Sea Train
I hadn’t heard of this band or album until I spotted a review in Melody Maker and had a listen after spotting two things that led me to include it here: this was George Martin’s first album as a producer after the break up of the Beatles, and lead vocals and guitar are by the great Peter Rowan, who’d just joined. Both Rowan and fiddler RIchard Greene had spent time with Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Boys, but you wouldn’t know it from this album until side two. I think the US release date was December 1970 with a UK release in early 1971.
It kicks off with Lowell George’s Willin’ and maintains a high standard of playing thereafter, but the second track Book of Job is a six minute retelling of that story with a country/soul/funk arrangement punctuated with yodelling. In the best possible way, I haven’t heard anything quite like this out of the US in the whole of this year.
Having said that, I don’t know if I like this enough to buy a copy (it’s easily available on Discogs). While the playing is of a high standard, as is the production, of course, and it can be pleasantly quirky when it wants to be, not all of the songs are up to the same standard, and the religious imagery becomes tiring. On the other hand, the final tracks, a work out of Oh My Love and Sally Goodin followed, a track later, by Orange Blossom Special takes it into territory much more to my liking.
It isn’t on Spotify, as far as I can see, but it’s all on YouTube, where I listened to it.
Recent Comments