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Highlighting in album tracklistings denotes 'contains Mellotron'. On 'multi-part' tracks I've tried to indicate which parts contain 'Tron, although this isn't always possible.
Ratings:
The * rating (½-5) is my personal, entirely subjective and completely partisan rating of the music.
The 'T' ('Tron, of course...) rating (0-5) is an only slightly more objective indicator of an album's Mellotronness.
By the way, if you know of any Mellotron albums that aren't listed here, please look at my albums page first! Thanks.
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Stackridge Jim Stafford |
Stampede Standarte |
Starcastle Starflyer 59 |
Starglow Energy |
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Stackridge (1971, 50.21/58.21) ****/0 (T) |
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| Grande Piano Percy the Penguin The Three-Legged Table Dora the Female Explorer Essence of Porphyry Marigold Connection 32 West Mall Marzo Plod |
Slark [CD adds: Let There Be Lids Slark (single version)] |
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Friendliness (1972, 40.47/58.05) ****/TTT½ |
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| Lummy Days Friendliness (1) Anyone for Tennis There is No Refuge Syracuse the Elephant Amazingly Agnes Father Frankenstein is Behind Your Pillow Story of My Heart |
Keep on Clucking Friendliness (2) Teatime [CD adds: Everyman Purple Spaceships Over Yatton C'est la Vie Do the Stanley] |
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The Man in the Bowler Hat (1974, 35.31) ****/T½ | |
| Fundamentally Yours Pinafore Days The Last Plimsoll To the Sun and the Moon The Road to Venezuela The Galloping Gaucho Humiliation Dangerous Bacon |
The Indifferent Hedgehog God Speed the Plough |
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Extravaganza (1975, 42.36) ****/TT |
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| Spin Round the Room Grease Paint Smiles The Volunteer Highbury Incident (Rainy July Morning) Benjamin's Giant Onion Happy in the Lord Rufus T. Firefly |
No One's More Important Than the Earth Worm Pocket Billiards Who's That Up There With Bill Stokes? |
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Mr Mick (1976, 37.58) ****/TTTHold Me TightBreakfast With Werner Von Braun Steam Radio Song The Dump Save a Red Face The Slater's Waltz Coniston Water Hey Good Looking Fish in a Glass |
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Do the Stanley (1976, 52.22) ****/T | |
| Dora the Female Explorer Everyman Percy the Penguin Slark Anyone for Tennis Amazingly Agnes Purple Spaceships Over Yatton |
Do the Stanley The Road to Venezuela Dangerous Bacon Lummy Days The Galloping Gaucho C'est la Vie Let There Be Lids |
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BBC Radio 1 Live in Concert (1997, recorded 1972-75, 56.37) ****½/TTTT½ | |
| God Speed the Plough Lummy Days Teatime Anyone for Tennis Amazingly Agnes She Taught Me How to Yodel 32 West Mall Syracuse the Elephant |
The Volunteer Who's That Up There With Bill Stokes? No One's More Important Than the Earth Worm The Galloping Gaucho Dora the Female Explorer |
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The Radio 1 Sessions (1997, recorded 1971-73, 33.57) ***½/TTThree Legged TableSlark The Lyder Loo God Speed the Plough The Road to Venezuela The Galloping Gaucho |
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The Original Mr Mick (2000, recorded 1976, 45.09) ****/TTT |
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| Hey! Good Looking Breakfast With Werner Von Braun Mr Mick's Walk Mr Mick's Dream The Cotton Reel Song [a.k.a. Save a Red Face] The Steam Radio Song The Slater's Waltz |
Hazy Dazy Holiday Coniston Water Can Inspiration Save the Nation? Mr Mick's New Home Fish in a Glass |
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Current availability:
Stackridge occupy a unique place in music history as possibly the only band to successfully combine music-hall, folk and rock in fairly equal measures. OK, so the Bonzo Dog (Doo Dah) Band are better known and got there first, but they were only ever really a novelty act, whereas Stackridge did it for real, despite the humour. Their ever-changing lineup, with various members leaving and rejoining at different times didn't help their cause any, but they attracted a small but faithful following, many of whom have stuck with them to the present day. Live shows featured much 'rhubarb thrashing' from audience members, and I believe dustbin lids were compulsory back in the band's heyday. Probably the best way to describe Stackridge is 'English'; no other country could have produced them, and I suspect their appeal doesn't travel too well. Other keywords on the description front might be 'whimsical' and 'twee', if you're in a bad mood; should this be the case, a quick spin of any of their albums tends to alleviate the symptoms post-haste.
