PRESENT

It was nice to hear VdGG reforming in 2005 and giving us a new 2-CD set, Present, with the classic lineup, Peter Hammill, Guy Evans, Hugh Banton and David Jackson. Unfortunately this album really left me cold. Now I don't expect it to be on the level of H to He Who Am the Only One or Pawn Hearts, even Godbluff, besides how can you? Those were very difficult to top by any standard. But at least still make the music well worth hearing. I realize this was 2005, not 1971, so I expect a bit of an updated approach, which I do get here. Except for "Every Bloody Emperor", with some really scathing lyrics on politics (recording during the middle of the George W. Bush administration in the States), the rest of the album really felt like they simply didn't have it in them. The second disc seems to get the most maligned as apparently VdGG doesn't do to well as an instrumental outfit (although they were responsible for a killer rendition of George Martin's "Theme One", which appeared as a single, but this was back in their early '70s glory days). That same reaction gets applied to ALT, the instrumental companion to A Grounding in Numbers. Nothing on that second disc to Present leaves an impression on me so I can see why reactions to their instrumental stuff isn't so hot. But to me I didn't find them any worse than the vocal numbers on the first disc.

To me, I really think Van der Graaf Generator could have done better, given their track record. I know they didn't have to be just like Pawn Hearts, nor do I expect anyone else to think that, but they could do better than what they did on Present (I hadn't hear the others they released since, though).