands
of ELP all these songs could have been winners.
For example, you
could just mail your ideas
FIVE
BRIDGES 
Year Of Release: 1970
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 9
The Nice at their most pretentious. I like how this sounds, actually,
but it's a full-blown classical album, and that's a fact.
Best song: look, what would you expect me to write here if you haven't
even heard this album? 'HIGH LEVEL FUGUE 4TH BRIDGE'?
This album is much more available packaged together with the following
(Elegy) under the title Keith Emerson With The Nice. However,
in that case you won't get the two bonus tracks on the original Five
Bridges, so if you're a fan, you still gotta scan the used bins. On
to the review now.
Right. What's the best way to resuscitate your career if you're just plain
unable to write a short pop song any more? Why, get away with a classical
symphony, of course! This is exactly what our three unhappy dudes preferred
to go through on this album. It's all live, from top to bottom, recorded
with the London Symphony orchestra, and includes (a) the famous 'Five Bridges
Suite', co-written by Emerson and Jackson, (b) live recordings of Sibelius'
'Karelia Suite' and Tchaikovsky's 'Pathetique (3rd Movement)', plus a couple
bonus tracks. If you're looking for 'rock' music, this is definitely not
the place: the band is so drowned out by the orchestra that you have to
filter 'em out of the sound panorama like a bunch of little fishes from
a net. And this is not an easy task, I tell ya! Okay, Keith obviously feels
totally at home with the orchestra: after all, he's a classical musician
by nature, and his organ sound manages to fit in marvelously. However,
the drummer and (especially) the bassist just don't seem to figure out
what to do - most of the time they don't seem to be playing anything. When
I hear 'Pathetique', for instance, I can't help wondering why it is credited
to the Nice - you can hear nothing but the orchestra; Keith is probably
in there somewhere, but where exactly, I'm not quite sure. Jackson and
Davison are definitely not there. Taking a wild guess, I'd suppose
these two guys were not entirely happy with this whole stuff.
Fortunately, the music is good. I'm no big classical fan, but at least
I'm able to appreciate the 'Suite'. It starts with five minutes of pure
classical vibes, with strong emphasis on the horns, and sounds like a cross
between Tchaikovsky and Beethoven, but it never transcends the border between
'artistic' and 'cheesy'. If you want to find this difference, I'd advise
you to check out the Moody Blues' Days Of Future Passed and compare
the two bands' approaches towards what they both consider to be 'classical'
- you'll see that, while the Moodies were content with that crappy Disneyesque,
generic Hollywoodish stuff, Keith Emerson really gave the orchestra some,
well, authentic material, whatever that might really mean to you.
The band kicks in a bit later, on '4th Bridge', with a lengthy jazz jam;
unfortunately, in the middle of this jam you'll also find Lee Jackson singing,
like some kind of particularly badass monster waiting for you in the middle
of a labyrinth in a computer game. Hey, but wait now - the funny thing
is, some of the sung sections would later be resuscitated by ELP! Seriously
now, that fast bit in 'Finale' sounds as if it was taken directly from
Tarkus (actually, I think it was later re-written as 'Bitches Crystal').
Isn't that cool? Serious ELP fans really need to check out this
album.
Then there's the second side, of course. What can be said? If you want
me to really discuss the good and bad sides of Sibelius and Tchaikovsky,
you'll just have to wait. Here I'll just say that the Sibelius piece is,
of course, interrupted near the end by some of Emerson's wildest antics
that culminate in a lengthy, ear-destructive set of organ feedback noises.
Ever heard some organ feedback? Well, if you haven't, it sounds about
ten times as dreadful as guitar feedback. Like a couple dozen motorcycles
roaring and then exploding at once. Guess old Keith was just shocking the
audience - yeah, indeed, why not diversify some pretty old classical music
with some murky apocalyptic noises? Very avant-garde, too! Very shitty,
goes without saying. But it's not very long, and it's near the end of the
track, so you can just skip it. And as for Tchaikovsky's piece, well, you'll
just be able to enjoy it in its nine-minute entirety with no serious fuck-ups.
It's totally dispensable, though - the band adds nothing to it, and you
should better get the original.
My CD also adds two bonus tracks, probably from the same concert. The first
is boldly titled 'Country Pie/Brandenburg Concerto No. 6', and credited,
as you might have guessed, to Dylan & Bach. I must say, though that
this funny little collaboration between Mr Dylan and Mr Bach (I'm sure
both got a maximum amount of pleasure of having to work with each other)
gets covered in quite a decent way: Jackson's usual horrendous voice sounds
almost funny (probably because the song itself is deemed to sound funny
and throwaway-ish, unlike 'She Belongs To Me' and definitely unlike
'My Back Pages', about which see below), and the gap in between the two
parts (I know this sounds crazy, but it is so) is hardly noticeable. Hah!
Another mystification, is it? Could be. The second track, though, is useless,
a boring 'organ rocker' that should rank among the band's most uninteresting
original tunes ('One Of Those People').
An intriguing album, in fact. Pretentious, classical, lengthy, boring,
etc., etc., but quite exciting and certainly verry original. I keep it,
and so should you - if you'll be able to find it, of course.
One of those people could mail his ideas. What people? Ah, never mind, just do it!
