I love PH but not always the most popular or lorded albums. I'll take Exotic Birds and Fruit over Grand Hotel, but let's start at the beginning. S/t is terrific and while it's an artifact of 1967, and like the Beatles' albums of that era, it's still a wonderful listen. I wish the production was as good as the Beatles' albums but I think it endears the album to me somehow. What say you on Procol's first?
As a debut, it's outstanding. Technically not really a debut as the core band had been putting out records as the Paramounts since 1963. Some of the band's most endearing and enduring work are on this album - Whiter Shade of Pale (on my US release) of course, Conquistador, Kaleidoscope, Mathew Fisher's epic Repent Walpurgis, She Wandered Through the Garden Fence and Cerdes. All are favorites of mine. I'll toss in A Christmas Camel as well. Their second single Homburg was on some versions of the album in Europe and of course is a classic. Lime Street Blues, the B-side of Pale, is great fun too. A couple of tracks recorded at the same time, Alpha and Understandably Blue, were released on an expanded version as bonus tracks and are both very good if not essential.
Their debut was one of the first albums that I owned. Although the band matured well beyond the material on this album, it is still the one to which I listen the most, both as a whole and one-off tracks. Repent Walpurgis is among my favorite instrumentals in all of rock.
Think this is one of the greatest debut rock albums. When issued in states it was “reprocessed” stereo from the original mono. Unfortunate. But thankfully now remedied. (Sounds great in Mono...stereo mixes exist of some of the songs) Some random notes: The UK version didn’t have “Pale” on it. And to think they would have a hit 4 yrs later with album track “Conquistador” in orchestrated form. The music is great and matched by outstanding, wry lyrics of Keith Reid. The lyrics really adds to the enjoyment and depth to this music. There is a magnificence to both music and the words. “Salad Days” sounds like it could fit on “Blonde on Blonde” Underneath the heavy piano and organ sound, Robin Trowers anguished guitar toils and then bursts to full fury on a number of the tracks. “Creeds” is a slow burn of a track if any definition needed. “Garden Fence” exists in stereo form with full ending. The band is playing on all cylinders on this lp
Agree on all counts. This was an era when the lyrics truly were as important as the music. When you combine Reid's lyrics with this incredible music an absolute classic album is the result!
i only recently bought this and thought it was great. I'm not sure why it took me so long to get and I don't know why it doesn't get more kudos.
They got a lot better later on, but it's a great debut. I would probably count it among the best debut albums of all time if they'd included "A Whiter Shade of Pale" and "Homburg" on it. Among the songs that were on the original album, I think "Something Following Me" is my favorite, with "Mabel" a close second.
Sorry, But I don’t see that “they got a lot better” The recordings on this record are sublime, and what followed was equally so.
They started out great and continually expanded the scope of their efforts. And while it was clear from the beginning that Fisher and Trower were exceptional players, it was over the course of the next couple of albums that Wilson was revealed as one of the most skilled and inventive drummers of his generation.
Wow! How bout that??.! (Just noticed that on my initial post “Cerdes” shows up as “Creeds”.. dang autocorrect...)
Solid album which I revisit often. The Classic Records vinyl reissue, which adds Homburg and a second 12 inch disc with the mono Whiter at 45 rpm and a 7 inch 45 of a stereo outtake of Pale backed with Lime Street Blues, rivals my 1967 Regal Zonophone for sound quality. The gatefold reveals that the original Whiter group had some really bad haircuts. Grab one if you see it!
Procol is one of the few groups that I find that I play their albums in couplets like s/t with Shine On Brightly and a Salty Dog with Home, for example. I feel that the group dynamics and album productions are similar in these couplets. Btw, I find it hard to understand why Shine On Brightly did not chart in the UK, but those were strange times for pop music.
You don't think Salty Dog and Grand Hotel were a step up on the debut? Wow. You're entitled to your opinion.
I'd definitely link the first two albums. They feel like a thesis that culminates with "In Held Twas in I." There's a little more of a reach in linking Salty Dog with Home though, at least to my ears. Salty Dog almost feels like the completion of the trajectory of the first two albums - particularly in regard to the title track. All of the expansive songwriting and genre blending seems to be distilled down to its essence there. Once you get to Home though, it feels more like the bluesier elements are coming to the fore. More riffs, more guitars, more swagger. Maybe that's just me and I need to wrap my ears around these albums closely again in order to see different connections, but that's how they're associated in my head.
A Salty Dog and Home seem inline to me as they are more of a 3 way and 2 way musical approach. Brooker, Fisher and Trower on A Salty Dog and Brooker and Trower on Home were very much doing their own things and both albums sound musically schizophrenic to me.
What Brooker and Fisher had been doing up to and including A Salty Dog always seemed pretty much complemenary to me. The only one to develop a conflicting style was Trower, from that album on until he left Procol.
