Van Der Graaf Generator [Still Life] This phenomenal album just sits outside my all time top 20 discs at 21, this along with its VDGG companion 'World Record' [played almost one year ago today 2nd January 2010], shaped my love of Album Orientated Rock [AOR], back in the early eighties, i would travel into London each month, and sift through the racks of vinyl, and pick out roughly a dozen records to buy, and then slowly one by one put each one back until i had three left [because of financial restraints], and then i would buy them, most of the time i wouldn't have a clue as to what the music sounded like, i would pull out albums based on their cover, and their track titles / lengths, and on Bands / Artists back catalogue, in my time i bought some real duds!, but then i bought sublime albums like this, which i wouldn't have discovered in any other way.
Van Der Graaf Generator were originally formed in 1967, and then broke up and reformed, and broke up and reformed... it's this middle period which was their purple patch for me, it spawned three albums, and they got better and better, this is the middle album in that trilogy, recorded in 1976, they weren't a singles band, they never planned on cracking the top 20, therefore most of their songs had no time limits on them, and tracks could clock in at over 20 minutes [Meurglys III], but most tracks hit the roughly 7 or 8 minute mark, this album represents their classic line up,
Peter Hammill - Vocals / Guitar
David Jackson - Saxophones / Flute
Hugh Banton - Organ / Keyboards
Guy Evans - Drums / Percussion
a strange set up of a band, the inclusion of a Saxophonist as a leading member at the front is rare in a Rock band, this isn't Jazz, and it isn't for a solo intro on 'Baker Street', now David Jackson has departed the band, and they continue as a trio.
All of the tracks were a revelation to me as i listened to them all again, but if i were to pick out an especial highlight, it would be the closer 'Childlike Faith In Childhood's End', a 12 minute plus track, its words are about reincarnation and the cosmos!, a real complex piece, full of different tunes and time signatures, but all the different parts are welded into one organic whole, i notice more than ever through this piece, how David Jackson uses different saxophones for different colourings, and the flute too, five minutes in it goes quiet, Peter Hammill sings quietly with only Hugh Banton's organ gently playing [5:08-6:33], but the music slowly rises to a crescendo, and then comes the very best part, Hammill sings,
though the towers of the city
are denied to we men of clay
still we know we shall scale the heights some day [6:37-6:53]
a truly powerful moment, powerful in singing as well as in the sheer power of the words, like an unconquerable mountain, that you know one day you will be able to defeat, the last 3 minutes are a recap of the music that has gone before, but this time coming back with a powerful conclusion [9:37-12:24], and it's the last minute that has a certain 'coda' to it, Hammill again sings quiet with just organ accompaniment [11:32+], 'and though dark is the highway...', Prog Rock is certainly operatic here [especially Hammill's voice], but VDGG go so far beyond Pop music into another realm, this song is a work of art, and i never tire of listening to it.
Here's Van Der Graaf Generator playing 'Childlike Faith In Childhood's End' on YouTube.
