DEEP CUTS

'Deep Cuts' is the tenth studio album of Strawbs and was released in 1976. As happened with the previous ninth studio album 'Nomadness', all tracks are short and timed with less than five minutes. On 'Deep Cuts', the absence of a full time keyboardist continue, as happened with their previous ninth studio album, 'Nomadness'. As also happened with 'Nomadness', it moved away from the progressive folk/rock leanings and it's quite definitely a more pop/rock oriented album. And like 'Nomadness', 'Deep Cuts' also continues the electric progression, an interesting and peculiar trade mark that belongs to both albums. It also contains the same line up of its predecessor studio album 'Nomadness'.

So, the line up on 'Deep Cuts' is also Dave Cousins (vocals and acoustic guitars), Dave Lambert (vocals, acoustic and electric guitars), Chas Cronk (backing vocals, bass guitar and acoustic guitar) and Rod Coombes (backing vocals, drums and percussion). 'Deep Cuts' has also the performance of some guest musicians, Robert Kirby (backing vocals, Mellotron, electric piano and French horn), John Mealing (piano, organ, electric piano, harpsichord and synthesizer) and Rupert Holmes (piano, harpsichord, clavinet and clarinet).

'Deep Cuts' has ten tracks. The first track 'I Only Want My Love To Grow In You' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk was the first single to be taken of this album. It was also the first single to be written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk as a partnership. This is a good effort to be a hit single with a simple but largely enjoyable melody and with great vocal performance. The second track 'Turn Me Round' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk is a song composed in the same vein of the previous track. It has a fine rock arrangement and a fine poetic lyric. This is a good song, very strong and hard, and in the bottom, it's very pleasant to hear. The third track 'Hard Hard Winter' written by Dave Cousins and Robert Kirby is a pleasant and nice ballad sung and performed with great musical expression. It's a song that reminds me strongly the ballads made and performed by Eagles. This is a short song where basically its musical structure has nothing of progressive. The fourth track 'My Friend Peter' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk, is an unconvincing rock song despite has a nice guitar solo. Curiously, this song reminds me the vocals of Phil Collins, not Peter Gabriel vocals, to which he has often been compared on vocal issues. However, this is one of the weakest points on the album. The fifth track 'The Soldier's Tale' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk is another rock song, but this time with some musical influence of the country rock music. This is a good and pleasant song to hear with several and beautiful keyboard works, which gives a kind of a depth to the song. The sixth track 'Simple Visions' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk is another good song on the album. This is one of the most overlooked classic songs of the band with good poetic lyrics, well sung and also with great imagery, and with some fine musical arrangements. The seventh track 'Charmer' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk is, in my humble opinion, another weak point on the album. It's the other song of the album which was also released as a single. Still, the single version has some additional overdubs compared with the version on the album. This song reminds me, in some moments, the music of Styx. The eighth track 'Wasting My Time (Thinking Of You)' written by Dave Cousins and Chas Cronk is another weaker musical point on the album. It's a soft and gentle ballad, nice and calm and where we can hear a French horn. This is a song that reminds me the music of The Beatles, but sincerely there isn't much more to say about it. The ninth track 'Beside The Rio Grande' written by Dave Cousins is, without any doubt, the highest point on the album, unfortunately the only one. It's the only song that reminds me, a little bit, the epic music of their good old times. This is an excellent song, very rocking, and that for a while make us think and revive their moments of musical glory. The tenth track 'So Close And Yet So Far Way' written by Dave Cousins is a calm, slower and beautiful ballad, well performed, with beautiful electric piano, nice guitar playing and enjoyable backing vocal harmonies. It's an enough decent song to end this musical work.

Conclusion: Unfortunately, I can't agree with some of you who consider 'Deep Cuts' better than 'Nomadness'. I know both albums, have short songs, are almost commercial oriented, its songs aren't particularly inspired and both albums has very few progressive lines. However, 'Nomadness' is, in my humble opinion, a better musical effort because it's more cohesive, more uniform, more balanced and has also four great songs, 'The Golden Salamander', 'So Shall Our Love Die', 'Hanging In The Gallery' and 'The Promised Land'. 'Deep Cuts' is less cohesive and less balanced, and, above all, has only one song which can be considered worthy of their great music moments, 'Beside The Rio Grande'. Despite what I said before, I decided to rate 'Deep Cuts' also with the same 3 stars of 'Nomadness'. In my opinion, 'Nomadness' is an album that deserves 3 or 3,5 stars and 'Deep Cuts' is an album that deserves only 3 stars. I think it has some interesting and good musical moments and it has also some good lyrics in their old traditional quality vein.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)

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