In 1970, this British quintet released a couple of albums that made no bones about aping the approach of Fairport Convention (then at their peak). A mixture of traditional folk songs and originals, extended electric-guitar heavy arrangements, and a female singer who took many of the lead vocals -- it worked for Fairport. It didn't work as well for the Trees, for several reasons. First of all, Celia Humphris was no Sandy Denny, nor a Jacqui McShee (Pentangle), Maddy Prior (Steeleye Span), or even Judy Dyble (who sang with Fairport before being replaced by Denny). The Trees' original material (usually penned by Tobias Boshell) was more often than not pedestrian. And their arrangements, prone to plodding lengthy instrumental passages, were often way, way too long. The group broke up after two similar albums for British CBS, although they continued to play for a while in the early '70s with some personnel changes. Boshell, in an unlikely turn of events, joined Kiki Dee's Band, and wrote her biggest hit, "I've Got the Music in Me."
The Trees' second album is so similar to the debut (The Garden of Jane Delawney) that it's difficult to recommend one above the other. If you like one, you'll like the other; if you want only the best stuff in this style, you'll stick to Fairport Convention and maybe Steeleye Span without digging this deep. It's more assertive, harder-rocking, and fuller-sounding than the debut, but the principal flaws of overlong songs and patchy original material remain. The taut and dramatic original "Murdoch" is the highlight, rivaling the first album's "The Garden of Jane Delawney" as their best track. [In 2007, Sony reissued a remastered version of On the Shore with a bonus disc of previously unreleased tracks.] AMG.
listen here
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Trees - On The Shore 1970
Popular Posts
-
The only album by the Steve Baron Quartet was a fitfully interesting but uneven effort, jumping between Baroque folk-rock, moody early si...
-
Kathy McCord - Kathy McCord 1970 Kathy McCord released a lone self-titled LP in 1970, the first release from Creed Taylor ’s CTI Records, ...
-
A wild, freewheeling, and ultimately successful attempt to merge psychedelia with jazz-rock, Soft Machine 's debut ranges between loving...
-
The Small Faces were the best English band never to hit it big in America. On this side of the Atlantic, all anybody remembers them for i...
-
When you think of the Doors , "guitar" isn't the first thing that usually comes to mind ( Jim Morrison 's manic persona an...
-
The Kinks - The Kink Kontroversy 1965 The Kinks came into their own as album artists -- and Ray Davies fully matured as a songwriter -- wi...
-
Ahmed Abdul-Malik was one of the first musicians to integrate non-Western musical elements into jazz. In addition to being a hard bop bas...
-
Spud released 2 albums on the Philips record label - their 1975 debut 'A Silk Purse' and 'The Happy Handful' (also in 1975...
-
Redbone was a Los Angeles-based group led by Native American Pat and Lolly Vegas . They hit paydirt in 1974 with the million-seller "...
-
Tiny Tim 's 15 minutes of fame were starting to run out when Tiny Tim's Second Album was released in November 1968, and it sold onl...
0 comments:
Post a Comment