HATFIELD AND THE NORTH

Random noises and noodling does not make good music. This album is atrocious. The only noise that sounds edgy enough to approach coolness is "Learning To Shave" its still piss, but at least its not crap like the rest of the album. This is bad, some of the worst music ever put on out. If anyone here knows who Liam Gallagher is, he makes better music as a solo "artist" and that is saying something. This is Yoko Ono "music". They must have been high as kites to have thought they were recording music. Don't fall for the glowing reviews, its from people who think Jackson Pollock is Michelangelo.

Like "Hatwise Choice" released in January of 2005, "Hattitude" is a compilation of live tracks performed at the BBC Radio and beyond. This was released in 2006 and is a nice companion album to "Hatwise Choice". Again we get just the band with no Northettes or guest appearances. Pip Pyle picked and assembled the tracks for both compilations. The liner notes are invaluable by the way for being incredibly detailed, with each member giving their take on the band's history from their start in 1972. There are pages of this as they would take a period of the band's history, then they each comment on it in detail.

Pip admitted that there really wasn't enough quality material for a second compilation until Dave Stewart discovered in his storage until a box full of original reel-to-reel tapes recorded between 1973 and 1975. And they were in good shape as it turned out. Pip realized now that they had more than enough for a second release, and possibly even a third! Pip was at it again this time going through about 40 hours worth of music and culling the good stuff. A long job as it took Pyle about 2 months. When he could he would edit the songs into segued passages making these tracks blend into each other. He did this because when they played they would go from one song to the next without a break. Just like SOFT MACHINE before them.

Sadly, in the liner notes, the band relates "Our dear friend and colleague Pip Pyle died in Paris in the early hours of August 28th 2006. He was our founder member and the driving force of HATFIELD AND THE NORTH... this cd... is dedicated to his memory." They also mention absent friends like Mike Patto, Alan Gowen, Steve Miller, Peter Bardens, Pierre Moerlen, Elton Dean, Pip Pyle, and others who have gone on before. The one surprise for me in the thanks department is the one to Gavin Harrison. We get 21 tracks and under an hour of music this time.

I am so glad they included "Al Clark Presents", that final track. Live from 1975 and just over 2 minutes, we get Al Clark who at the time was Virgin Records Press Secretary, presenting the band with a lot of clever humour and complimentary words. It made me proud. By the way Dave Stewart may have been inspired by Pip's hard work and the results with these two compilation albums, as he would do the same for his previous band EGG, and release an archival album the following year to this, in 2007. He called it "The Metronomical Society" and it is incredible. Better than the two HATFIELD comps in my opinion. And no one writes better liner notes than Dave Stewart. So funny.

For HATFIELD AND THE NORTH fanboys both of these comps are nothing but essential. It shows the band in a different light than on their two studio albums.

It doesn't get much better than HATFIELD AND THE NORTH. So of course fans have been drooling for more after pretty much having only those two studio albums to enjoy over the years. The "more" came in 2005 with the release of "Hatwise Choice" a compilation of mostly live tracks and I believe one demo. These tracks were taken from the period of 1973 to 1975, a time when the HATFIELD's were a gigging band. Pip Pyle picked and assembled these tunes, and their four stints on the BBC with John Peel are a focus, but the other live recordings take up roughly half of this almost 70 minute record.

In the liner notes they mention that this recording is dedicated to the memory of the irreplaceable John Peel. Of course Peel is thanked in these notes as well, along with Robert Wyatt and others. But I like the thanks to "Alister at the pub in Southall." Almost all of these songs have been re-titled making it fun to find out what the original piece was called. The tracks seemed stripped down really, and more raw. They let their hair down, as opposed to the two studio albums where every note seems to have it's place. Both studio albums could not be more perfect.

This reminds me of how ANGLAGARD sought perfection in the studio, but unlike the HATFIELDS they also sought perfection with their live recordings. The latter was not something that HATFIELD AND THE NORTH strove for. You could say we get a more immature version of the band here on "Hatwise Choice". Yes their hair is down. No Northettes, or incredible guest appearances like on their two studio albums. The sound quality here varies. A few aren't that great but most are very good. A lot of these tracks are quite short as well.

