Felt "Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty" (1982)

Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty [debut]
release date: Feb. 27, 1982
format: cd (2003 reissue - CDMRED 25)
[album rate: 3 / 5] [3,10]
producer: John A. Rivers [recording engineer]
label: Cherry Red Records - nationality: England, UK

Tracklist: 1. "Evergreen Dazed" - 2. "Fortune" - 3. "Birdmen" - 4. "Cathedral" - 5. "I Worship the Sun" - 6. "Templeroy"

Studio debut album by Felt reissued in 2003 also on Cherry Red. The album credits only mention John A. Rivers as recording engineer but (producer) John Leckie also worked with the band in the studio, however, he is uncredited, and the role of a producer remains a bit of a mystery. The cover feature the founder and musical leader of the band, who was always only credited as simply Lawrence [aka Lawrence Hayward, birth name]. Somehow, everywhere you look for a style characterization of this album you meet the tag post-punk. I find this very difficult as the style is much more folk rock-based but with a brand new approach. That could then be referred to as jangle pop, which tracks this back to origins in the 1960s folk pop AND a mix with a certified fascination / inspiration in music by the American art rock art punk band Television as heard on Marquee (1977). Also, the band name Felt apparently derives from the song "Venus" from that specific album and upon listening to this song it's quite striking how close the music by Felt (on later albums) comes to the style of that particular song, or at least "Cathedral". The band is, however, far from just a copy of another band. Felt has a unique style of its very own, and here, as on their first three albums, they produce very simple, light, and repetitious compositions without much focus on lyrical framework. The album is perhaps mostly for fans and completionists but it truly signals the start of a very original journey led by Lawrence.
[ allmusic.com 3,5 / 5 stars ]

Felt

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Felt is a British band formed in the 1979 in Birmingham, England, UK, and it was founded almost single-handedly by Lawrence Hayward (vocals, guitar), who initiated the band as a solo-project, and around 1980 established it as a proper band with Maurice Deebank (guitar) and Nick Gilbert (drums). The initial style was heavily based on Deebank's guitar sound with a clear inspiration in The Byrds jangle folk rock and Lawrence's maybe biggest lyrical source of inspiration: Television / Tom Verlaine (the name Felt apparently comes from the song "Venus" by Television and written by Tom Verlaine). Gilbert switched to handle the bass as the band had Gary Ainge playing drums, and this was the members list when they signed with Cherry Red Records and recorded their first single in '81, and also for the debut album Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty (1982). Shortly after the first full album, Gilbert was replaced by bassist Mick Lloyd, and with this line-up they released the following two albums The Splendour of Fear (Feb. '84), and The Strange Idols Pattern and Other Short Stories (Oct. '84). Before recording their fourth studio and last album for Cherry Red, Ignite the Seven Cannons (1985), Lloyd was replaced by Marco Thomas and keyboardist Martin Duffy became a new member. His role soon became central, as his Hammond organ would characterize the band's sound for the next three albums to follow. After their '85 album, Deebank left the band, which only made even more room for Duffy's keyboard but also meant a turn to a new and more simple style within their jangle pop and in '86 they signed with Creation Records and released the instrumental fifth album Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads to Death (Jun. '86) and the longer and more traditional jangle pop, pop / rock album Forever Breathes the Lonely Word (Sep. '86), which is their perhaps best received album ever. In '87 they released the ep Poem of the River, and the following year the eigth album The Pictorial Jackson Review (Mar. '88), which is a somewhat special mix of styles. On the A-side of the album, one will find a bunch of recognizable Felt tracks with uptempo pop / rock and jangle pop and the B-side is dominated by an ambient jazz pop instrumental style, which really tell much of the story of this band: on one hand you have a band playing harmonic jangle pop that may appeal to a broader audience but at the same time, they also embrace a certain experimental ascetic originality that one may find in artists like David Sylvian, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and early Everything but the Girl. The ninth album Train Above the City (Jul. '88) is the only Felt album not to include band leader Lawrence on the musical part, as he only titled the tracks composed and played by Duffy and Ainge only, which makes it difficult to accept as a Felt album. The following year, Lawrence declared that the band would only release one more album to fulfill his [original?] idea of releasing a total of 10 albums and 10 singles in the span of a 10 year period [which may or may not be correct depending on how one counts their releases]. After the release of Me and a Monkey on the Moon (Nov. '89) on the indie label él (sub-label of Cherry Red) followed by a short tour, Felt disbanded. Lawrence continued in his glam rock [!] project-band Denim [releasing two full albums], which led him to a collaboration work with Terry Miles. When Denim was shelved in '99, the two formed the band Go-Kart Mozart.