Their wonderful 1971 debut is filled with strange characters; Marzo Plod, Dora the female Explorer, Percy the Penguin and Slark the monster, whose exploits are detailed in a folk/prog style, with Slark afforded over a quarter of the lengthy album's running time. Other Stackridge highlights include Essence Of Porphyry and Marigold Connection, but to be honest, there ain't a bad track here. There also isn't any Mellotron, but the recent Angel Air reissue (see below) adds a drastically edited re-recording of Slark, released as a single the following year, complete with Mellotron brass and strings.
They first used Mellotron on their second outing, Friendliness, including on their jaunty 'anthem', Lummy Days, where Andy Davis' 'Tron strings duel nicely with Mike Evans' violin. There are several other nice 'Tron moments, particularly on mini-epic Syracuse The Elephant. Overall, the album compares extremely favouably with its predecessor, with a noticeable Noël Coward creeping in on several songs, not least the bonkers Anyone For Tennis, while both parts of the title track pretty much redefine the word 'fey'.
I was fairly certain that their rather belated follow-up, The Man in the Bowler Hat (a slightly different version released in the States was called Pinafore Days and yes, that's their (male) manager on the sleeve) had several tracks with rather understated Mellotron, but it seems that it's only obviously featured on album closer, the rather wonderful instrumental God Speed The Plough. I wouldn't know Vaughan Williams' music if it bit me, I'm afraid to say, but I get the feeling that this is how he might have written were he a member of Stackridge. Maybe. The rest of the record is the by-now usual Stackridge mixture of Cowardesque humour (Fundamentally Yours), music-hall madness (The Galloping Gaucho) and more straightforward material, or as straightforward as Stackridge ever got.
In many ways, Extravaganza was an even better album, with one of its Mellotronic highlights being the superb No One's More Important Than The Earth Worm, written by ex-Crimso Gordon Haskell during his very brief tenure with the band. Again, there was a different US version, this time with the same title. Other album highlights include The Volunteer ("Hands off cocks and on with socks!", he said to me...), Happy In The Lord and the Marx Brothers-referencing Rufus T. Firefly. Many fans believe that this album and its successor were fatally compromised by lineup changes, as co-singer/guitarist James Warren left for pastures new, but the end result still sounds like Stackridge, albeit Stackridge with bits missing.
1976's Mr Mick was a rather odd concept album about an old boy in a retirement home who breaks out for the day and has several rather strange encounters. It's actually far more promising than it sounds (honest!), and has a couple of brilliant 'Tron tracks in The Dump and Coniston Water, both primarily instrumental. Dave Lawson, recently ex-of Greenslade, was augmenting the band by this point, but it seems likely that Davis was still playing the 'Tron. The band were unhappy with the way the record company messed about with the record, and released their original version as The Original Mr Mick in 2000 (see below).
Sadly, that was it for Stackridge; I don't know if punk brought them down, like so many others, or whether the constant instability of their lineup finally did for them, but they bowed out with a compilation of various tracks from their original label, Do the Stanley, including some non-album stuff, although this is all now available on the Angel Air CDs of their first two albums. '71's originally 'Tron-free Stackridge now adds the shorter, '72 single version of Slark, this time featuring some 'Tron strings (and brass?), recorded a little before Friendliness.
And that was that, basically, until the late 1990s, when a couple of archive releases crept out. BBC Radio 1 Live in Concert is an excellent compilation of three separate radio broadcasts; it would be nice to have the full versions, but as with so many of these albums, I suspect the record company would expect to sell rather less of a double CD than a regular release. Pity. Anyway, there's some excellent 'Tron work to be heard, with another version of God Speed The Plough being particularly effective. The Radio 1 Sessions is only a mini-album, but like the same year's live release, it features tracks never recorded in the studio. There's yet another version of God Speed The Plough, but all three are different enough that they're all fairly essential, really. Round about the same time, Stackridge reformed, though without 'Tron man Davis; their sole studio album to date, Something for the Weekend (ho ho) has what sounds like Mellotron flutes on a couple of tracks, but I strongly suspect they're samples (reviewed here). Whatever, it's good to see them back, even if their lineup problems seem to be as bad as ever.
