Deeper we go into my old heavy rock roots this week. I follow up Led Zep's debut album with another listen of the classic IV. I pick up on a relatively little known Canadian rock band. I reacquaint myself with Black Sabbath's most progressive album, and dive into possibly Hawkwind's greatest two albums. Carly Simon retains some calm from last week's playlist.
Led Zeppelin - IV
April Wine - Harder...Faster
Hawkwind - In The Hall Of The Mountain Grill
Hawkwind - Warrior On The Edge Of Time
Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
Carly Simon - No Secrets
Led Zep's IV has a great balance of heavy rockers and acoustic whimsy. Black Dog is a powerhouse of blues rock - incorporating one of Page's greatest riffs and Plant's call and response moans. I'd never heard anything like it on first hearing. Now, years later, I still think it's pretty unique. Then you've got the Tolkien influenced Misty Mountain Hop and The Battle Of Evermore (with Sandy Denny). The Bonham showcase When The Levee Breaks and the hippie flower power Going To California. And Stairway To Heaven of course which is a little tired but I still love the jaunty middle section with it's "bustle in the hedgerow".
April Wine were alright. Attempting the monumental 21st Century Schizoid Man was probably not a wise move though - it has none of the show stopping power of the original.
Brilliant stuff from Hawkwind. I love both these two albums which both follow a similar pattern with alternate rock anthems and instrumental or spoken word interludes. The rock tunes are often based on just 2 or 3 stuttering guitar chords with Lemmy's heavy bass underlay. The interludes are simple piano figures, crude synthesizer effects, sawing violin, or, in the case of Warrior, spoken monologues from sci-fi writer Michael Moorcock (who also wrote lyrics for The Blue Oyster Cult).
In The Hall Of The Mountain Grill (the band's fourth album) is the more basic and less polished album. Psychedelic Warlords (Disappear in Smoke) is a classic Hawks tune. There are a couple of tracks on the band's fifth album Warrior On The Edge Of Time that approach some of the best progressive rock of the mid '70s, namely Assault and Battery / Golden Void and Magnu, where the band present monumental walls of sound. One of the most intriguing tracks for me when I first heard this album was the heavy motorik beat instrumental Opa-Loka which foretold my interest in krautrock. Surprisingly the band changed their sound after Warrior choosing to go down a more "new wave" road. The line up changed too with Lemmy, who had described Opa-Loka as "fucking rubbish" and Warrior generally as "a fuck up", moving on to form Motorhead.