However, the best songs on the new album were still on par with Face the Music and A New World Record, so all you really had to do was skip the weaker tracks and you would still end up with about as many great ones as on those two albums. One of the best was the touching It's Over embedded below. As you can see, there is even a real music video: we are fast approaching times when the embedded links contain also those instead of just audio accompanied with an album cover.
Passage by the American pop super duo The Carpenters was also an October 1977 release. I wouldn't be mentioning it at all, had it not included a brilliant cover of the Canadian band Klaatu's song Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft. I will not embed it, but be sure to check it out.
Another American group Kansas released their fifth studio album Point of Know Return on 11 October. As was typical for the era, their recording career had moved forward with high speed. Their self titled debut had come out in March 1974, and here we were, listening to their fifth one only three years and seven months later. Their previous album Leftoverture had been a fan favorite and the new one also featured some excellent songs like the title track, Paradox, and particularly Dust in the Wind which would go on to become the group's best known song and a beloved classic.
Only three days later, on 14 October, David Bowie released his classic Heroes. The title track in particular got plenty of radio play in Finland soon after the album's release, so I was familiar with it from the very beginning. However, because everyone is familiar with the song, let's embed something else. I also liked the quieter charm of Moss Garden - I think it might be my favorite track on the album - and among the non-instrumentals there was also Sons of the Silent Age that felt like yet another instant classic to me.
The British rock group Queen were never to repeat the success of A Night at the Opera, but their 28 October release News of the World contained a couple of my late autumn favorites. The band's sixth studio album opens of course with We Will Rock You that has since become a sports event anthem, and is followed by another well known song We Are the Champions. Please, skip these two.
The next two tracks are much more interesting. Named after their third album that was released already in 1974, Sheer Heart Attack is one of the definitive straight rock songs of the seventies. Its speed and energy are something that one rarely has a chance to experience, even if one listens to pure rock and roll only. And the next song All Dead, All Dead is a true gem in melancholic, even sad songwriting. I could have embedded either one; let's go with energetic rock this time.
In many of the previous years, November has been an important month, as if a lot of the best music were released then in preparation for the Christmas market. 1977 was different. Only one new album worth mentioning came out in November, and even that one is worthy only because of it contains one single unmissable track. Like most of Emerson, Lake & Palmer's output, the 10 November release of Works, vol. 2 was mostly crap but there was an unbelievable exception.
I Believe in Father Christmas felt like it was a solo effort by Greg Lake; yet the lyrics were written by Peter Sinfield and the centerpiece of the song is Keith Emerson's interpretation of Sergey Prokofiev's composition Troika. It remains one of the few real strikes of genius from the group, and I still think it is the best, most effective Christmas song ever recorded - even though it was originally intended to be a criticism against its commercialization.
Finally, in December there were two more recordings released that must be mentioned here. One was the debut album of a newcomer; the other, the fifth release from a seasoned veteran that we have already mentioned several times before.
The French musician Jean-Michel Jarre has done a lot to popularize electronic music. His compositions are nowhere near as difficult to approach as those of, say, Tangerine Dream. Jarre's first album Oxygène became an immediate hit and received plenty of radio play also in Finland. I was also excited about it, although I have later come to think that, just like in Mike Oldfield's case, even though the second album was less successful, it was nonetheless slightly better.
We conclude 1977 with Brian Eno's Before and After Science, an album that had so many high profile guest musicians that there is not enough room here for to naming them all. Eno had been preparing the new album for the best part of two years and, during that time, written approximately one hundred new songs.
It is therefore all the more surprising that Before and After Science felt like a failure after listening to the first six of its ten tracks. Was this really the best he could come up with? But then began the jaw-dropping sequence of masterpiece after masterpiece. Tracks 7 and 8, Julie With... and By This River are both among the greatest of the decade. These are followed by the instrumental Through Hollow Lands which is very good but not as great as the previous two tracks. Finally, the album is concluded with a third undying masterpiece Spider and I.
By This River was actually a collaboration with the German experimental group Cluster, who we already mentioned earlier when discussing early 1976 releases. Cluster had worked with Eno on an album called Cluster & Eno earlier this same year, but for some reason they had saved their best for the Eno solo album. Nothing on that previous collaboration came even close to matching the peaceful beauty of By This River. It is a nice way to close the discussion of the year in music that brought us, in my opinion, the greatest album ever made.
ALBUMS OF THE YEAR:
Electric Light Orchestra: Out of the Blue
Peter Gabriel: Peter Gabriel
Pink Floyd: Animals
Yes: Going for the One
UNMISSABLE TRACKS OF THE YEAR:
10cc: Feel the Benefit
Anthony Phillips: God If I Saw Her Now
Anthony Phillips: Which Way the Wind Blows
Brian Eno: By This River
Brian Eno: Julie With...
Brian Eno: Spider and I
The Carpenters: Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft
Cerrone: In the Smoke
Electric Light Orchestra: It's Over
Emerson, Lake & Palmer: I Believe in Father Christmas
England: Poisoned Youth
Genesis: Inside and Out
Gentle Giant: I'm Turning Around
John Cale: Hedda Gabler
Peter Gabriel: Humdrum
Pink Floyd: Sheep
Wigwam: Cheap Evening Return
Wigwam: The Big Farewell
Yes: Awaken
Yes: Going for the One
Yes: Turn of the Century
Yes: Wonderous Stories
Best albums of the year, 1967 to 1977:
1967: Pink Floyd: The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
1968: -
1969: Procol Harum: A Salty Dog
1970: Genesis: Trespass
1971: Genesis: Nursery Cryme
1972: Yes: Close to the Edge
1973: Pink Floyd: The Dark Side of the Moon
1974: Mike Oldfield: Hergest Ridge
1975: Electric Light Orchestra: Face the Music
1976: Genesis: A Trick of the Tail
1977: Yes: Going for the One
Best short tracks (under 12 minutes):
1967: Pink Floyd: Bike
1968: Pink Floyd: Julia Dream
1969: Pink Floyd: Cirrus Minor
1970: The Beatles: The Long and Winding Road
1971: Genesis: The Fountain of Salmacis
1972: Gentle Giant: Schooldays
1973: John Cale: Paris 1919
1974: Mike Oldfield: Mike Oldfield's Single
1975: The Tubes: Up from the Deep
1976: Gong: Chandra
1977: Yes: Going for the One
Best long tracks (12 minutes or over):
1970: King Crimson: Lizard
1971: Van der Graaf Generator: A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers
1972: Yes: Close to the Edge
1973: King Crimson: Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part 1
1974: King Crimson: Starless
1975: Mike Oldfield: Ommadawn, Part 1
1976: -
1977: Yes: Awaken
Ei kommentteja:
Lähetä kommentti