WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU ARE

The Here and Now side brings together live versions of all of their Charley records single releases. Starting with the rather twee "What You See Is What You Are" Tis starts off with a some rather un-together girls singing but finally takes off and becomes a rather powerful pop song, There is of course an excellent and spirited guitar solo by Steffi and a rather badly delivered vocal by Keith the Bass, all held in place by some plodding but sound bass work. " Dog In Hell" how much is that doggy in the window the one that cries bonafide tears Kif Kif continues to wallow in his moment of stardom and wrecks yet another otherwise competent space rocker. this time the lyric is quite interesting and its only by bellowing it out that he manages to kill the feel. "addicted" end this poorly produced and disappointing side of here and now's music. I caught Here and Now many many times over the years and its true to say that at times they played some scorching space rock, most notably when given the opportunity to play through Hawkwinds PA at Stonehenge. When ever Kif Kif shut up and they just jammed they certainly would have given gong or hawkwind a run for their money. Later Kif kif left and they improved immeasurable as a live act playing sensible space rock with just a little prog twist. Other low points of this recording are the synthesizer burps pops and weals live they sounded OK but on this recording they are almost always miss-timed. Possible this was due to the home made nature of their synth. Steffi sharp-strings really was a great guitarist but the rest of the musicianship is only a littel above awful. Kif Kifs drumming is terrible throughout possibly because he was singing most of the time. The bass playing is a little better and that sexist on sax is actually quite good who ever he was. The ATV side is utterly unmemorable and is also badly produced into the bargain. A strange release in any case this is worth buying as a document of this period of Here and Now sadly it is neither there best period or the best recording. The Charley singles of this time are incredible hard to find and worth seeking out as they bring the material presented above into focus and although they also suffer from Kif Kif they are not half bad a must for serious Gong collectors as well as Here and Now fans.

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