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Tuesday, October 21, 2008

HATFIELD AND THE NORTH



HATFIELD AND THE NORTH
THE ROTTER'S CLUB (1975)
320 KBPS

Hatfield and the North were one of the very few bands that understood how to fuse Rock and Jazz, not just to show off playing ability (which is demonstrably excellent on this disc), but also to experiment with song structure, lyrical games and complex rhythmic soundscapes. No endless masturbatory sequences here. It's all sewn up very nicely. More a patchwork quilt than a stained duvet.
One might even say there's a pop sensibility in here, but that's such a hackneyed description that it would probably discourage the audience that would get the biggest blast from this excellent album. Still, there are proper 'songs' which - in a parallel universe - might have been hit singles, like 'Share it'. There are also extended, rhapsodic instrumentals which make up the bulk of it.
The sound is reminiscent of early Gong - minus the druggy zaniness - or Hillage's 'Fish Rising' (there are band members in common in both cases). Arguably it's Hatfield's Dave Stewart that makes 'Fish Rising' as good as it is, and many people have mistaken his fuzztone organ - also well in evidence on 'The Rotter's Club' - for Hillage's own instrument.
Dave Stewart (NOT the tiresome Eurythmic beardy weirdy) is the keyboard player's keyboard player. Highly technically skilled, but with a sense of absurdity, chaos and space. Pip Pyle's drumming is effervescent and seemingly effortless. Phil Miller knows how to make his lead guitar lines enhance, rather than dominate, the proceedings - the kind of humility we've been led not to expect from guitarists. It's all carefully balanced, with a handful of guest musicians from Henry Cow, Egg and other places scattered about for special effect. The 'Northettes' are sublime sirens as usual. Stop your ears with wax, or they will surely lure you to the rock.
'The Rotter's Club' has light and shade by the bucketful. It's an intensely rich and often humorous listening experience. Not least because of the hilarious song titles, and witty lyrics. I also appreciate Richard Sinclair singing in an unaffected British accent.
I'd go so far as to say this is not only one of the best Jazz Rock albums ever - the one by which all others should be judged - but also one of the best slices of that finer kind of Progressive Rock which did not get obsessed with equipment machismo and cosmic on-stage pretentiousness, and which should have given the genre a good name. Alas punk journalism needed - and still needs - to see its villains as an undifferentiated mass.
Nobody did it better, before or since, and the relative obscurity of this item (compared to - say - any of Mike Oldfield's offerings from the same period) will ensure that it retains its own internal musical meaningfulness for a long time. Buy now, or any time in the next five hundred years. (But consider the starving artists - still alive today - who sweated and strained to produce a masterpiece like this).

1. Share It
2. Lounging There Trying
3. (Big) John Wayne Socks Psychology On The Jaw
4. Chaos At The Greasy Spoon
5. The Yes No Interlude
6. Fitter Stoke Has A Bath
7. Didn't Matter Anyway
8. Underdub
9. Mumps
BONUS
10. (Big) John Wayne Socks Psychology On The Jaw
11. Chaos At The Greasy Spoon
12. Halfway Between Heaven And Earth
13. Oh, Len's Nature!
14. Lying And Gracing



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