Supertramp's Crisis? What Crisis?

Wow, that’s taking me back. A friend and I met John Anthony Helliwell backstage once and he gave us each one of these, they were massive! .

 

Haven’t played it in years but, having read your thread, can’t think why - as I dearly loved it back in the day; more, even, than ‘Crime Of The Century’. I have a 1975 UK A&M pressing which, though clearly worse for wear, still sounds fine. I also have it on a 2 on 1 chrome cassette with ‘Even In The Quietest Moments’ which was a Walkman fave back in the 80s. Both of those albums tend to get overlooked compared to ‘Crime’ and ‘Breakfast’ but are, in my opinion, at least as fine as either. Thanks for the nod: I’m going to play ‘Crisis What Crisis’ right now!

 

Great thread!!! For me Crisis? What Crisis? Is my favorite Supertramp album, and i love all their classic discography but CWC have something so special. I remember when i first listened to it i was very sad and worried about a familiar situation and when the first sounds of Easy Does It started all the darks clouds went away and my life changed. I felt different and better. Sister Moonshine keep that feeling.
Favorite songs on the album for me are Soapbox Opera, Another Man’s Woman and The Meaning.
Wow, just wow.
That feeling appears every time i spin this album. Never gets old, just gets better!

 

I think Roger would be glad to read that. I was lucky to see him live. Please do it if you have the chance.

 

Thank you! I was lucky to see him in concert three times and met him twice. Once in 2009 and the other in 2012.

 

I am really interested about this information. Thank you. This is an amazing record and sound quality is really important.
8 years ago i bought a UK sealed copy, with a “Best Price” sticker. Absolutely new. This copy seems to be from 1975, but i am not sure. No poster, no yellow inner sleeve but on the label appears Crisis! What Crisis?, with an exclamation instead of a question sign.
The sound is really good.
In the dead wax there’s a strange word, something like UTOPIA.

 

I recall a radio show decades ago with Supertramp featured and they didn't care too much for this album. I believe they thought it was rushed.
However, I enjoy this album a lot. I really believe artists aren't the best judge of their work. Also, the title and cover art, they're so...present day.

Agreed.

 

That's correct.

It was the follow-up to Crime which was a phenomenal success and the band had toured the world for a ridiculously long period of time, like 11 months. They were burnt out at the end, had had no time to write new songs, and were only able to start work on the album due to an injury to Roger's hand preventing him from playing guitar. Since there were little to no ideas when they entered the studio, they basically used Crime's leftover tracks and even went back into their song vault to flesh out bits and pieces they had left over. There was no end goal for the album, no theme, no vision per se, so it feels like a compilation of B-sides rather than a whole. Didn't help that they recorded in weeks instead of 6 months as they had done with Crime.

Unfortunately, all of this left the album feeling a little disjointed. Pressure from the label to release it quicker so they could ride the wave of their popularity spawned by Crime didn't help matters either.

Roger's opinion of the album has changed in recent years, going as far to state it's now his favorite. He also states he often disliked bassist Dougie Thomson's playing and would let him know but now admits he doesn't know why he acted that way as his playing is terrific. I agree that each member of the band played terrifically and I've always found the bass playing to be quite great as well so reading those comments made me think there might be some more potential revised viewpoints on other parts of the Supertramp experience.

Bottom line is that the album while still sounding terrific and containing a few gems, is (perhaps inevitably so) a big step down from Crime, IMHO. There are some directionless songs on the album but then again, even with some of that same directionless in Famous Last Words, I still enjoy that album, so the same can be said of Crisis.

 

The Problem with Crisis is it's sandwiched between major breakthroughs for the band. Crime was a revelation after two middling albums. (I'll never forget seeing Indelibly Stamped in the bins of my local record chain. Wow! Just wow. Sitting right there in the open.) As a kid, I didn't understand the band's trajectory, much as I didn't understand pre-Dudes Mott the Hoople for a very long time. Century established the band on a a much larger level, for good reason, as at least half the album became American FM/AOR radio staples. Crisis did much the same. I have fond memories of first hearing that piano fade in on "Another Man's Woman" and immediately falling in love with the band. Ditto "Sister Moonshine."