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Leonard Cohen "Songs of Leonard Cohen" (1967)

Songs of Leonard Cohen [debut]
release date: Dec. 27, 1967
format: cd (2011 reissue)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [4,02]
producer: John Simon
label: Columbia / Legacy - nationality: Canada

Tracklist: 1. "Suzanne" (5 / 5) - 2. "Master Song" - 3. "Winter Lady" - 4. "The Stranger Song" - 5. "Sisters of Mercy" (4 / 5) - 6. "So Long, Marianne" (5 / 5) - 7. "Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye" (4 / 5) - 8. "Stories of the Street" - 9. "Teachers" - 10. "One of Us Cannot Be Wrong"

Studio debut album by Canadian singer / songwriter Leonard Norman Cohen originally released on Columbia Records. All songs are written by Cohen, and the style is unmistakably his with the minimalist instrumentation, the focus on lyrical content and the distinct narrating vocal.
The album became a considerable success and one that should only be surpassed in his heydays in the 1980s. The album is naturally enlisted in "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die".

[ allmusic.com 5 / 5, Rolling Stone 4,5 / 5, Uncut, Q Magazine 4 / 5 stars ]

Elvis Costello and the Attractions - Live at Rockpalast, June 15,1978

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5

Bruce Springsteen "The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle" (1973)

The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle
release date: Sep. 11, 1973
format: cd (2010 reissue)
[album rate: 3 / 5] [3,14]
producer: Mike Appel, Jim Cretecos
label: Columbia / Sony Music - nationality: USA

Track highlights: 2. "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" - 5. "Incident on 57th Street" - 6. "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)"

2nd studio album by Bruce Springsteen originally released on Columbia Records, 8 months after his debut from Jan. 1973. Stylistically, this continues much in the same melting pot of r&b, folk and singer / songwriter tradition as the debut. It's still The Band, Dylan, Morrison, Cohen and Waits one comes to think of as close sources to many of the songs. "4th of July, Ashbury Park (Sandy)" and "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" stand out as quite original material, but much of the remaining material doesn't live up to the same standard. "Kitty's Back" is a dreadful jazz fusion composition, and other songs drown and disappear in looong arrangements without distinct direction because there need to be a part for the sax, the organ, the piano and... (perhaps inspired by Morrison's great Astral Weeks and Saint Dominic's Preview?).
After listening to his first two albums, it's evident that Springsteen is a strong songwriting talent, and it could have been a truly great debut had he come up with the best tracks from both and only released one album in '73.
[ allmusic.com, Rolling Stone 5 / 5, Q Magazine 4 / 5 stars ]

Jethro Tull "Benefit" (1970)

Benefit
release date: Apr. 1970
format: digital
[album rate: 3 / 5]
producer: Ian Anderson
label: Chrysalis - nationality: England, UK

Track highlights: 1. "With You There to Help Me" (3,5 / 5) - 5. "For Michael Collins, Jeffrey and Me" (3,5 / 5) - 6. "To Cry You a Song" (3,5 / 5)

3rd studio album by Jethro Tull shows how the band quickly was lead by Ian Anderson who has written all compositions and also produced the album. The credit list reflects that the members list remain unchanged but keyboardist John Evan, who is credited as additional personnel, would soon become a fifth official member of the band. The music has taken a distinct turn to their trademark of progressive rock blended with hard rock and folk, and no longer shares bonds to blues rock, r&b, or psychedelic rock for that matter. Although, my older brother had the album back in the '70s, I didn't really know the album until around the 1990s, and although, I find it an anachronism, I also understand the popularity the band gained with this their first major album. It went as high as to number #3 on the UK albums chart list.
[ allmusic.com 4 / 5 stars ]