INDELIBLY STAMPED

Listening to this gives you very little in the way of hints about what was to come. Straight-forward early 70s rock of the kind stamped out in tin pan alleys on both sides of the Atlantic, 'Indelibly Stamped' is the sound of a band trying - and failing - to find an audience.

There's no doubt DAVIES and HODGSON could write songs, but also no doubt that few of the songs featured here were anything other than strongly derivative. We hear, for example, SIMON AND GARFUNKEL on 'Rosie', any of a dozen southern blues bands on 'Your Pappa Don't Mind' and 'Remember', and what sounds improbably like FRANK ZAPPA/CAPTAIN BEEFHEART on 'Potter'. The progressive leanings of their debut album have been deliberately cast aside in favour of shorter, simpler tracks (the seven-minute 'Aries' is padded out with a rather tame jam), but none are anything more than mediocre. It all adds up to an album crafted to penetrate the soft underbelly of the American market. I am pleased to report that it failed miserably, forcing the duo to re-form the band and come up with something different.

While this is competent and inoffensive, there's nothing here that invites the listener back for a second listen. Or a first, for that matter.