The Canterbury Appreciation Thread

Not a bad album by any means, but I find Caravan's Waterloo Lily somewhat lacklustre in comparison to both its predecessor and its follow-up. Richard Sinclair is given too little space there in the vocal department, and in my opinion that shows.

NaturalScience wrote: I would say my least favorite Canterbury albums right now might be either Steve Hillage's first solo output, Fish Rising, or Soft Machine Fourth.  Particularly the latter, considering the greatness of its predecessor and that Wyatt was still with the band, I expected great things and was surprised at how lackluster it was - not bad music by any stretch, but nothing I would ever play with regularity, I think.

I like Soft Machine's Fourth considerably (still a four star album for me -- in fact I like it a great deal -- difficult for any band to follow up an album as magnificent as Soft Machine's Third), but, as you know, I'm not that keen on Fish Rising (my one real disappointment).  I do like Khan rather more than you (grew on me, and it's a good one from the category when I want to rock out), though I too feel that You is in a higher class (trying to think of a  better term.  Higher works well for the Pothead Pixies).

Zyma's Thoughts (from Germany) rather underwhelmed me, but I still enjoy it. 

Logan wrote:   I do like Khan rather more than you (grew on me, and it's a good one from the category when I want to rock out), though I too feel that You is in a higher class (trying to think of a  better term.  Higher works well for the Pothead Pixies).

Don't get me wrong, I really love that Khan album, and indeed it is a great "rock-out" album.  It's just that to me, You is superior in a very clear way.

^  I think we would.  That's a reason why I was disappointed with Fish Rising.

Here's a  review I came across a while ago at amazon...

gigidunnit wrote: "Fish Rising" is notable for a number of reasons. It was Hillage's first solo album, setting the scene for the soft psychedelia that would occupy him for most of the rest of his career (including his reinvention as rave music programmer System 7). It successfully shifted Gong fans, chronologically, away from Daevid Allen's near disastrous solo career and onto Hillage's, bridging the gap from "You" to "L" and beyond (ignoring, as we all should, the disaster of "Shamal"). And its critical acclaim (and commercial success) on its release in 1975 seems now an astonishing peculiarity of that baffling year just before punk changed everything. A year later and Hillage's dreamy psychedelic noodling and hippie phrases like "sky drunk heart beat band" would have got quite a different response. It is also Hillage's best album, excluding the excursion of "Rainbow Dome Music", but sadly that isn't as high a praise as it seems. Except for an obscure and frankly awful cod-psychedelic album credited to Arzachel and bashed out cash-in-hand in 1969, Hillage first came to notice with his band Khan's dismal "Space Shanty" in 1972. This wasn't psychedelic but soft Canterbury prog rock, an album of harmless, mediocre rock with undistinguished guitar. A good production job might have saved it, but "Space Shanty" suffered from a flat, limp, lifeless production that compressed everything to the flavour of wet cardboard. Possibly that was Hillage's way of working, as (bizarrely) his contribution to Gong's "Angel's Egg" the following year, "I Never Glid Before", also suffered from a flat production, in contrast to the rest of the album. And that same flat production all but made "Fish Rising" unlistenable. I'm guessing it all had something to do with Hillage's favoured guitar sound, which was pale and reedy and completely lacking in top end. His short tenure in Gong simply interrupted Khan: "Fish Rising" was intended as the second Khan album. Two of the tracks, "Solar Musick Suite" and "The Salmon Song" were written for that purpose, and in fact would both have sat happily in "Space Shanty". The only difference is that Gong had given Hillage a slightly keener sense of psychedelia, enabling his bubbly loop guitar to add a gentle hallucinogenic edge to the busy prog of the basic tracks, laid down by Gong's rhythm section in 1974. They're not all that appealing, though "Salmon Song" did at least point forward to "Green" in 1978, whose "Sea Nature" is a virtual rewrite. "Fish" is a one-minute throwaway, while "Meditation Of The Snake" another version of the layered loop guitar he'd introduced as "Castle In The Clouds" on "Angel's Egg". None of this has much to commend it. However, the album is redeemed by its final track "Aftaglid", a showcase for Hillage's guitar style and a fine psychedelic journey, culminating in a brilliant powerhouse coda "The Golden Vibe". Everything you need to know about Hillage is here, and was never bettered. Though the production is still thin, it does at least show Hillage working himself up toward his second solo album "L", where he attempted to make up for his production deficit by hiring Todd Rundgren to give it a brash, thundering Utopia sound that almost makes up for a second set of uninspiring material. All Gong fans will at least need "Fish Rising". You'd probably do best to jump straight to "Green" and "Rainbow Dome" after that, then hop ship over to "Be Good To Yourself" era Man. If you're thinking about upgrading, then this is probably one occasion when the remix is worth having. Though it's not much of an improvement on the original sound, it's at least better. Don't expect this to sound like another "L", though -- it's merely marginally less compressed. For how it could have sounded, you have to head for the bonus tracks and a fabulous 13 minute unadorned version of "Aftaglid", which has something approaching proper dynamics. It's billed as a "backing track" but the loop guitar is all in place -- this is the familiar released version but consists only of the bass, drums and guitar parts, with scat singing where the lyrics would eventually be. It's also lacking part of the introduction and the final guitar fade-out -- though the unadorned "Golden Vibe" is a terrific way to hear Hillage's guitar technique. The other bonus track "Pentragrammaspin" (7.46) would have fit perfectly in the released album, and sounds like yet another Khan piece. We should be grateful that Hillage, who long ago disowned his pre-System 7 past, was coaxed into remixing this material in 2006. He's done a good job. It's not so radical that you'll miss your original LP or CD version, and with the bonus "Aftaglid" you at least get the impression of just how punchy this album might have been. Best of all, it's dispensed with the pointless border that Virgin gave the front cover, and there's a lavish booklet.

