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The Other Paper Page 7 HOOPLE HOOPLA: KUDOS FOR ALL THE YOUNG DUDES Mott the Hoople havfe only just hit the limelight with their smash single, “All the Young Dudes”, but they’ve been around awhile. The group aroused much controversy on the release of their first album early in 1970, owing to lead singer Ian Hunter’s astonishing vocal resemblance to Bob Dylan. They've been trying to live down that tag ever since, and Hunter has demonstrated great vocal ver satility, ranging from the rough rock ’n roll shouting of Mad Shadows, their second and least successful LP, to the hesitant and husky tone of the beautiful “Waterlow” on Wild Life. Wild Life was their third album, a quieter, country-styled LP; it was followed by a raving rocker, Brain Capers, which was very much in the heavy hard rock vogue and one of the most impressive of that style. Tracks like “Death May Be Your Santa Claus” (great title!), “Darkness Darkness”, and \The Moon Upstairs” had a strong im pact. But )the album didn’t sell well, and the group was about to break up when David Bowie, just becoming the rage of England, gave them the song “All the Young Dudes”; it shot to number 1 on the English charts and gave them a new. lease on life. Deservedly so, too; its controversial lyrical con tent and catchy chorus made it one of the best singles of 1972, with a great performance by the band. Now the follow-up album is here, and it lives up to the single’s promise. Opening with a cover ver sion of the Velvet Underground’s great \Sweet Jane”, the rocking pace never flags until the last cut, a pretty, soft-paced number with strings called “Sea Diver”. Best tracks, aside from the billiant single, include “One of the Boys”, a wild, heavy rocker; guitarist Mick Ralphs’ infectious and powerful \Ready for Love”; and the provocative “Jerkin Crocus”. “Sucker” is a fairly strong rock ditty, but “Momma’s Little Jewel” is rather unimpressive, and “Sweet Jane” could’ve rocked a little har der. “Soft Ground”, the remaining track, is a pleasant rocker, and all in all All the Young Dudes may be Mott the Hoople’s best album. Perhaps it’s not as frantic as Brain Capers, but it has more overall consistency and a greater melodic attractiveness. Anyone who likes British hard rock is sure to like this LP. It’s heartily recommended, and if you get the chance, catch them live, where they sound even better and add a lot of flashy British showmanship. In any case, don’t miss out on all the Hoople - Hoopla. LP REVIEW CHUCK BERRY’S GOLDEN DECADE (CHESS RECORDS) By Mark H. Phillips The other night I happened to be watching the second ABC “In Concert” rock special. The line-up was good., .with Blood, Sweat & Tears, the Allman Bros., and Poco. But the real action for me was an appearance by a man I consider the greatest' rock writer-performer ever, Chuck Berry. It seems it was just a few months ago that I read an article about Berry, claiming that he was “a man out of time”, and that today’s rock audience had left him behind. Well, developments since that article was published have truly made that writer eat crow. Berry has, of course, had his first number one single in about a decade, with Continued on Page 15 Column 1 BLACK SABBATH BOMBS Like Grand Funk’s Phoenix, Black Sabbath Vol. 4 (WB BS 2602) is a big disappointment. It follows their best album ever, Master of Reality, which is one of the firiest heavy metal albums ex tant. Come to think of it, the same comparison can be made with Grand Funk and their previous album, E Pluribus Funk. What’s the matter with these old pros, are they getting too old? Passing strange, I’d call it. “Wheels of Confusion” begins on a riff so tired you can’t* believe they intend to make an 8-minute song of it, and a lapse into double tempo near the middle doesn’t help much. Give me two minutes of Uriah Heep’s “Easy Living” over this any day. “Tomorrow’s Dream” has one good chord, and stretches it about as far as it’ll go. If you can bear to hear yet another singer wail, “I’m going through changes” as violins weep and pianos plink, you might like the next song; if you never head Stockhausen, you might even be impressed by the pointless synthesizer echoes of “ F x” . “Supernaut” proves to be the side’s salvation—one of the few really spirited outings on the album. “ C o rnucopia” on side two comes in second, and “Snowblind” ain’t bad, if characterless. F6r bad you gotta wait ’til “Laguna Sunrise”, in which the group’s stan dard one-chord approach