JANE

If someone asked you 'do you fancy a heavy prog debut album on Brain from 1972', you would snatch their arm off. I was unlucky and didn't get a free arm with my copy (Record Fair Wigan early 80's) but I certainly got a bargain! I don't have the follow up, but the 3 that came after, and this is by far the best.

For those 'new' to a band we always have to mention comparisons. They are certainly more Heep than Purple ....with a dash of Gravy Train...and more Frumpy than Birth Control (to use 2 German examples). It is now a sound we would consider 'generic' but way back in the day this was 'as heavy as...' and a cross legged head nodder (I really can't do the lotus anymore but in my head am there...). The opener, Daytime, sets the template and while you can mix and match any of the above mentioned influences there is a bit of Grand Funk in the sound too. The heavy Hammond ...and the producer/band have the sound captured to perfection...swirls and the guitar man keeps it precise, although I suspect he was 'limited'. Matters not what language the lyrics are in as the singing is not the strong point but not bad enough to upset the groove. Wind picks up the pace and utilises everything in their armoury again. Unfortunately the semi ballad Try To Find follows and this is where you do need a decent singer. It does pick up (even a bit of Steppenwolf re The Pusher riff and organ sound ) and escapes the Euro pop route it nearly went down. Spain could have been found on a Babe Ruth album. You can take that either way depending on where/how you rate Babe Ruth. It doesn't quite know what it is and straddles a fine line between prog and again going down an early 70's Euro pop cul de sac. Luckily the mix has the Hammond high and the vocals low and we get a Purple-esque passage where the keysman can go all Lord Emerson and the heads nod in approval and the space rock guitar adds err atmosphere and a passing brush with Nektar. It becomes the standout track due to this middle keys/guitar jam and the vox being absent! And although a bolero beat became cliche, they get away with it. Yep the vox come back...not dissimilar to Black Widow now I come to think about it...but perhaps a bit stronger/more confident than previous. Together, the short track, is a simple arpeggio and sustained keys standard for the time. It is what it is. One of several 'laws' back in the early 70's re rock albums was having a track called Hangman or similar. I always cut some slack for 'second language' bands but even so... It is a straightforward much used three chord riff but done well with some light n shade and again top marks for perhaps some of the best Hammond sound ever captured on disc of this period. It chugs off into a solid 4/4 (again a progression we have heard a thousand times before) but it works with the echo laden guitar and the momentum gathers pace till they let the err rope out to its full extent and actually is a great album (and show?) closer although they felt obliged to return to the earlier theme...when judicious use of a fade out might have left us wanting even more. I guess Jane will always be 'second division' but this is a fine debut and this is the place to go if you fancy checkin em out.

Fire Water Earth Air is another dreamy Jane album, but like the length of the album this review will be short. The album is a classic Jane, 33 minutes long but seems much shorter, maybe because there is only 3 songs. The first song is 17 minutes long and has some great guitar work and the vocals are great on this song, really they are great on the whole album, Panka must have been working on his English. Though like I've said before because he can't do English that well the music and his voice work really good together and this song is excellent.

This album was much better than Lady. After the first 3 albums which were all good came Lady which was a notch down. Then starting with this album came another 3 more good albums. The next song is only 5.5 minutes and then it closes out with a 11 minute number which starts out with some cool lyrics, the middle has some keyboards and sound effects and closes out with guitar and synth. Another one of those albums that are great with headphones and sit back and take a trip. Rate this at 3.5.

This second album by Jane is just a dreamy flow of beautiful music. The singer from the first album is gone but drummer Peter Panka takes on the vocals. Hess and Krantz play both bass and lead guitar and both are quite good. The best way to listen to this album, just start with Redskin a mostly instrumental bluesy track and just sit back until you get to Her We Are as all the songs fit nicely together and will take you on a trip.

After Redskin is Out in the Rain a nice ballad with nice lead guitar and then an acoustic track Dandelion. Moving flows right after and is followed by two more instrumental songs until the climax Here We Are. All of the songs have great lead guitar along with the keyboards and even though Panka's English is not very good, the vocals just blend beautiful with the music. Great album.

Oh, the 70's! The decade of the double live album! So many masterpieces came from that time: Deep Purple with Made In Japan, Uriah Heep with Live, Wishbone Ash with Live Dates, UFO with Strangers In The Night, to name but a few. Even live triple albums were game in that category (Yessongs and Welcome Back My Friends..., were the prime ones). Well, it seemed a sure shot for everyone. And even some, say, "second league" bands did release some at least very good ones. So when I found out that Germany prog rocker Jane did theirs, I smelled something good. And, thankfully I was right. Jane never really got much of my attention at the time, for there were so many better and more creative groups releasing far superior albums at the time, even in that country (Triumvirat, Ammon Dull II, Eloy and others). But nowadays I tend to appreciate their work more. And as a live band they do sound better than in the studio, at least for me.

At Home Live was recorded at their hometown, Hannover, and so, the audience was truly a fanatical one. Everything work on this album: the cover the repertoire, the performances, the production, even (excellent picture of Mars landscape). I was drawn to this record mainly because it featured ex Eloy Manfred Wieczorke on keyboards, so I knew it would have lots of heavy Hammond runs, and sure enough they are there. Jane never really got too sophisticated or complex as its contemporaries, and it shows on the longer tracks, where it is clear they are not capable of long solos or jams and are relying a lot on Wieczorke's talent to hold things up. Although it does not always work, most of the time it does. And, what the hell, it is a kind of "best of" compilation, I guess the songs featured here are indeed their best so far. I'm not so fond of the last track, the unreleased Windows. With its 20 minute long running time it shows that it was a good idea not to commit that one of their studio album. Typical at the time it has its moments but could have been cut to one third of its length for a better result. But I guess they had to prove they could deliver their "epic". It was kind of obligatory in the 70's to do such thing, I guess, even if you could not really handle such undertaking.

