As already mentioned before Jean and I created the lost Van der Graaf Generator album between "Pawn Hearts" and "Godbluff" by combining the five tracks from the Peter Hammill solo albums "Chameleon In the Shadow of the Night" and "The Silent Corner and the Empty Stage" on which all four band members play. We called the album "The Silent Corner In the Shadow of the Night". The track list for the vinyl would have been:

Side 1:

1) A Louse is not a Home 12:13

2) (In the) Black Room / The Tower 10:56

Side 2:

1) Red Shift 8:11

2) Rock and Role 6:41

3) Forsaken Gardens 6:15

We finally created a cover for it. Here it is:

The silent corner is of course the left one where there is no rustling of the leaves of the trees in the wind. We like how the stars somehow spotlight that silent corner. What is your opinion on our lost VdGG album, both music and cover?

Did you send a copy to Peter Hammill yet?

We wanted the album to be released early 1974, so stuff from "Nadir's Big Chance" was out. We liked the idea of "A Louse is not a Home" being the closer though, so we swapped sides and also swapped tracks on the new side 2. So the track listing is now:

3) Forsaken Gardens 6:15

TheH wrote: I don't think Banton plays on "Red Shift"

he is not easy to hear in the loud passages; in the quieter passages the organ can more clearly be heard

you probably mean "Red Shift". I love that song, especially the lyrics. what a great idea to use the red shift in star spectra, which shows that they move away from us (due to the Doppler effect; the further away a star is from us the bigger the red shift and thus the bigger the speed at which it moves away from us, which is generally interpreted to indicate that the universe expands), as a metaphor for people moving away from the singer

This is too weird ... at the time, before GODBLUFF came out, I believe that one of the comments we had heard was that it would be a double album, and my thoughts are/were that this album would have contained BOTH GODBLUFF AND STILL LIFE ... which ended up being released as single albums apart from each other. I'm inclined to believe that these were released as single albums BECAUSE OF THE AMERICAN MARKET, for which PH and VdGG were still new ... and I don't think the record company wanted to risk an expense that would hurt the artist and the record company .... these are my thoughts, and only PH would be able to add more, but I think that he is too nice, and will not say anything about it at all ... unless it comes out in an autobiography after he passes away from us ... (gawd that thought makes me cry right now!).

I still think and hear the same feelings in both of these albums ... whereas these being combined with PH's solo stuff is crazy ... things like "The Lie" and "Red Shift" and even "Modern" do not quite sound like Godbluff or Still Life to my ears ... maybe better recorded and cleaned up, which SC and ES seems to be more home recorded than it does studio refined ... almost ... at least by comparison!

Very interesting.

Actually I did create such an album for myself already long ago, despite the fact that The Silent Corner is one of my favourite albums. And it is in that form also one of my favourite albums.

I have this burned on CD and hear it very often.

But I made it with a different order, which has a perfect flow for me:

I also respected the fact that such an album would have been released as LP, and I took for Red Shift the different single version from the Italian single. Which has less of the added sound effects, and sounds more Vandergraafish by that.

I added Gog for my hearing pleasure, and cause it was so often played live by the band, that it has become a "real" VdGG song. And it feels in the studio already very much like a VdGG song, despite that only Hammill and Evans are on it.

Of the others only Red Shift was never played live by the band, and especially Black Room and Louse belong to the band, as they were part of their live set already in 1972, directly before their split, and then again in 1975 after their reformation.

TheH wrote: I don't think Banton plays on "Red Shift"

He does, but I think he does not play on Rock and Role, but instead Nic Potter on bass.

nope; that's Hugh Banton on bass

Are you sure about that?

My infos about who plays on which track on Chameleon would be that Jackson played on German Overalls, Rock and Rôle, What's it Worth, Easy to slip away and Black Room.

Banton only on Black Room

Evans on Rock and Rôle and Black Room

Potter on Rock and Rôle and Easy to slip away

I'm actually at the moment not sure where I got this from, it is also what the Wiki site says, but of course that might be wrong too. I remember that a few years ago I thought that Potter also plays on Black Room.

What about the next album? All 4 play on the 3 tracks here used for this compilation, but Banton also plays on The Lie. That at least true?

Ok, you hear this by listening to the songs?

Or do you have a reliable source for that?

Just checking the CD booklets and The Book, and they don't tell me anything specific about it.

In the summer of 1972 VdGG toured for a short time through Italy with 3 new songs in the set, and I think these would have formed the basis for a new album, which was intended for the end of the year.

Instead they split, and 2 of the newbies appeared on the next 2 PH Hammill solo albums, but the 3rd one called "Roncevaux" was never again played by the band, nor properly recorded. And that's a shame.

"Roncevaux" only appeared in a pretty poor audio quality on the anti-compilation Time Vaults. For that Hammill had added in 1982 the vocals to a heavily distorted rehearsal recording, which surely was never intended to be released.

I always wished VdGG had recorded this forgotten gem for their comeback album Present, an album I really love, but it had needed one great track as last song instead of the more or less mediocre "On the Beach".

Another thing I always wished is, that they had released in 1972 the 3 live-in-the-studio tracks, they already had recorded for the intended Pawn Hearts double album, as an LP.

Well so many bands which disbanded, released a live album as a farewell (actually in 1978 VdGG did the same). Of course it seems VdGG had nothing recorded live then, but they could have recorded quickly some more live-in-the-studio stuff, enough for an LP. To have e.g. Aquarian and Afterwards in the live versions, like they exist on some lo-fi live tapes, that would be a pleasure.

VDGG 1972 -Chameleon in the Shadow of the Night

1 - Ferret and Featherbird

2 - Modern

3 - Roncevaux ( properly recorded)

4 - A louse is not a Home

5 (In the) Black Room

VDGG 1973 - The Silent Corner and the Empty Stage

1 - The Liquidator

2 - Rift Valley

3 - Rock And Role

4 - German Overalls

5 - What it´s Woth

6 - The Lie

7 - Red Shift

VDGG 1974 - In Camera

1 - Istitute of Mental Heatlh Burning

2 - (No More) the Submariner

3 - Forsaken Gardens

4 - Tapeworm

5 - Faint heart and the Sermon

6 - The Comet, The Course, The Tail

7 - Gog

OTHER OPTION:

A Double album in 1973 only

1973 -  Chameleon in the Silent Corner of the NIght

01 - Ferret and Featherbird

02 - Roncevaux

03 - The Liquidator

04 - W

05 - Modern

06 - Forsaken Gardens

07 - Fiant Heart and the Sermon

08 - A Louse is not a Home

09 - In the Black Room

10 - Rift Valley

12 - Gog- Magog

I love Roncevaux. Peter Hammil should really re record this properly