As mentioned above, the band self-released The Original Mr Mick in 2000, letting the world know how the album was originally intended to sound. Losing Hold Me Tight was an excellent move (it was only ever meant to be a non-LP single), and the rest of the narrative makes more sense in this order, with missing tracks restored. Comparing the two versions is actually a pretty fiddly job, as bits from one found their way into the other, though by no means necessarily full tracks, but despite losing the official version's opener, the 'original' version still manages to be seven minutes longer. There's actually hardly any more Mellotron than on the official version (this time apparently played by not only Davis, but 'Mutter' Slater, too), with Hazy Dazy Holiday leading into Coniston Water, and a fairly ordinary string part on Mr Mick's New Home, while Mr Mick's Dream is merely the original version of The Dump. After it slipped out of print, those nice people at Angel Air released a double-disc edition of Mr Mick, coupling the original version on disc one with the official one on disc two, making for a nice complete edition, with the official release's sleeve design, which is nicer than the 'original' version by several orders of magnitude.
As far as the various reissues go, the 1996 Demon version of The Man in the Bowler Hat adds three of Do the Stanley's six single-only tracks, but is now deleted. The band's whole original catalogue is now on Angel Air, and although neither The Man in the Bowler Hat nor Extravaganza now have any extras, all six of those hard-to-find numbers are spread over Stackridge and Friendliness, although I shall leave Do the Stanley above for completeness' sake. As stated above, both versions of Mr Mick are now available as a double, although I've no idea whether the BBC CDs are still available.
Anyway, buy 'em all, 'cos they're great. Er, OK then, get BBC Live, and Mr Mick for the instrumentals, then if you get on with them, progress to the others. Let there be lids!
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Not Just Another Pretty Foot (1975, 36.39) ***/TTTMaking Love With the Headphones onNone of Us Are Here I Got Stoned and I Missed it I Can't Find Nobody Home Lady Greenfeet You'll Never Take Me Alive Midnight Snack Bring Me You Your Bulldog Drinks Champagne I Ain't Working |
Current availability:
Jim Stafford seems to have been pigeonholed as a country artist, but going by '75's Not Just Another Pretty Foot, complete with 'smokes cigarette with foot' sleeve pic, singer-songwriter would seem to be a better description. Notorious for 'novelty' songs, I Got Stoned And I Missed It is a little unnecessary, but the bulk of the album consists of perfectly good, varied material, if very much of its time. Opener Making Love With the Headphones On may possibly be the highlight, but that could just be in the lyric department; suffice to say, despite a couple of novelty efforts, although dated, this could be a lot worse.
Alan Lindgren plays ARP strings and 'Melatrone' (hey! New mis-spelling!), with the latter, startlingly, on almost every track, mostly strings, but with flutes on a couple of tracks, too. No especially standout performances, although there are some interesting pitchbent strings on Midnight Snack that you don't hear every day. So; an OK record, though not one that's going to appeal to most of you, but plenty of 'Tron, admittedly in 'string section substitute' mode.
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Days of Wine and Roses EP (1982, 15.08) ****/TDays of Wine and RosesMovin' on Photographs Missing You |
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Hurricane Town (1983) ***½/TI've Been ToldLove Letters Casino Junkie The Other Side Turning in Circles Hurricane Town Girl The Runner Mexico |
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Stampede appeared around 1981, rising from the ashes of the Bristol-based Lautrec, while just about hanging on to the fast-fading NWOBHM movement, such as it was. Notable for the singer being the guitarist's stepfather (!), both bands had a rather Lizzy/UFO sound; in fact, guitarist Laurence Archer went on to play in both Phil Lynott's post-Lizzy project, Grand Slam and eventually UFO themselves. So basically, we're talking melodic hard rock without having that dreadful wussy American sound that the likes of Grand Prix appropriated. Talking of which, it appears that when Sammy Hagar toured his Standing Hampton (arf arf, phnar phnar) album around this time, he got Grand Prix to support solely on the basis of their name. As our US cousins would say, "Go figure"...
Er, anyway... Stampede were snapped up almost immediately by Polydor, and had a dodgy live album, The Official Bootleg (***) (says it all, really) rush-released by the label, doing the band no favours at all. They had already lost their keyboard player and contracted to a four-piece, but they always missed the keys on stage, and smothered their studio recordings with them. Within months, they released their debut single, Days Of Wine And Roses, with the 12" EP version irritatingly appearing a week or two later (I've still got both versions as a result). The EP is magnificent, especially the two tracks not on the 7", with some great keyboard work, probably by Magnum's Mark Stanway, including a nice bit of 'Tron choir on Movin' On.
