Album Reviews

The back story here is that in May of 1963, the Yardbirds’ first guitarist, “pimply” 15 year old Anthony “Top” Topham stepped on stage with the new group at the Eel Pie Island Club.

A few months later Topham was replaced, first by Eric Clapton, then by Jeff Beck and finally be Jimmy Page. For them, the rest is history. For Topham it was a Pete Best like send-off to oblivion, but not before recording this highly sought after all-instrumental record on which the guitarist is backed by a basic rock rhythm section augmented with brass, reeds strings and percussion.

Recorded late 1969 at CBS’s New Bond Street, London studio and originally released in very limited numbers on Mike Vernon’s Blue Horizon label shortly thereafter, original copies of <i>Ascension Heights</i> are supposedly worth close to $200.00 for reasons having more to do  with rarity than its musical value.

Sometimes it sounds like Chet Atkins Quaaludes. Other times (“Funks Elegy”) it sounds like Booker T. and the MGs on ‘ludes or Les Paul on ‘ludes, or The Ventures on ‘ludes. Whoever and whatever, each tune sounds like the musicians or the playback machine has been chemically or electrically slowed down.

First play I was dismissive of the reissue’s value but by the third play its essential hipness, especially in this time frame, became clear.

The one-off sluggish curiosity has an intense personality that could have translated into a musical movement but it just never did. Topham could have been the next Herb Alpert or Bert Kaempfert, more to the point, Chet or Al Caiola for the Woodstock generation. It just never happened.

Some of the grooves are fun, others are insipid even though they all follow the same basic slowdown formula. There’s even one sluggish western “range” song featuring a ridiculously loud and sloppy stick representing horse hoofs that pans across the soundstage.

The sound is excellent late sixties stereo studio, which means instruments are heavily “box placed” left and right and phantomed dead center. Topham’s electric guitar floats thick and holographically three dimensionally well in front of the other instruments. His acoustic is closely miked, ultra-vivid and rock solid. The horns sound great, the bass lines are deep and taut and that horse hoof will “clop” its way through your skull if you crank it up too high.

So there you have it. An enjoyable curiousity from Pure Pleasure that’s sure to please some and annoy and confuse others. There are times in life when this album’s vibe will feel like the only correct musical accompaniment. Maybe that’s when Eric Clapton pushes you out of a band, or some dweeb steals your girlfriend or you back your car into a fire hydrant. Times like that.