So while this all sounds familiar, it also sounds fresh and different. This is called "Volume 1", and the following year in 2006 they would release "Volume 2", a second compilation album they called "Hattitude". I much prefer the studio albums to these two compilations, but "Hatwise Choice" really is an essential release for Canterbury fans.

"The Rotters' Club" is the second full-length studio album by UK progressive rock/jazz-rock act Hatfield and The North. The album was released through Virgin Records in March 1975. It's the successor to the band's eponymously titled debut full-length album which was released in February 1974. Hatfield and The North formed in mid-1972, released two full-length studio albums and disbanded in 1975. So it was a relatively short-lived act, but at the time it was a sort of Canterbury scene supergroup featuring members and ex-members of acts like Delivery, Matching Mole, Gong, and Caravan, which meant that Hatfield and The North got some attention. The four-piece lineup who recorded the debut album is intact on "The Rotters' Club". Phil Miller (guitars), Dave Stewart (Hammond organ, Fender Rhodes, piano, MiniMoog, tone generator), Richard Sinclair (bass, lead vocals, additional guitar), and Pip Pyle (drums, percussion)...

...all of the above incredibly accomplished and experienced musicians and it's audible. "The Rotters' Club" is a very well performed release featuring many great musicial moments and details. Stylistically Hatfield and The North play a soft progressive rock/jazz-rock style, which is often laid-back and pleasant, but definitely not devoid of musical experimentation. Opening track "Share It" is a bit deceiving with it's nice pop melody and Sinclair giving a polished vocal performance (not completely unlike some of his most "light" work with Caravan), but already from track number two "Lounging There Trying", the band start showing their true colors. Jazz/fusion rhythm work, odd time-signatures, and a general disregard for regular vers/chorus structures or normal pop/rock compositional rules. In that respect Hatfield and The North are definitely closer to jazz music than they are to pop/rock. The album features several sections with improvised jamming ("The Yes No Interlude" is probably the best example of that) but also more structured compositions.

While it's a step up from the rather incoherrent debut album, "The Rotters' Club" does suffer from some of the same inconsistency issues as the debut album did. It's predominantly the songwriting which could have been more memorable, because as the case is with the debut album, "The Rotters' Club" is a both well produced and well performed album. There's no arguing that it's through and through a quality release featuring many intriguing musical ideas, but to my ears it often sounds a bit random and it's sometimes hard to know where the improvisation and the structured composed parts start and end. A 3.5 star (70%) rating is deserved.

This is something of a companion piece to Hatwise Choice, with a similar ethos - offering the cream of the Hatfield and the North vaults, helping to fill out the missing pieces in the story of a band who were crucial to the mid-1970s development of the Canterbury scene (containing former members of the likes of Caravan, Khan, Arzachel/Egg, and Matching Mole, and acting as a forerunner to National Health) but whose studio output only consisted of two albums.

Derived from live recordings, radio sessions, and demos, you might expect this to have fairly patchy sound quality, but actually it's much more consistent than you'd expect from such a diversely-sourced collection. As with Hatwise Choice, some of the compositions here may have new titles but prove to be different takes or interpretations on familiar tunes, but there's also enough improvisation and whatnot and sufficient variations from the studio renditions that this doesn't feel redundant.

There may well be more in the vaults than this - but the fact that the Hatfield camp has been satisfied to leave this archival series at two releases suggests that the cream of the crop is already represented here. As with its predecessor, this is in no way as essential as the band's original albums, but once you've digested those it makes an excellent next stop.

HATFIELD AND THE NORTH existed from 1972 to 1975 before disbanding and they released two studio albums over that time. So it's seems a little curious that their label would release a compilation album in 1980 when the band only had two recordings. Well a closer look reveals that this record has 16 tracks and of those four are from their self titled debut, and seven songs from "The Rotters' Club". The opening two tracks are alternate versions from the debut recorded the year after in 1974. Then we get three live tunes including "Halfway Between Heaven And Earth" recorded live in London in 1972 plus "Oh Len's Nature!" recorded live in France in 1975 and then "Lything And Gracing" live in France in 1974. Of course the band is beyond amazing and a legendary four piece with maybe the best keyboardist I've heard in Dave Stewart, plus Phil Miller guitar, Pip Pyle drums and Richard Sinclair bass and vocals. Not worthy! Guests include The Northettes, Mont Campbell and his french horn, Jimmy Hastings sax and flute, Robert Wyatt vocals, Lindsay Cooper bassoon and oboe and Tim Hodgkinson clarinet.