I knew you also liked Khan considerably.  Really, I do agree with you; You is the superior album (and one I return to much more).  Khan has kind of a bittersweet place in my heart, even if I don't consider up to the standards of You, due to personal circumstances when I was listening to the album a lot.  It was a good album for what I needed at the time.

Edited by Logan - June 02 2008 at 16:14

Yep.  Incidentally, when Raffaella did this topic Your own personal Top 10: the reasons! last August, You was one of my top ten.

Gong - You

Possibly the best of the Radio Gnome Invisible trilogy (Angel's Egg is about tied for me).  Great spacey album.  "Isle of Everywhere" sends my mind on a retro-futuristic voyage to a really cool orgy where there are women dancing in silver and/or white go-go boots, and wearing minimal tinfoil and cellophane bits.  Sw**ky; it takes me to a happy place.

Wasn't much of a description, but then that's why I don't write reviews.

It is an amazing album.  Incredible.  At that time, "Isle of Everywhere" was the particular standout for me, but I came to appreciate the whole thing more.


Edited by Logan - June 02 2008 at 16:40

I should check out more Hillage solo one of these days.

Here's a non-UK one I've been meaning to get: Pazop


1972
Psychillis Of A Lunatic Genius
4.03

Looks like poor Hillage is taking a beating 

Oh and one more must buy, if you can find it:

Graham Collier Sextet - Down Another Road

Just look at the lineup!

Harry Beckett (flugelhorn), Stan Sulzmann (alto & tenor sax), Nick Evans (trombone), Karl Jenkins (piano & oboe), John Marshall (drums), Graham Collier (bass) . Recorded in London, England, March 21 & 22, 1969.

Basically this band contains three future Soft Machine members (although Evans was only a sessionman really), whilst Beckett fwas also on the fringe in Isipingo and other bands.  I don't know much about Sulzmann.

Lullabye for a Lonely Child is heartwrenchingly gorgeous and I prefer this version to the Nucleus one (featuring Marshall and Jenkins as well).

Ghost Rider wrote: Not a bad album by any means, but I find Caravan's Waterloo Lily somewhat lacklustre in comparison to both its predecessor and its follow-up. Richard Sinclair is given too little space there in the vocal department, and in my opinion that shows.