Your worthy comments:
James Quinn <[email protected]> (18.05.2000)
Shame you didn't understand "One of Those People" by the Nice. That was one of my anthems when I was 15. That and "Why Don't We Do It in the Road?" Perfect expressions of the nihilistic spirit!!! :)
Year Of Release: 1971
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 8
The last and the most self-indulgent Nice album, recommended only
for huge Emerson fans.
Best song: AMERICA
By the time this record finally saw the light of day, the Nice were
already history - and none too soon. Like the preceding albums, Elegy
is a confused hybrid of live and studio recordings, but you couldn't really
tell - they all sound like they were recorded over one evening's studio/live
jam sessions and tossed over to the public so as to make a final couple
of bucks. No way - I doubt whether the album sold at least a couple hundred
copies. It's easy to see why, too. There's but four tracks on the whole
album, two of which you've already had before and one of which you'd probably
never wish to have at all.
Namely, the album starts with a twelve-minute live recording of 'Hang On
To A Dream'... but never mind the song titles: all of these 'songs' are
just sorry excuses for Keith Emerson to go fiddling away on his instrumental
battery. In fact, Jackson's vocals are so low in the background, so stuttering
and hasty that you almost get the feeling he's only glad to evacuate the
microphone and give way to a classical, then a jazz, then a ragtime and
then God-knows-what-other solos. Hmm, it seems that halfway through Keith
even goes into boogie-woogie, as I suddenly find myself tapping my foot
and bobbing my head. They're actually great, these solos - Keith really
was, and still is, the finest keyboard player in existence. But they're
kinda pointless, if you know what I mean - what relation do they have to
Tim Hardin's melancholic lyrics? Also, what the hell is there happening
towards the end of the fifth minute of the song? It actually sounds like
Keith was just lugging his keyboards around and then suddenly opening the
piano and hitting all the hammers with a stick or something while at the
same time playing with his other hand. That's the way I decipher these
noises, although I might certainly be wrong...
Then off we go into the real horror of the record - I ditched it two, maybe
a complete three points for this. Once again, they butcher a Dylan song!
But if I was able to forgive them for re-inventing 'She Belongs To Me',
no way is there that I could forgive them for taking a song as great as
'My Back Pages' and turning it into an atrocious parody. No, wait,
once again I'll step in favour of Keith: since he keeps his mouth shut,
it's all right by me. He actually embellishes the final result with some
nice organ and piano solos, some of them coming really close to
imitating the original melody; and he displays some of his most complicated
technique on here, too. But Jackson's singing is worse than anything I've
heard in my life; this is not even a parody, it's just a mockery. Obviously,
he is trying to invent hip-hop before its time, isn't he? Anyway, try to
make a rap song out of 'My Back Pages', sing it totally off-key (particularly
stressing that on the 'you know I'm younger than that now' line) and you'll
get the impression. This guy should be forbidden to sing, at least,
forbidden to sing Dylan! There is one good point to this, though: come
all you haters of Dylan voice, come and witness Lee Jackson doing a Dylan
song and let me not hear you complaining that mr Zimmerman's tone is, er,
'wheezy'...
Thankfully, the second side is purely instrumental. Which doesn't mean
it's really good, though. First, there's another version of Tchaikovsky's
'Pathetique' which I again don't personally need to hear very much: if
I want to, I'll get the original. Moreover, it isn't even vaguely interesting
or captivating, as are ELP's Pictures At An Exhibition. It's just
okay. Not offensive, but not essential either - even if this probably was
one of the first attempts to get a live rock recording of a classical piece
on record. For all their flaws, the Nice were really pioneers of that stuff
and must be given praise for that. And then we get presented with a grandiose,
flashy version of 'America' together with all the necessary attributes
of a Nice (and early ELP as well) show, such as organ-bashing, knife-throwing,
weird noisemaking, etc. Unfortunately, the visual effects do not translate
very well on record, and the last three or four minutes of the song, filled
with organ feedback, are sheer torture. While the song goes on, it's effective,
even if it can't help being overshadowed by the studio version; when Emerson
starts 'going insane', I follow suit. My ears can't stand that racket,
and I feel sorry for those crazy guys who actually take their time to get
used to it, calling it "art". I do suppose the audience in the
hall was quite perplexed, though, but I also pity the poor organ. At least
when Pete Townshend crashed his guitar, its end was short and sweet; Keith
sounds like he's slowly pulling out all the sinews from the wretched little
instrument, one by one. Bastard. Where's the Nuremberg tribunal?
As I recently found out, the album makes for some perfect background
music - all these piano and organ solos really soothe the mind. Must probably
work a lot more efficiently than Alka Seltzer, too (although I still haven't
tried). But, of course, I can't imagine anyone listening to this for self-contained
pleasure. Why waste time on this stuff when you could be gladly headbanging
away to the sound of Brain Salad Surgery?
Nevertheless, the record really has a lot of historical importance - after
all, it was the prototype of what is now known as the typical live prog
rock album: lengthy, imporvisatory pieces with a lot of gall but next to
no emotions. In this respect, the fact that it is out of print in the US
is simply outrageous. Damn the music industry, I say! Let's all overthrow
these bastards and stuff the Web with MP3s! Long live freedom of music!
Hang on to a dream and
mail your ideas accordingly
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