So "Afters" is well worth it in my opinion and man how can you not give anything this band has done anything less than 4 stars? So melodic and humerous and yet challenging. Distortion!

Short Review//

This is a very pleasant and cozy record full of very free flowing and generally pretty, mellow music. The lineup is incredibly stacked, but honestly, just having the name Dave Stewart attached is already enough to sell me on it. There are parts of this record that actually make me laugh out loud. The pure absurdity of having the sound of someone picking up a ringing phone, just to hear Richard Sinclair singing the chorus of the song on the other end always gets me. Robert Wyatt pokes his head in for the memorable and psychedelic "Calyx," but it's the following track where for me, the album really hits a stride: "Son of There's No Place Like Homerton." I love the big celebratory sounding payoffs in this track and the brilliant interplay between the four members, which is a sentiment I can echo for pretty much all the material on this album. These guys are dialed in, and most certainly on the same wavelength. While this track has those big energetic moments, there's a lot of quieter, intimate, female vocal led passages as well that offer a nice contrast within the music. I also really dig the track "Aigrette" being a very upbeat and melodic shorter piece. It reminds me of something you might see on a Camel record around the same time. The North Fol De Rol is very meditative and flowing, giving you some room to breathe before the more chaotic and frantic "Shaving is Boring." The last track i'll highlight is the menacing and evil sounding "Gigantic Land Crabs In Earth Takeover Bid." What a song title! Overall there are some moments during this albums runtime where my attention drifts a little bit during. Mostly in some of the mellower passages. I'd say I prefer the more calculated sound of the follow-up band of sorts: National Health. But there's certainly a time and a place for this memorable release, I love walking through the woods to some Hatfield.

4 stars

This is a great album, lovely vocals, keyboard, bass, percussion and all around wonderful vibe.

One thing that I dislike about this album is the track "Son Of There's No Place?" which starts off well but descends into an instrumental I find quiet dull.

Another gripe of mine is the insufficient usage of Richard Sinclair's voice. Aside from singing some of the opening/closing bits of the album his words are unused for a large portion of the albums middle. Since this album is one song, the uneven distribution of what for me is one of Hatfield & The North's best parts brings down the albums middle, resulting in an album that shies away from 5/5.

Overall this is a great album, though I recommend the follow up over this one. Canterbury Sound Score 5/5

Fantastic album, 4.5/5. I only small issues with this album. These are 1, the lyrics suck. 2, Share It. Other then these 5/5.

The lyrics are cryptic and armed with innuendo which I wish was replaced by lyrics as good as those featured on the works of bands like Egg. I still like the songs but the lyrics hurt. Thus I simply can't give 5/5. Furthermore the opening song Share It has this Moog solo that just comes out of nowhere and is unbelievably cheesy.

Canterbury Sound Score 5/5, duh.

Overall this album is fantastic a clear improvement over the debut, tracks like Mumps are at the pinnacle of beauty.

HATFIELD & THE NORTH were a two-album Canterbury Scene band, named after the well-known A1 Motorway sign on the Great North Road from London to Edinburgh. Their first eponymously-titled album passed by virtually unnoticed at the time of its release in 1974, but their second album "The Rotters' Club" (1975) is much better-known. The line-up for this second album featured Dave Stewart on keyboards, Phil Miller on guitar, Richard Sinclair on bass and lead vocals, Pip Pyle on drums, a 4-piece brassy horn section and a 3-piece female choir of Barbara Gaskin, Amanda Parsons & Ann Rosenthal, collectively named The Northettes.