All in all a real good live album, Not really a masterpiece, but a solid work with probably the best songs and performances of those guys. And I love those vintage keyboards sounds!

Rating: 3,5 stars, that I will round to four because of those great keys!

A real disappointment after some of the heights they scaled on the first two albums. It explores similar territory to Wishbone Ash using the same twin guitar line up but there is still enough of Jane in there somewhere to give the album an identity which is unique. The real problem with this album are some truly abysmal vocal performances. It seems like the band was trying to be democratic but handing the vocal duties on a potentially great track like 'Mother You Don't Know' to Charly Maucher is a disaster. The results are a great composition married to the worst pub rock vocals.

' I Need You' fares better its a great composition and a fine melody, but the vocal is still the weakest part . The version which appears as 'Rest Of My Life' on the live album 'At Home' is miles better. Piano and acoustic guitar feature on the ballad `Way to Paradise' which has a passable lead vocal . Despite the flaws its still a good album , interesting and a part of the Jane story so 3 stars .

This album is one of those which could have been an all time classic but fails because of the way the tracks have been compiled. It contains the sensational 'Out In The Rain' which is enough on its own to guarantee greatness. one of the all time peaks of progressive rock

So what went wrong ? ...well 'Redskin' for a start is a disastrous choice to open a vital album. It would have been OK tucked away to close Side 2 but as a grand opener it just doesn't work. There is not enough melody form and it soon gets repetitive. Everything else is just dandy. 'Waterfall' is great too. I tend to skip side 1 but on the odd occasion I do give it a spin its an enjoyable experience. Jane are always interesting and this is indeed an excellent addition to any prog collection, so I'm saying 4 stars.

This surely must be worth 5 stars. Its a very bold idea to mix classic tracks with unreleased material in a live album. This wonderful collection consists of familiar material from the first 5 albums plus previously unreleased tracks . The ratio is 50/50 of classic tracks to new tracks but everything blends together remarkably well. It's probably because the tempos , keys , melodic ranges of the lead lines and the feel of the tracks is very similar. Its true symphonic prog. A masterpiece which was a huge seller in Germany and even broke the band in America (well a little bit anyway)

The cover picture of the surface of Mars was also a bold move for an album released in 1977. Everything is perfect. This album should be hailed alongside Made In Japan, Strangers In the Night and Uriah Heep Live as one of the all time double live albums.

The unreleased material consists of 'All My Friends', Expectation', 'Another Way' ,'River', 'High Time For Crusaders' and 'Windows' This is a real masterpiece. If you only try one Jane album this will have you hooked. Then you can move on to the first album, possibly skipping Jane III and go as far as 'Masque'. 'Masque' is where I leave the Jane fold , but I'm always prepared to be lured back in!

I love the combination of bluesy stonerrock and progrock.

Jane is a great bluesy spacerock band with less emphasis on the synth and more emphasis on the guitar.

Jane sounds somewhat like Eloy (Floating, Inside) but with less organ. Because Jane doesn't have a strong vocalist, the vocals are minimal and most of the music is instrumental. Somehow it also sounds a bit like real early Wishbone Ash.

I love the concept of Fire, Earth, Water and Air, but it's not really important to the music. I think that a lot of people expect the band to play some cosmic krautrock, but they are essentially a heavy guitarband with a proggy side to it.

I will have to be honest about this album: it's disjointed, it's messy. Age of Madness was the end of their space rock phase, and what they demonstrated on Between Heaven & Hell, you'd think they were able to continue on the greatness of that album. Unfortunately that's not the case. The instrumental title track is actually quite good, has more than a hint of Eloy in it, which is really no surprise when you know that Manfred Wieczorke is responsible for the keyboard playing (he left Eloy after the fiasco of Power and the Passion - itself a great album - for a more financially stable band, in this case, Jane). But there is so much questionable stuff that just doesn't appeal to me. They attempt to sound like the Kinks with Ray Davies type of vocals on one song, and much of the rest of the album left little impression on me. I have to say that Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Live at Home, and Age of Madness show Jane at their finest (particularly their space rock phase), so I'd suggest you go for those albums instead.

Jane's debut album, "Together," is a prime example of early heavy prog from Germany. They also inject a bit of psychedelia into their brand of heavy prog. The reviews/ratings of this album are varied here on PA, and good points are made both to praise and to criticize this album. I, for one, really enjoy this album.

The songs are all good, but what really stands out for me is the singing of vocalist Bernd Pulst. This would be the only album he would be featured on, and the next year he was dead. Such as shame for a great talent to die so young. I have not been able to find any information on why he passed away, but I'm guessing it was drug related. Anyway, to give you an idea what he sounded like, think of something like Joe Cocker with a German accent. Some people don't care for it, but I think his vocal performance gives the music an emotional element often missing in prog rock. While none of the musicians are technical masters of their instruments, the performances are solid. At times some of the songs sound a bit like Eloy circa "Inside" or "Floating," but this album actually predates those, so I guess Eloy sounded a bit like Jane! The opener "Daytime," and the closer "Hangman" are the two standout tracks for me, primarily for their emotional impact. The most progressive track is the 11+ minute "Spain," which changes direction several times.

While Jane would go on to greater success on subsequent albums, their first is by far my favorite. Recommended to those who can enjoy a progressive rock album without all the technical wizardry that often goes with it. 4 stars.