THE MOUNTAIN QUEEN

Another strong album from ALQUIN as this followup to "Marks" continues the quality this band from The Netherlands showed on their debut. A six piece with two sax players and one of them plays flute. The guitarist adds vocals and violin. And we get an organ/piano player along with bass and drums.

"The Mountain Queen" was released in 1973 and features six tracks although that short "Don And Dewey(Theme By Don Bowman)" is an intro to the closer. Don Bowman was a Country musician and comedian out of Texas. This is where we get the violin mostly. The violin continues when this song ends and "Mr. Barnum Jr.'s Magnificent And Fabulous City" begins but the sax will replace the violin fairly quickly. This is uptempo and piano will lead for a while but so does the organ and we get more sax later.

The title track is excellent giving us a brief Canterbury section with those keyboard and flute leads. Vocals on this one too and distorted keys later on but at almost 15 minutes this is a ride folks! I just don't like the start with the blasting sax and heavy drums. A minor complaint. The opener is catchy with pulsating organ as the guitar solos over it the bass and drums. A calm with reserved vocals before it kicks back in. I like the flute then we get more guitar. Sax before 7 minutes but then the guitar starts to solo too. Another calm with vocals follows. Love the trippy sound here. Some bluesy guitar on "Soft-Eyed Woman" along with flute leading the way. A mellow tune overall. I like "Convicts Of The Air" for that determined sound and it just sounds cool. A catchy beat too with guitar and flute over top. Vocals follow, some sax later but the guitar and flute are more prominent.

Tough to pick which one I like better of their first two recordings but who cares when you have them both.