bass with a French loaf and Dave Mattacks on washboard, the song leapt to the dizzy heights of Number 21 in the British charts, their only hit. ‘We were,’ mused Hutchings, ‘very impetuous in those days, very sparky. There was certainly a feeling of experimentation, great energy then.’
Unhalfbricking played a crucial role in the Fairport story, marking the arrival of Dave Swarbrick on fiddle and the first hint of their epochal step into serious folk music territory. It was also the album they’d just finished when drummer Martin Lamble was killed on the M1 in May ’69 as roadie Harvey Branham drove their transit van near Scratchwood Services on the way back from a gig in Birmingham. The band were still in shock when the album was compiled by Boyd and released, and they almost split completely. Eventually they opted to regroup with Swarbrick as a full-time member and Dave Mattacks as drummer. (It was this line-up that cut Liege & Lief.)
Unhalfbricking stands as a folk rock benchmark; Thompson believes it’s better than its more celebrated successor. While there was a real sense of fun about the Cajun influence of Million Dollar Bash, Cajun Woman and If You Gotta Go (which they translated into French), Thompson weighed in with a dramatic composition which provided a signpost to his songwriting future, Genesis Hall, and singer Sandy Denny contributed her greatest song, Who Knows Where The Time Goes? But most profound of all was their epic arrangement of A Sailor’s Life. ‘Sandy used to sing Scots ballads in the bus or dressing room, and that’s really what got them intrigued by British traditional music,’ explains producer and manager Joe Boyd. ‘She specifically played them A Sailor’s Life, which she used to do in the clubs. I went to see them in Bristol and heard them do it for the first time and it was wonderful. How do you put a rock’n’roll attitude to a traditional ballad? There it is.’
Procol Harum
A Salty Dog
Procol Harum remain a greatly undervalued band, and this was undoubtedly their finest hour.
Record label: Regal Zonophone
Produced: Matthew Fisher
Recorded: Abbey Road, London; January–February 1969
Released: July 1969
Chart peaks: 27 (UK) 32 (US)
Personnel: Gary Brooker (p, v, hm, celeste, recorder); Matthew Fisher (o, g, marimba, recorder); Dave Knights (b); Barrie Wilson (d, pc); Robin Trower (g, tambourine); Kellogs (bosun’s whistle); Ken Scott; Ian Stuart, Henry Lewy (e)
Track listing: A Salty Dog (S/UK); The Milk Of Human Kindness; Too Much Between Us; The Devil Came From Kansas (S/US); Boredom; Juicy John Pink; Wreck Of The Hesperus; All This And More; Crucifiction Lane; Pilgrim’s Progress
Running time: 43.07
Current CD: Westside WESM534 adds; Long Gone Geek; All This And More (alternate take); The Milk Of Human Kindness (alternate take); Pilgrim’s Progress (alternate take); McGregor; Still There’ll Be More (alternate take)
Further listening: Procol Harum: 30th Anniversary Collection (1997). For the excellent later incarnation of the band seek out the mighty Grand Hotel (1973), a real forgotten gem
Further reading: Procol Harum: Beyond The Pale (Claes Johansen, 2000); www.procolharum.com
Download: Not currently legally available
For most people, the story of Procol Harum began, and ended, with Whiter Shade Of Pale. After that one era-defining single, the band simply skipped the light fandango right out of the frame. But that, as with so many rock’n’roll clichés, is only half the picture. Procol Harum actually went on to record a further 10 albums, and this, their third, is generally regarded among fans as their best.
A Salty Dog was their fourth single, released in June 1969 – a swirling, Gothic epic, drenched in salt spray, it was progressive rock at its very best, Procol Harum in excelsis. The subsequent album built on the band’s strengths – Trower’s guitar flowed freely (he was yet to be subsumed by his Hendrix infatuation); Brooker had rarely sung better; Fisher’s production was ’69 rock in Cinerama; and Barrie Wilson’s thunderous drumming (he was Jimmy Page’s original choice for the Led Zeppelin drumstool) underpinned the whole album. As well as the title track, the music was ambitious on Matthew Fisher’s epic Pilgrim’s Progress and Wreck Of The Hesperus. They got all heavy on The Devil Came From Kansas, folky on Milk Of Human Kindness, and slipped into a Latin rumba groove on Boredom; while All This And More took Procol Harum into a stratospheric place all of its own.
The 1999 reissue added the single’s B-side – the robust Long Gone Geek – which found Procol trying to sound like the Small Faces; some outtakes; and a real gem, in the shape of the only existing take of McGregor.
In its day, A Salty Dog received respectful reviews, and helped cement Procol’s position as critics’ favourites – particularly in America where they toured pretty much non-stop during the late ’60s; but increasing apathy at home led to their split in 1977. Posthumously, Procol Harum began to receive the respect they had always deserved. Latterly, A Salty Dog has been covered by Marc Almond and, ahem, Sarah Brightman; while Pete Townshend and Brian May have testified to Procol’s influence on The Who and Queen. Unfortunately, in the aftermath of A Salty Dog, the band let slip the one gig that could really have lifted them up another notch: by declining to appear at a rock festival in upstate New York – reputedly because the Trower family had already booked their summer holidays – Procol Harum missed out on Woodstock.
Jethro Tull
Stand Up
Featured a pop-up likeness of the group in the gatefold. Sadly, a marketing wheeze that never caught on.
Record label: Island (UK) Reprise (US)
Produced: Terry Ellis and Ian Anderson
Recorded: Morgan Studio, London; April 1969
Released: August 1, 1969
Chart peaks: 1 (UK) 20 (US)
Personnel: Ian Anderson (v, g, flute, k, mandolin, balalaika, hm); Martin Barre (g, flute); Glen Cornick (b); Clive Bunker (d, pc); Andy Johns (e)
Track listing: A New Day Yesterday; Jeffrey Goes To Leicester Square; Bouree; Back To The Family; Look Into The Sun; Nothing Is Easy; Fat Man; We Used To Know; Reasons For Waiting; For A Thousand Mothers
Running time: 38.18
Current CD: Chrysalis 5354582 adds: Living In The Past; Driving Song; Sweet Dream; 17
Further listening: Aqualung (1971); LP/singles compilation, Living In The Past (1972)
Further reading: Flying Colours: The Jethro Tull Reference Manual (Greg Russo, 2000); www.jethrotull.com
Download: iTunes; HMV Digital
There was a time when Jethro Tull were kings of the British rock underground. Hard to imagine, perhaps, given the perception of many that they’re purveyors of music-hall buffoonery in monstrously unfashionable clothing, but they came second only to The Beatles in the Melody Maker poll of 1969, streets ahead of more conventionally swaggering rock behemoths like Led Zeppelin or The Who. Having worked their way up by constant gigging and a reputation founded largely on Ian Anderson’s uniquely charismatic and eccentric stage persona (shabby raincoat, hair, flute, standing on one leg), Tull would enjoy a good two or three years as rock aristocracy before slipping gently down to a more sustainable level. As Anderson was quick to realise, being ‘top of the second division’ has its advantages, not least in longevity. Thirty years later the Tull brand would still be shifting