Unfortunately, by the time of their one and only studio album, Stampede had already recorded many of their best songs, leaving an album of too many also-rans. Hurricane Town's title track (more choirs, definitely by Stanway this time) and the single The Other Side are great, but many of the other songs have that 'filler' smell about them. There's a good Stampede compilation to be er, compiled, but you'd really have to pick and choose.
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Standarte (1994, 47.00) ***½/TT½Dream Love SequencesOne Strange December Evening As I Wandered Tolerance Town Beat Pimp Muzak A War is Declared In My Time of Dying Traumland I Want You |
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Curses & Invocations (1997, 50.28) ****/TTTTT |
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| Dysangelium What More I Have to Pay Cities of Towers Ordeal Gehenna Arrival of the Traveller Herald Mooning Around the Mill Hill |
N.T.F.B.Y. The One You Fear and Hate Crossing |
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Stimmung (1998, 50.12) ***½/TT½ |
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| Intro (We Want) a Peaceful Village Kankweezler Stimmung Sonnermensch Moon in Cancer Dark Satanic Mill In My Time of Dying |
Yellow Cave Woman I Won't Start Another Song |
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...E Tu Vivrai Nel Terrore (1998, 9.17) ****/TTT[Standarte contribute]Necropolis incl.Verso l'Ignoto |
Current availability:
Standarte fall fairly and squarely into organ-driven hard rock/prog territory, being vaguely akin to America's Bigelf, or, historically speaking, Atomic Rooster. Having not released anything for five years at the time of writing, I rather suspect that they're no more; their website is full of dead links, and I can't trace any current information about them anywhere. It would be easy to criticise the band for their considerable lack of originality, but that would be to rather miss the point; they obviously idolise early-'70s British hard rock, and don't care who knows it. The whole purpose of their existence is/was to recreate an era they love, which makes them ideologically identical to a million '60s-influenced outfits, just less fashionable. And as for '80s revivalists, let's just not go there...
Standarte is a solid enough debut, although it rarely transcends its influences, to be brutally honest; the songs aren't at all bad, but I keep spotting stolen riffs, which can be slightly disconcerting. Strangely, Michele Profeti's Mellotron use tails off as the album progresses. The first sound you hear is 'Tron strings on Dream Love Sequences, with flutes on One Strange December Evening and Beat Pimp Muzak, but a couple of the marked tracks only have a few seconds of The Beast under their spoken intros (there seems to be some sort of storyline running through the album). Sparse choirs on A War Is Declared and a few seconds of cello, and that seems to be it. Oh, and while In My Time Of Dying has the same lyrics as Led Zeppelin's version of the old blues standard, the tune is completely different.
Three years passed before their follow-up, Curses & Invocations, and it was immediately obvious that although the style remained the same, the songwriting had improved no end. The band chose to cover Gracious!'s Return Of The Traveller from This is... Gracious!, but otherwise stuck to their own material. Profeti's Mellotron use here is better and far more varied than on their debut; Dysangelium opens with a fantastic string part, and what I take to be solo trumpet starts What More I Have To Pay off nicely. There's ridiculously heavy 'Tron on Ordeal, with female voices, flutes and strings all vying for attention, not to mention the almost overpowering strings on Gehenna. Actually, the album's a complete Mellotron monster, with at least half the tracks featuring it as, essentially, a lead instrument. The music's good, but the 'Tron's fantastic. Buy.
In retrospect, it looks like the band were already starting to wind down on Stimmung, as half its tracks are live, including another (and slightly unnecessary) version of In My Time Of Dying. The studio tracks (1-5) tend to be better, with less jamming, but I suppose that's only one man's opinion. After Curses & Invocations, Profeti obviously decided to cut back a little on his 'Tron use, and it's not just because of the live tracks, as he used it onstage. Intro has (male?) choir, (We Want) A Peaceful Village has a short burst of strings, and Kankweezler is effectively based on a 'Tron flute riff, but the most major use on the album is the first live track, the instrumental Moon In Cancer, with an excellent strings part opening the song.
Well, Curses & Invocations is by far and away their best 'Tron album, and the material sounds superior to my ears, too, but their first and third releases are still worth the effort on both fronts. It appears, by the way, that the band has essentially morphed into psych monsters London Underground, so no more Standarte. Pity. Incidentally, the band recorded one track for Black Widow's 1998 ...E Tu Vivrai Nel Terrore set, Necropolis incl.Verso l'Ignoto, including plenty of decent string, flute and choir work. Hear it.