to music is translated into harps and flamenco guitar. What makes them think we want to hear this kind of slush? Talk about artistic hubris! “St. Vitus’ Dance” is an apt follow up to a song like that, and it’s almost refreshing until one realizes how essentially boring it is in its own right. But you must leave ’em smiling, and that’s what they do with “Under the Sun”. It goes through a few sections, most of them interesting, and also a drum solo. Okay, so the album isn’t all that bad. But it’s not up to Black Sab bath’s standard, nor does it sound like the prime Work of a heavy metal group. In fact, if their next album is as good as their last (Machine Head), I have a feeling Deep Purple will wrest that title away from them. I know a lot of people who still say, “Uh, Machine Head ” when I ask what new albums they’re listening to, despite the fact it came out almost a year ago. Warner Bros, has now acquired the rights to Deep Purple’s first three albums, on the defunct Tetragrammation label, and issued their highlights in a 2-LP set called Purple Passages (WB 2LS 2644), with liner notfes even. The group was less disciplined and more un der the influence of pop jazz back then, but they had their moments. \Hush” was a fun single, and some of these others like “Hard Road” and “The Shield” bear rediscovery. There’s also some interest to_their versions of “Kentucky Woman” (yes, the Neil Diamond song) and “Hey Joe” (yes, the folk-rock classic). For songs like this, Deep Purple was once considered practically a bubblegum group, believe it or not. But then who amongjis can claim he didn’t mal e a few wrong judgements in 1968? THE NITTY GRITTY DIRT BAND IN NASHVILLE The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is one of those groups that’s been around the fringes for years without ever building up a strong image in the public mind. They were one of countless coun- try/folkrock bands around L.A. in 1966, and though they included Jackson Browne at the time, put out a basically fine album, and even had a fair sized hit single called “Buy For Me the Rain”, nothing happened. They’ve had three albums since then and built up a following of sorts, but never really broken through. Until now. Their new album, a 3-record set called Will the Circle Be Unbroken (UA 9801) is, as usual, unlike anything they’ve done before. It’s also a smash hit, having sold 25 .Q 00 in the first month of release, which is like 75,000 for a single album. It’s a concept album and one that fulfills their lifelong ambition to play real country music. What they did is round up all the legen dary Nashville country stars who would consent to being involved, take them into the studio, and have them recut their classic records with the Dirt Band playing along, and the whole thing done on acoustic instruments to help create the atmosphere of a friendly back- porch jam. Among the living legends who agreed to appear on the album were Earl Scruggs, Roy Scuff,, Mother Maybelle Carter, Doc Watson, Merle Travis, and Jimmy Martin. They were joined by dobro player Norman Blake, who has worked in the Nashville studio bands of Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, and Beecher (Bashful Brother Oswald) Kirby, one of the most famous members of Acuffs Smokey Mountain Boys, as well as a sensational young fiddle player named Vassar Clements, who does astounding things with the old standard, “ Orange Blossom Special”. Despite initial fears, there was no friction between these bastions of Southern conservatism and the long-haired Dirt Band, once the basic affinity of their approach to music became clear. The songs on the album, like “You Are My Flower”, “I Saw the Light”, “Wabash Cannonball”, “Honky Tong Blues”, and “Wildwood Flower” and the title number, are all well-known country-traditional standards. While the original classic recordings are ■ in little danger of being topped, it has been generally conceded that this group did about as well as any t human being had a chance of doing. While perhaps not as important to musicologists as the old Carter Family 78s somes of these songs once appeared on, this set has already achieved historic impor tance for bringing together these legendary figures, many of whom had never met or played together before. The Nashville Tennessean’s prestigious music section hailed .the album as “one of the most im portant recordings in the 45 years of the Nashville music business. Pretty strong language, but justified, I think. What the album does is solidify