Album Reviews

This 1973 release, minus saxophonist Phil Shulman who had left the group (leaving but two Shulmans),  was rejected by Columbia Records for being "un-commercial" yet it became one of the band's most popular releases. It was available only as an import in America.

If you're going to pick one Gentle Giant album to explore whether or not its music might be to your liking, this would be the one.

This 1973 release, minus saxophonist Phil Shulman who had left the group (leaving but two Shulmans),  was rejected by Columbia Records for being "un-commercial" yet it became one of the band's most popular releases. It was available only as an import in America.

If you're going to pick one Gentle Giant album to explore whether or not its music might be to your liking, this would be the one.

It's among the group's most rocking records yet it maintains the group's penchant for experimentation, particularly in terms of both time signatures and percussive sounds.

Sometimes they sound like the late Captain Beefheart or precursors to some of Andy Partridge's more angular moments that wouldn't arrive on vinyl for around five years. Then again, at times they produce a medieval  monkish, hymnal quality.

Other segments segue into grand, organ drenched proclamations ala Yes. There are lyrical string backdrops too.

One thing's for sure: you won't be bored by this one. It keeps shifting instrumentation and time signatures and it's not a long album.

The album's typically introspective lyrics concern themselves with incarceration, whether literal ("The Runaway" and "An Inmates Lullaby") or of the mind trapped in time ("Experience"). The title tune is less decipherable—at least to me—though it could be about not casting stones. If so, it's stated rather obtusely.

The recording is dry, direct and intimate as the lyrics are introspective and some might say the singing precious. This is certainly not rock as envisioned by the genre's founding fathers (and mothers) but the Brits appropriated it for more serious thought  during the '60s and these guys took it to the outer limits.

This LP was generated from 96k/24 bit files produced from the 1/4" analog master tapes and sounds very good for what was probably a low to mid-budget closely miked production that emphasized dry directness over the production of a large, glittering sonic spectacular.