Been listening to the Repertoire cd of this album tonight,what a great sound it is!!And what a good album!!A scottish group as well!!
This album is one fine prog album awash with mellotron,organ,guitars and good vocals.
My picks are:
Time Machine-Kicks of the album in fine style with to my ears is a psych/prog crossover number,good mellotron used to fine affect along with some fabby organ,8 minutes of fine sounds.
Lament-Beggars Opera showing their Scottish side with this organ dominated piece of instrumental Scottish music!!
Nimbus-A trully atmospheric instrumental,real mellowed out piece of music,the drums are used to great affect and great use of an echoed guitar being main features along with floaty mellotron and organ,this is my fave track on the album....love it!!!
Silver Peacock-A true masterclass of prog,good vocals,awash with keyboards and this has a slight classical influence which harks back to the debut "Act One",6 and a half minutes of twists and turns but stays melodic too,i just love the guitar solo on this in there with the washed out mellotron accompanied by swirling organ being played in style.
Impromptu-Another short instrumental with nice acoustic guitar stringing along the dour oboe which i think is being played.
The Fox-The last track on the album and quite a long one at just under 7 minutes,the plaudits go to the organ playing along with the guitar as both play off each other splendidly,again twists and turns abound,leaving you wondering were its leading you.....but oh what do we meet ..the mellotron,i just cant get enough of that big cumbersome machine,love the sound it makes.
I must add the vocals by Ricky Gardiner are good all the way though,but the Mellotron is used a fair bit on this album,played by Virginia Scott,great to hear an album where its used a fair bit.........i have left 2 tracks out as im a lazy bugger,which are "I've no Idea"and"Festival"not bad tracks but not amongst my faves,i'll probably come round once ive played this cd a bit more.
Any other folks enjoy this album??Or have another fave album by Beggars Opera??
Personally Stuart I prefer the first album-Act One and the third album-Pathfinder. Not that I don't like Waters Of Change. I still have my trusty vinyl copies but I also have a double cd comp called Nimbus-The Vertigo Years Anthology.
It contains all the tracks from the first three albums, both sides of the non lp single and four tracks from the not so good album Get Your Dog Off Me.