the bridge between country music and the -young (or “rock”) audience, that bands like Commander Cody and Asleep at the Wheel have already begun building. Which, like any new source of vitality, can only strengthen and improve the music. Whether or not the fusion goes any further, this is an important album by any standard and absolutely essential to any fan of traditional country music. FINDING THE GEMS AMONG THE REISSUE GIMCRACKS 1972 was certainly been the year for reissues, and in 1973, they promise to appear even more frequently. We can look soon to repackages of all the mid-60’s English groups, now that their op tions (most of which were renewed for 5 years in 1967) are beginning to lapse. This means that the Searchers material, for instance, no longer belongs to Kapp in the U.S., but reverts to Pye in England and is available again to any American company that wants it. With Richard Nader planning an English Invasion revival show, as the ’60’s begin to take on a nostalgic glow and the Raspberries ride the top of the charts, we can p r o b a b l y e x p e c t th e s e re p a c k a g e s to d o p r e t t y w e ll. The first example is the recent set of four albums from Polydor — Heavy Cream (3502), Erie Clapton- -At His Best (3503), Ginger Baker— At His Best (3504) and Jack Bruce- -At His Best (3505). Yes, the Cream and associated stuff has gone to Polydor, and if by some oversight you have neglected to purchase one of the myriad albums on Atco, and you don’t mind two records jammed into a single plain white sleeve with no liner notes or photos, then by all means pick up these albums. An equally shoddy reissue much more in keeping with the spirit of the music involved is The O’Jays Greatest Hits (UA 0598), rushed out while \Back Stabbers” still lingers on the airwaves. Simple, competent, occasionally outstan ding R&B music has kept this group s around for a decade or more, and this album contains the best of their stuff. The only really great song is “Lipstick Traces\ but there are no real losers and on the whole it’s a very playable album. Avaricious motives are okay with me as long as they result in the availability of more good music. 1 wasn’t aware that Chuck Berry’s albums had ever gone out of print, but presumably to draw attention to their existence after his first hit single in eight years, they’ve reissued both together in one package. Aside from an excellent back cover photo, there’s not much to look at or read on this album, and little worth hearing for that matter. Berry was never at home on Mer cury; his recordings for the label are lacking in spirit and originality, and despite whatever worth their own records might have, the Steve Miller Band turned in a singularly uninspired perfor mance backing Chuck at the Fillmore. I, for one, could have lived without a reissue of this listless material. The real stuff is still around on Chess—accept no substitute. c Bell Records has initiated a cheesy reissue series, with juke boxes on the covers and corny liner notes about ponytails ana bobbysox. You Must Remember These Vol. I (6077) consists of material leased from several old New York labels (Herald, Ember, Fire, Fury) and generally available on a hundred other albums. Great music, but no marks for creativity. Volume 2 (6078) is more like it': real Bell stuff this time like \The Letter” by the Box Tops, along with hits by Ronny & the Daytonas, the Syndicate of Sound, Merrilee Rush, the Delfonics, and even Joey Powers. Really scraping the barrel, but good light car-radio pop all the way. I like it. The weirdest reissue of all so far is Annette Funicello (Vista BS- 4037). Annette had a-dozen or so albums back when she was a famous ex-Mouseketeer, and now all her hits, including “Pineapple Princess”, “Tall Paul”, and “First Name Initial” are here for your nostalgic listening pleasure. ONE MAN DOG BY JL James Taylor: “One Man Dog” (Warner Bros.). It’s difficult to avoid underestimating someone who has been overestimated. The truth remains that James Taylor is an average songwriter and perfor mer who ahppen to be around at the right time. “One Man Dog” confirms my impression. The songs rely on tone and control. On melody/lyrics alone fire -and rain would surely fall. His back-up group called the Section Hightens the mood of the album instead of cutting through. The tracks are all Taylor's apart from a little contribution from Daniel Kortchmar who also plays acoustic and electric guitar with James. A good album for non sophisticated-music lovers.