The opening song "Share It" sounds strangely familiar, even upon first hearing. This upbeat jaunty Jazz-Rock number is very reminiscent of both Caravan and Camel. There's no doubting that Hatfield & the North are an English band from Richard Sinclair's clear-cut vocals, which sound as English as fish & chips. The obscure lyrics are a riddle wrapped in an enigma though, but that only adds to the quaint English charm of this catchy tune . Here's a brief opening taster of the lyrics:- "Tadpoles keep screaming in my ear, Hey there! Rotter's Club! Explain the meaning of this song and share it" ..... The bizarre meaning of this particular song will perhaps forever remain shrouded in mystery, when even the singer sounds baffled by the abstruse lyrics. And now for a little instrumental lounge music with "Lounging There Trying", which sounds like the kind of sophisticated improvisational Jazz you might listen to whilst coolly sipping a gin and tonic in a trendy cocktail lounge. There's no clue as to what the strangely-titled "(Big) John Wayne Socks Psychology on the Jaw" might be all about, because it's a brief 43 second instrumental, and the slightly discordant music bears little relation to the bizarre song title. This leads us into the even shorter "Chaos at the Greasy Spoon", which does indeed sound chaotic and a bit of a tuneless mess to be absolutely honest, so it's something of a blessed relief that it's less than half-a-minute long. Next up is "The Yes No Interlude" which is not so much an interlude, but more of an extended 7-minute instrumental jam session, where the musicians throw caution to the wind with gay abandon and let loose with some wild and improvisational Canterbury Scene Jazz. We're back to more familiar territory with "Fitter Stoke Has A Bath", which sounds like a typical lively Jazz-Rock song that Caravan might have recorded, although the meaning of the weird song title and lyrics are just as obscure as Hatfield & the North's instrumental numbers. Here's a brief example of the totally nonsensical lyrics:- "Bing billy bong - silly song's going wrong, Ping pong ping, clong cling dong, Tie me up, turn me on, Bing billy bang, Desperate Dan, frying pan, Cling clong cling, Bong bing bang, Michael Miles, Bogey man," ..... Yes indeed! Song lyrics don't come much sillier than that! They sound like the kind of wacky lyrics you might have heard in a typical Eurovision Song Contest entry from the 1970's. There's a return to some kind of normality - or whatever passes for normal in the bizarre musical world of Hatfield & the North - with "Didn't Matter Anyway". This is a gentle Caravan-esque song floating on a mellow wave of flute and delicate keyboards. It's the most approachable and easy-to-listen-to song on the album. You can just relax and let the worries and cares of the day slip away listening to this gorgeous insouciant song, because whatever might have been troubling you, it probably "Didn't Matter Anyway".

It's time now to don a dinner jacket and order a dry martini - shaken not stirred - for the Side Two opener "Underdub", because it's another pleasant cocktail lounge diversion to while away four minutes of spare time whilst waiting for your dinner date to arrive for the evening. And finally, we arrive at the 20-minute long suite "Mumps" to close out the album. The music is divided into four parts with the kind of weird and crazy titles that we've come to expect by now:- 1. "Your Majesty Is Like a Cream Donut (Quiet)"; 2. "Lumps"; 3. "Prenut"; 4. "Your Majesty Is Like a Cream Donut (Loud)". The Jazzy Canterbury Scene music is just as eccentric and off-kilter as the titles suggest, featuring another wild excursion into uncharted realms, occasionally sounding atonal and disjointed, but always unexpected and totally unpredictable. It's an endlessly complex arrangement that deserves to be listened to several times to truly appreciate the musical diversity on offer here.

"The Rotters' Club" is undoubtedly an essential album for fans of the Canterbury Scene sound, but it's not so essential for Prog-Rock fans generally. The album won't be to everyone's taste, because this is wild and improvisational Canterbury Scene music that's nowhere near as approachable and easy to listen to as the more melodic and harmonious sound of Caravan and Camel for instance. "The Rotters' Club" album is not for the uninitiated. If you've dipped your toes into the Canterbury Scene with Caravan, then Hatfield & the North by contrast are like jumping into the deep end. Their complex music veers more towards the Jazz Fusion end of the musical spectrum, than the more traditional British Jazz-Rock sound. On the other hand, if you're in the mood for some uninhibited and unrestrained Jazzy flights of fancy, then head on up the Great North Road to the sound of Hatfield & the North.