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Citadel (1977, 39.15) ***½/TShine on BrightlyShadows of Song Can't Think Twice Wings of White Evening Wind Change in Time Could This Be Love Why Have They Gone |
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Champaign, Illinois outfit Starcastle were one of the handful of US progressives to get a 'proper' deal (Epic in this case), and actually managed to release four albums in their lifetime. Starcastle (****) and Fountains of Light (****) were both good, in a 'complete Yes copyist' kind of way, although by Citadel the cracks were just beginning to show, with more, and shorter tracks, although their overall style hadn't changed that much. Their multi-layered harmonies sound like a cross between Yes and their Champaign colleagues REO Speedwagon, on whose first album singer Terry Luttrell appeared, and the guitars lack Steve Howe's quirky individuality, but other than that, read 'Yes-lite' for a pretty accurate description of their sound.
Keyboard man Herb Schildt is credited specifically with Mellotron here, although there's definitely none to be heard on their first two albums. For that matter, there's not that much here, either, with nowt but a smattering of background choir on Evening Wind, and only a fraction more on Why Have They Gone. So, a good, if not great, album, but don't even bother for the 'Tron.
WARNING! Avoid like the plague Starcastle's fourth 'effort', Real to Reel (**). This is absolutely appalling AOR, with only closing track When The Sun Shines At Midnight being anything less than utterly offensive. File under 'shite'.
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Old (2003, 39.08) ***/T½UnderneathMajor Awards Loved Ones Passengers Lights on New Wife, New Life Old Kissing Song Unbelievers First Heart Attack |
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Starflyer 59 get reviewed on Christian music websites, but unlike the other dreck I've seen described as 'Christian music', Old is a perfectly acceptable, if rather unexciting album of indie-flavoured middle-ground rock, although its averageness wears the discerning listener down after a while. The quality of the material varies somewhat, with closer First Heart Attack being a highlight, but there's nothing here that made me want to reach for the 'off' button, which has to be a bonus.
Although Richard Swift is credited with Mellotron, the male voices on opener Underneath sound more like Chamberlin to me, while the strings on Major Awards could be either, although the strings on Passengers are either real or good samples. The title track's flutes are definitely 'Tron, with more of those voices on First Heart Attack, and while other tracks could possibly have some 'Tron input (notably Unbelievers), they're more likely to be synths or samples.
So; a Christian Rock album that treats the music as at least as important as the lyrics. Result! Not a classic, but quite listenable, with a smattering of alleged Mellotron.
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Gate to Celdan (1998, 42.52) ***½/T½Dance of the TrollsFly Into the Rainbow Time Traveller Vengeance The Rite Celdan (the World of Colours) Certain Friends |
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It seems Gate to Celdan is actually Starglow Energy's fifth album, including a live release, which is a fair bit for a band so little known. Going by this album, their sound is a Uriah Heep-ish early-'70s style hard rock with a progressive feel in places; extremely retro, anyway, with plenty of Hammond solos and other period touches, not least the opening minute-long drum solo (!). It's not bad, and sounds authentically 'old', but... Maybe I need to play this some more, but like so many other bands who try to do this style (with the honourable exception of Spiritual Beggars), it doesn't really capture what made Heep et al. so great; maybe it's the songs? Anyway, this is OK, without being particularly outstanding.
According to the Black Rills site, the (borrowed) Mellotron used on Gate to Celdan was the same one used one Kedama's sole album, a good twenty years earlier. It's played here by Luky Bosshardt, although only on the 'side-long' Celdan (The World Of Colours), a partially jammed-out epic, fairly heavy on the strings. Amusingly, the band opted to fill the near-five minute gap before the unlisted Certain Friends with 'end of LP' noise, with the needle clicking in the runout groove. Very good, chaps, especially as the 'needle' goes 'back down' before track 7... Ironically, said bonus track is possibly the best thing here, so I've no idea why they've tried to hide its light under a bushel, especially since its title is clearly easily available (well, I found it).
So; an average-ish retro-style release, with one OK 'Tron track. Good, but not that good. Given the lack of an official website, and no information about subsequent releases, I think it's safe to assume the band have split up, which is a shame, particularly now that their retro approach has entered the mainstream. Bad timing, boys.
