The Canterbury Appreciation Thread

James wrote: Someone on P.A. will want it, I'm sure. Going back to Arzachel.  It's a good album, but only the last track is fantastic in its psych vain.  The rest are bluesy (or as Laplace says: bloozy).  You'll most likely enjoy it, but it's not as proggy as Egg or Khan.

That was a quick purchase, Pat!  I listened to it the other day and it is indeed excellent.  The first track has a slow start, but it certainly gets going later on.

Elton Dean's best performances are on the many different versions of Seven for Lee.  The version of it on The Wrong Object's The Unbelievable Truth is astonishing (and there are/were a few versions of this available for download from The Wrong Object's website -- it's best to check), but the one I like the most is called Seven for Me.

My favourite Elton Dean solo however, is the one on Part IV of Centipede's album.  Many people love this album and many people hate it, so I'm not sure what you'll think of it.  I personally think it's fantastic from start to finish.

Referring back to Soft Heap: the whole band gels brilliantly.  Hugh Hopper is one of the best bassists I've ever heard (especially when in fussbass mode) and Alan Gowen's keyboard parts are completely different to those of Mike Ratledge's.  They're more atmospheric and in less of a solo style.  They breathe life into the compositions.  Apart from Hopper and Dean, there's a lot less of a similarity between Soft Heap and Soft Machine.

In Cahoots is another great band.  Similar in many ways to Soft Heap, but with Phil Miller on guitar.  The Wrong Object also remind me of In Cahoots in places.

Finally, need I say more about Pip Pyle's drumming?

Pat, if you can find them, check out both of the Hopper/Dean/Tippett/Gallivan albums, I think you'll also enjoy them.

One must not forget Bundles and Softs either, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.  As Dick Heath mentioned a few pages back, also see if you can get Floating World Live by Soft Machine, or maybe the two BBC Sessions CDs, especially the second one, which covers the Bundles and Softs era and the passing of Holdsworth and the arrival of Etheridge.

As I'm still relatively new to this scene, I'm sure that any questions I would have are probably answered somewhere - but I'd sure like to hear some of what you two talked about, if you wouldn't mind posting some of the content here.

I've really been enjoying Robert Wyatt's Rock Bottom lately, it's yet another album that gets better with every listen.  In particular, the first two tracks are really beautiful.  I may try to get Ruth is Stranger than Richard in the future (my wife put me on a purchasing hiatus for a spell )

NaturalScience wrote: Picchio dal Pozzo =

That's where they started to go more RIO, on their second. Their debut is really laid-back Canterbury, it's fantastic. I may have to listen to that again right now.

bumped - vive la musique Canterbury!

Pick up Hatfield's debut.

And then you're ready for what for me has been the pinnacle - National Health.  You can get their three studio releases on a 2 CD set called Complete, although since you're in the UK perhaps you can get the individual releases cheaply - their first two are absolutely essential.

That's enough homework for now. 

I'm really listening to a lot of different genres of prog now, considering I only came to this site listening to a limited amount of prog metal, and some 70s prog. Now I've been listening to a lot of Caravan, just the first band I've listened to from the Cantebury scene, and it's really good.