40 Year Itch: I Hear A Symphony

                       

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    Canterbury art rockers Caravan follow-up one of their finest albums, 1973's For Girls Who Grow Plump in the Night, with this live set recorded with the 39-piece New Symphonia Orchestra. Hey, it worked for Procol Harum (whose live album with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra was their top seller) and Deep Purple ( 1969's Concerto For Group and Orchestra). The Caravan offering doesn't have as many fans but I think it's a treat, especially on the longer tracks like "For Richard" from 1969's If I Could Do It All Over Again, I'd Do It All Over You. A remastered version is longer and much better recorded.

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These Italian prog rockers/ jazz fusionists sported both the softest and most melodic tunes in progressive rock and one of the fastest drummers ever on record : the perfectly named Furio Chirico.

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 Check out the track "Positivo/Negativo" and you too will be wondering why this album is out of print.

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Having broken worldwide with their novelty number "Hocus Pocus", these Dutch masters of progressive rock get serious again and produce the fan favorite Hamburger Concerto. It's a little surprising that a band with a recently inducted guitar god (in Jan Akkerman)  has recorded an album so dominated by keyboardist (Thijs Van  Leer). A grower that requires patience and appreciation.

40 Year Itch: Focus Plays The Rainbow Theatre

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   By 1973, "the Dutch masters of progressive rock", Focus had hit their peak. Sire Records claimed, thanks to the top ten hit single "Hocus Pocus" and the Top 40 albums Moving Waves and Focus 3,  "everyone is getting into Focus". Maybe they had a point. In the UK, live shows were greeted with standing ovations. Melody Maker  voted Jan Akkerman "Best Guitarist in the World", beating Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page.
   On May 5 the Pye Mobile Recording Studio recorded Focus in concert for two nights at London's Rainbow Theatre. The band played no new songs but as Akkerman pointed out to NME:

"Every night is different...it's actually like building a new word or a new language out of the words you know...if people have heard us four or five nights, it's all right. Because they still hear new things."

  Fans of "Hocus Pocus" certainly heard something new. The tune begins in a herky jerky style that anticipates Gang of Four before it's played at more than twice its normal speed. Still, 40 years later, I just can't relate to Focus. Too many of their tunes sounds like TV themes to me. Maybe it's my fault.




 Released in October, At The Rainbow only peaked at 135 in the US ( 23 in the UK). There would be two more Focus albums ( including 1974's classic Hamburger Concerto) before Akkerman and the boys split up.

40 Year Itch: Focus III

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The greatest things Dutch guitar god Jan Akkerman ever did wasn't with Focus. It was refusing to play with Sting "because I didn't like his music".

Anyway, Focus followed up their international prog metal yodeling classic "Hocus Pocus" with this double album, Focus III, released in November of 1972. The yodeling is kept to a minimum tho I think you can hear some hints of operatic singing about two minutes into  "Sylvia", a major hit everywhere but in the US. To my ears this sounds like a really bad TV theme. An adventure show starring a lifeguard and his pet chimp. "Surf Chimp" I think we'll call it. Starring Jan Michael Vincent.