Quietest Moments broke through with a hit single, "Give a Little Bit." Still recall the surprise of hearing it in the first Christopher Reeves Superman movie. (Every summer in NYC, I think of that moment in the movie.) Breakfast was their monster hit album. What a run they had from 1974-79. It's easy to overlook Crisis in that company, but the larger reality is those guys were operating on a level of excellence that we all took for granted at the time. Has there been a band anything like them since?

 

It's a trident which refers to one of the studio they recorded it in.

Ψtopia

 

I believe "Hide In Your Shell" is one of the most passionate love songs that Supertramp or anyone has ever done.❤️

 

Could be read that way. It's one of the most compassionate songs ever, but I hear it as written to a friend, maybe, but its never struck me as a conventional love song.

 

One of the first albums I bought, and still one of my faves. A tad better than Crime, IMO.

 

As mentioned a few times already, the band didn’t feel as though they put together a cohesive work; part leftovers, part rushed.

At the time, I recall that it came across as more of a pop album in the wake of the somewhat more rockier COTC, but that one had its pop moments too. Crisis certainly had a lighter tone to its songs, but it also seemed to be reasonably well received.

Personally, it’s one of my more favoured works from the band, mainly because I do find it to be a very nice collection of good pop songs without some of the pretension that cropped up on later albums.

 

Very sensitive interpretation, and one that I also share. As someone who identifies with the traumatized, frightened, defensive, vulnerable introvert-who-once-ruled-the-world that Roger is singing to, I like to think of him as a deeply concerned, compassionate friend who is trying hard to bring me out of my "shell". Thanks for sharing your viewpoint.

 

Thank you! And that means that is a good copy of the album? Or just an average copy?

 

Yes, it's a good one.

 

Thank you! It’s hard to know which press is exactly the Uk 1st press.

 

Crisis? What Crisis? is a solid album that had the misfortune of following up a landmark album. Many fans see it as a step back because it didn't a have a standout track such as "School" or "Bloody Well Right".

 

When I first had the album, late '70s, I really disliked Easy Does It, which to 12-year-old me, sounded sort of wimpy and corny. It's now one of my favorite Supertramp tracks. I often throw it into a playlist on my iPod and, because there's no silence at the end of the track, it sort of segues into whatever track comes next in the shuffle, which has created some interesting combos. The most memorable, which worked surprisingly well, was Easy Does It going straight into The Headmaster Ritual by the Smiths.

 

Kind of like when Styx followed up Paradise Theater with Kilroy Was Here.

 

It's my favourite Supertramp album except for Crime Of The Century. With "Poor Boy" and "Another Man's Woman" it even has my 2 favourite Supertramp songs. They moved into a more pop direction with their next 3 albums and while those albums were more succesful and produced much bigger hit singles, I think something was lost musically when they parted ways with Ken Scott.

 

Wow, you really look happy there! Nice pictures, thanks for sharing! Roger is a nice guy. I just wished he put some studio albums out! He claims to have so many songs and nobody gets to hear them. I really loved "Open The Door" and the song "Oh Brother" on his DVD. Please, Roger!

 

Funny that he is wearing the same outfit three years apart...

 

That’s true! I was really happy, i just couldn’t believe that after so many years hearing that voice and those songs i was actually with the man itself at my side. For a guy from Chile, like me, it was a dream come true. And he was really nice with us. We spend like half an hour with him, talkin’ and sharing stories. He gave me his autograph in my Crime Of The Century vinyl copy. He wrote “Dear Nacho, Have fun with your music”. Nice memories. It is indeed a shame that he stop making new music. I would love to hear those new songs.