Graham Reid | | 2 min read
Very much one of those book/cover/judge moments when this album came to hand for this on-going column where we pull a record off the shelf at random.
We can alight on classics, half-forgotten moments and real stinkers.
But this one defies expectation: the cover suggests a bit of bachelor pad exotica or at least Playboy Club cool, the name Howard Blake doesn't spring to mind for any special reason and 12 pieces on Hammond organ is a lot of swirly and shimmery Hammond organ.
But we remember why bought it in first place (for a dollar): the name of the guitarist is “Johnny McLaughlin” who would have been in his early 20s when this was recorded.
He went on to great fame in the years of jazz fusion with Miles Davis, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, work with Carlos Santana, the Indo-jazz group Shakti and so much more.
McLaughlin is 83 at the time of this writing and quite the legend. Elsewhere interviewed him.
But let's turn attention to the band's leader Howard Blake (86 now) because far from being some MOR player he had an illustrious career as a composer and pianist, although around the time of this album he was just re-engaging with music after a period away from it.
He'd all but quit music but was playing piano in pubs and clubs before he was spotted by someone at EMI and taken on to make popular albums and work as an arranger. He played piano on the theme to The Avengers and arranged the music for it.
Then it was all upward: film scores (Ridley Scott's The Duellist and the 1980 Flash Gordon among them when he collaborated with Queen although not a lot of his work was used) and his love of classical music in a series of diverse concertos and some religiously inspired pieces.
When seated at the Hammond in '66 for this album he was a real swinging player on Gypsy in My Soul (where McLaughlin gets in a short, stuttering solo) and doesn't milk the sentimental tunes like Till There Was You for effect. He gets a swing into that one too.
And damn if that isn't a ska rhythm buried in Blake's original Scorpio when he gets on piano behind the prominent Hammond.
His treatment of Bacharach-David's theme to Alfie is a highlight, a slow and understated version which nudges perilously close to spaced-out exotica.
Blake was certainly handy on multi-tracked vibes, xylophone, piano, marimba and celeste as well, and eclectic in his taster: from Moon River and More (the theme to the film Mondo Cane) to Perdido and the Brazilian tune Recado.
We can't tell you anything about drummer Dick Harward other than he pushes along Paul Simon's Someday, One Day which the Seekers made famous.
Oh, and it looks like it was one of those albums designed to demonstrate stereophonic sound.
So there it is, another random album which has more going for it than it might appear, it's certainly got more Hammond than you may ever need.
But if you are surprised by that then you didn't read the big print.
Probably distracted by something else.
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You can hear this album at Spotify here
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Elsewhere occasionally revisits albums -- classics sometimes, but more often oddities or overlooked albums by major artists -- and you can find a number of them starting here.
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